The human body was the core of the inspiration since the cave man. It inspired him to draw the first ever hand made drawings, and it remained the same through out all the art periods and the history of creativity overall. The graphic shapes inspired by the human figures are full of grace, dynamics and sophistication and they offer a lot of expression approaches. So the art itself found it’s place in the graphic design niche as well, and the element of the body and movement offered a nice base for incredible logo solutions to. We meet them around all the time and some of them are really underrated knowing how hard it really is to achieve an high quality standard when replicating such a complex form. And as in every technique we talked about so far, the wide range from really simple all over to the super complex forms can be found and analyzed. Sometimes those logos offer the direct movement and strength messages but sometimes they are used to describe the subtle character aspects of the figures. Since we are involved in every aspect of human actions and behavior there is no boundaries when it comes to usage of this illustrative technique and designers love to reach out for the logo solutions inspired by the people.

There is an popular beverage TV commercial at the moment that is based on that ‘People who said NO to…’ concept, so we can transfer that idea on this article and name it ‘People who said NO to only 2 dimensions!’. And those people are logo designers who decided to go over the edge and use all available vector tools to welcome us in the 3D world. Now there are many techniques of how to achieve this style, as you will see through the featured examples, but all of them have the same goal – to provide an unforgettable experience of almost being able to touch or feel these visual solutions. Elements being visualized can be subjects, beings, space around us or even something virtual and abstract that is inspired by something else. But as complex as it might seem, after some practice with the most common software tools the one can discover the spectrum of endless possibilities. The technology barrier between print and screen media is getting thinner every day and that allows these logos to be applied on almost anything – having the 3D logo really working in the 2D world was only a dream just a few years ago.

If there is any style of the logo design that will make your head spin, but this time literally, that would be the ambigram form. By definition easily found on internet, an ambigram is a typographical design or art form that may be read as one or more words not only in it’s form as presented, but also from another viewpoint, direction, or orientation. So that means that you always get an extra bonus with these creations through an really exciting experience. Playing with optical illusions, symmetry and visual perception you can design one of the 12 main forms of ambigrams that don’t necessarily have to be extremely complex. For example, very popular ambigram logos throughout the history were DeLorean Motor Car (the one that made traveling through time possible for Michael J. Fox) or ABBA (extremely popular Swedish pop group). That’s why I decided to show you not quite well known but very interesting solutions that span from super simple to very complex ones. There is also a software that will make your job a lot easier if you decide to make one of these,
but if you want to create an really interesting and original visual ambient with an ambigram, don’t use it but let your creativity burst out!

We all have heard what would the world look like without bees. Those little fragile creatures are extremely important for the whole humanity. And that importance inspired some of the logo designers as well. When it comes to messages and metaphors we probably don’t have enough space to count them all here: from the symbol of hard work and dedication to agility or just being extremely organized. Or if we take another route over the shape of the insect itself that provides us with curved but also sharp edged elements to work with. But also not to forget probably the most inspirational part of a very interesting and powerful yellow and black color combination. But being inspired by the bees, as you will see here, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to directly use the exact shape of that insect or copy the exact color scheme: let your imagination flow and final result can be more then interesting. So next time when you see even the smallest insect around, don’t just squash it but take a moment to explore it fully and let it ’sting’ your senses and creativity.

Trendy or not, there is a lot of film strip inspired logos at the moment. Since graphic designers are very visual people and love to communicate and experience the world around them that way, I bet you that you can’t find a designer that doesn’t like watching movies or browsing through some nice photos in magazines or online. And that’s how we get inspired every day because movies and photos became parts of our everyday life. The media that brings it all to life inspire designers to bring interesting logos to life.
There is something magical about that simple black/white element that combines the worlds of square and curve and forms into interesting shapes while being put into it’s purpose. But logos featured in this article show the endless options if you try to play with it a bit: it can form unnatural shapes, it can come as a fusion with other objects around us and it really doesn’t have to be in black at all! So take a look at this fine examples of well designed logos and once again enter the amazing world of film.

One of the hardest fields of logo design overall is definitely sport teams logos. It takes a lot of creativity, imagination and execution skills to show the messages of power, agility and dynamics. The base of it lays in the team name and different sports treat those names in different ways: some use weather terms, some animals, some use founder’s name and some just a name of the town they hale from. One way or the other, only original and nicely detailed solution will get recognition amongst the fans but also provide an extra feeling of loyalty and power for allthe team members as well. While we all know of many sport team logos, especially the ones that we support (I’ll never forget watching Jordan’s and Pippen’s magnificent play) take a look at this new and maybe less known but nice examples of the subject. One thing is for certain, only a designer that really loves this field can create a nice solution and maybe for a second feel as a sport team member he did it for.

Can you imagine the time when there was no TV, no videos or DVDs, no internet or any other complex on screen media? Well, those times are not so far behind us and large number of designers that did logos only for print and similar media are still very active. But ever since the ’screen communication’ came to life people are trying to make more and more visually impressive logos searching through all the 3 dimensions for a proper way to send out a message. And that progress brought us to internet age where we can meet special visual effects in every corner. Even logo design couldn’t resist this ‘tsunami’ and a lot of new logo design techniques were born. One of the most popular of them is definitely so called ‘transparency effect’ where overlapping graphic elements offer a new dimension for visual stories. Transparent design or not, there’s one more treat for all of you: from now on we will bring you interviews with designers who’s logos we have featured in each article so after you browse through this examples learn more about one of those directly from it’s maker. Enjoy!

The best way to explain my idea here is to look at some definitions of ‘abstract’: thought of apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances (an abstract idea), expressing a quality or characteristic apart from any specific object or instance, difficult to understand, an idea or term considered apart from some material basis or object, to divert or draw away the attention of… These kind of logos are usually followed by question ‘Ahem, excuse me, but, what is this suppose to show?’ the answer is simply ‘Magic!’. It diverts your attention but makes you stare at it and decipher it for hours. And that was the point, to show something that can’t be shown, to express the chaos with the goal of achieving the order.

Time to whip CreativityDen back into shape! Starting off with some amazing logos. I don’t know what it is about identity and branding but I just can’t get enough of these logos. Everyone I see makes me want to boot up illustrator and start drawing. Unfortunately when staring at the screen for 10 minutes I realize the difficulty in brainstorming, preparing, drawing and choosing what colours and typefaces to use.

Dear readers! You have a chance to vote for your Top3 favorite featured logos on Creativity Den! Please add an short explanation next to your list in the comments section and BEST FEATURED LOGO will be announced in 7 days from today (30th Oct 2009 – 5th Nov 2009)! Here’s the list to pick out from.