A few weeks ago, I told you about plans to rework The Logo Factory logo and walked readers through the stupidly exhaustive process of redesigning a logo. After overhauling The Logo Factory house (long overdue) I set about incorporating the icon into a servicable word mark. I thought we were on the right path, but numerous nay-nays in the comments section gave me reason to pause. My daughter’s “Looks like Crazy Earl’s Logo Emporium” comment didn’t help either. We had managed to develop what I though was a funky ‘different’ approach, but many thought the design didn’t work. Like most designers working on their own logo, I just didn’t know and when it comes to criticism of our own stupid logo, my confidence goes right out the window. While I sorta liked it, I wasn’t sold completely. So in this never-ending saga, we’re going to take another stab. Decided to have a another go at the font work, this time using versions of ITC’s Lubalin. Let’s start with a similar setup to the original rework, arcing the word ‘Factory’.

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The argument about speculative work and design contest sites continues unabated as designers and creative types grapple with the most contentious subject in the graphic design industry today. If the ongoing forum and blog arguments weren’t enough, the debate has now moved into the Twitterverse (that’s Twitter talk for people who, ahm, Twitter). First, there’s No!Spec, a grass roots coalition of designers and artists who have been writing about ’spec work’ for several years, but have only recently moved onto the rapidly growing social platform. You can visit their website here. Follow No!Spec on Twitter here.

Another interesting addition to the kerfluffle is Spec Watch, an offshoot initiative that delivers sporadic “design contest & crowdsourcing” bulletins through their Twitter page. Spec Watch doesn’t have a website per se, other than a home, propaganda and a “why?”page which describes their mission - some weird Twitter driven strategy that may, or may not, get their ‘message’ out (Spec Watch ‘tweets’ lead back to more fleshed out examples that illustrate that design contests might not be as rosy as some might like us to believe). As cool as that is, not sure how effective this Spec Watch will be and a Twitter-only campaign seems rather narrow in focus (for a quck comparison, Spec Watch boasts a total of 365 Twitter followers, No!Spec has 1,100 while Crowdspring has over 4,000 and Australian counterpart 99designs weighs in with just over 3,000 followers in total). In any case, you can follow Spec Watch here. There’s already been some criticism about how ‘unbiased’ Spec Watch is, or isn’t, or whether their campaign is ‘dishonest’ at face. You can join that debate over at David Airey’s always excellent Logo Design Love blog.

While I have to admire their sisyphean pluck, both No!Spec and Spec Watch are challenging a monumental PR campaign that’s seen recent pro-crowdsourcing articles in Business Weekly, Forbes and Wired to name but a few. Might be seen as the digital version of peeing into the wind.

However, I did manage to fit sisyphean into a blog post, and that’s always good for a rainy Tuesday.

For graphic designers, the internet is awash in free information. Some of it good. Some of it, well, not so good. Some information is so valuable, that it’s worth plonking down your hard earned cash for. Take this example. Seems there’s this book out for freelance designers. Called Freelance Dream, it’s available here. Visually, the page looks like every other kooky get-rich-quick scheme on the internet, but this one advertises a freelance design book that promises all sorts of career enhancing knowledge. The web page claims that the book has been featured in Entrepeneur Magazine and offers all sorts of glowing testimonials about how full of awesomeness it really is.

Written by top freelance professionals you say? That certainly sounds interesting. Learn from the best? Why, that would be wonderful. And what freelance designer wouldn’t want to be the best that they could be. Surely, such wisdom would cost hundreds, if not thousands to tap into. No?

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In case you missed it, Facebook opened up ‘vanity’ URLs this weekend. What’s a vanity URL? Simple really. It’s a web address that features your name or internet handle - in terms of Facebook, it ends up being www.Facebook.com/YourName. Vanity URLs are considered prestigious, may have some SEO benefits, and are the internet version of Kilroy Wuz Here. In terms of ‘branding’ it equates to staking out turf on the social media landscape. When it comes to Facebook vanity URLs, there are some restrictions on company, group and fan pages but personal names are pretty well open season.

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As we were messing about with a recent logo rework for The Logo Factory, I decided to add some cog elements into the mix. So, how does one get vector artwork of a perfect cog or gear? I’ve never been a fan of clip art (even for simple graphics) so stock art was out. As I wanted to draw a perfectly flat and symmetrical cog, without too many teeth, tracing photography was out too. Needed to create my own from scratch. How? Here’s a very simple technique that you can use to draw a perfect vector cog, using Illustrator, in under 20 seconds.

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Looks like Apple has a new QuickTime logo. The shiny, chrome 3D design is to replace the gel version that’s been kicking around for a few years, and will represent Apple’s movie player with the QuickTime X (as in ten) release. I suppose this is timed to coincide with the rollout of Apple’s new operating system upgrade, Snow Leopard 10.6. Unlike the hideous MobileMe logo design, this is classic Apple design goodness, and the new version works well within the Cupertino company’s family of icons and logos - arguably the best branding design package around today. The QuickTime logo has been updated regularly, almost with every major update release (below).

As an interesting aside, General Motors came under criticism from some design quarters a couple of years ago when they rolled out their new Goodwrench logo, complete with an aqua gel treatment (below). Many opined that it looked suspiciously like the QuickTime mark and wondered if the now bankrupt car company had borrowed a few tricks from Apple designers. While certainly similar, not sure if it qualified as a ‘rip’ of Apple, though it does look remarkably like the ubiquitous “power on” symbol used on many electronic devices and appliances. The reason I’m mentioning this now is that I wasn’t aware of this ‘controversy’ at all until I poked around the Internet, researching this post.