Designed my first font for a fashion brand logo. How did I do so far?

Cristóbal Alarcón
Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
in Type Design Critiques

Hi Type Drawers community!

I have been afraid of creating logos with customized fonts because, well, they always end up poorly. This time I kinda got out of my comfort zone and decided to do it.

This project it's called Petit Poison (Small Poison). It's a fashion brand, in which she wanted it to have a Baroque style, being really into the Alexander McQUEEN font style (Baskerville), but in a quite modernized style.

It's definitely not done and in need of some refinements. However, since it's my first ever customized font I don't really know what's wrong about it. It feels odd, but I can't quite put my finger where it does.

If you guys can aid me to point out the weak points it would be immensely helpful.





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Comments

  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    Looks cool to me.
    The "e" and especially the "o" seem a bit too light.
    And I would loosen the "ison".
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited November 2019
    I'm kinda new to type design, so bear with me please.
    You mean like the spacing between inlines it's too much compared to the "i", "t" and "n"?
    About the "ison", by loosening you mean the kerning?
  • Craig Eliason
    Craig Eliason Posts: 1,440
    Lines on the straight stems look much closer to each other than those on curves. 
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    edited November 2019
    I mean there's too much white inside the "e" and "o". Alternatively you could make the "i", "t" and "n" more white inside. The "s" is in-between.

    Yes, I would move the letters in "ison" further apart from each other.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Oooh yeah, you are right. That's definitely a weak point.
  • Jasper de Waard
    Jasper de Waard Posts: 641
    edited November 2019
    Glad to see you made it to typedrawers! I'll repeat again:
    1. The thick parts of o, e, s, are much thicker than those of verticals like i and n (edit: hrant already said this).
    2. You need more 'overshoot'. I.e. the round shapes need to dip below the baseline and exceed the x-height a little (more).
    3. I would make the top of n and i identical.
    4. The tittle (dot on the i) needs to be a little bigger, and possibly the line that constructs it a little thinner.

    Good luck!
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited November 2019
    Awesome! Those are definitely good points. I have a concern tho.
    One designer suggested that the type has too many "stops" causing it to not flow easily, causing the eye to jump too much.
    What do you guys think about that?

  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    That sounds pretty fancy...
    But I don't think a (static) logo has to "flow".

    The only hiccup I had was reading "poisson" first. But that double-take could actually be an interesting feature.
  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,901
    Cristóbal Alarcón said:
    Awesome! Those are definitely good points. I have a concern tho.
    One designer suggested that the type has too many "stops" causing it to not flow easily, causing the eye to jump too much.
    What do you guys think about that?

    Not at all true, IMO.
  • Craig Eliason
    Craig Eliason Posts: 1,440
    edited November 2019
    I'm having a hard time working out the patterns of when lines intersect and when they stop short of each other. In P/t/i/n it feels like the whole letter shape is made with continuous lines, and then additional, discontinuous lines are added on the left, almost like a shadow. But e/o/s don't follow that, and the intersection in the middle of P's stem is also unexpected. 
    So maybe the issue was less that there are too many "stops," and more that there is no clear logic to the "stops."
  • Claudio Piccinini
    Claudio Piccinini Posts: 681
    My impression is that there are currently three letter treatment logics going on at once: one on the capital /Ps (triline, also decorated but the latter is not a problem), one on the circular letters (/e /o /s) where there is more "air" between the strokes, and one on the straight/mid letters (/i /n etc.) where the composing vertical strokes are closer one to each other.
    This gives a sense of inconsistency, and distraction. It could also help to introduce some king of "tapering" logic to the various stems, where they end or meet, unless the design is monotonal on purpose.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Craig Eliason said:
    I'm having a hard time working out the patterns of when lines intersect and when they stop short of each other. In P/t/i/n it feels like the whole letter shape is made with continuous lines, and then additional, discontinuous lines are added on the left, almost like a shadow. But e/o/s don't follow that, and the intersection in the middle of P's stem is also unexpected. 
    So maybe the issue was less that there are too many "stops," and more that there is no clear logic to the "stops."
    Hmm. Interesting.
    About the middle intersection of the P being unexpected, is it a positive or negative kind of unexpected?
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited November 2019
    Claudio Piccinini said:
    My impression is that there are currently three letter treatment logics going on at once: one on the capital /Ps (triline, also decorated but the latter is not a problem), one on the circular letters (/e /o /s) where there is more "air" between the strokes, and one on the straight/mid letters (/i /n etc.) where the composing vertical strokes are closer one to each other.
    This gives a sense of inconsistency, and distraction. It could also help to introduce some king of "tapering" logic to the various stems, where they end or meet, unless the design is monotonal on purpose.
    Yeah! About the P I gave it a different treatment on purpose because I wanted capitals (or at least this only capital) to have three lines compared to lowercase (two lines) and to have decorations as well.
    I have no idea what tapering is heh. I didn't realize it was kind of monotonal tho, my goal was actually the opposite, being that the baroque artistic style was completely organic and uneven. Would tapering reduce that monotonous feeling?
    EDIT: Now that I thinking about it, it was actually a goal to get a kind of monotonous feeling for it to be a bit modern, although not too much so it feels organic. Kind of a middle point.
  • Claudio Piccinini
    Claudio Piccinini Posts: 681
    @Cristóbal Alarcón: English is not my native language, but by "tapering" I was thinking something along these lines: :-)
  • Claudio Piccinini
    Claudio Piccinini Posts: 681
    Clearly the modulation needs to be carefully adjusted for each letter: you won’t obtain "automatic" results like you could expect while still working with lines of constant weight. 
  • Claudio Piccinini
    Claudio Piccinini Posts: 681
    I see now that maybe "thinning" is a better term than "tapering".
    In italian it would be "rastremazione": I see that "to taper" means «to diminish or reduce or cause to diminish or reduce in thickness toward one end», so I guess it’s quite the correct term. :)
  • Christian Thalmann
    Christian Thalmann Posts: 1,988
    I think it's perfectly viable to have three lines in the cap stems and two in the lowercase.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited December 2019
     Hey guys! I have been gathering a lot of feedback, and also learning tons thanks to the different resources provided here in Typ Drawers. I've come to update this, I think I reached a stage I'm really satisfied.
     The main issues like the inconsistent white space in the vertical stems , the "e" and "o" needing further development, the "i" and the "n" needing some tweaks, and the "P" needing some really minor adjustments (including the drop angle) they should be solved by now.
     There are still things that need to be adreessed, like the overshooting, kerning and the overall spacing. But for now, the base structure I think it's done.
     What do you think?
     There is a PDF attached if you are feeling to compare the changes from up close.


  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Here are two more images with the logo isolated


  • Craig Eliason
    Craig Eliason Posts: 1,440
    Lots of kerning work to do. And I wonder if the bowls of the Ps should be a little narrower.
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    Just the "ti" is loose.
    And I think the "P" is nice.
  • Christian Thalmann
    Christian Thalmann Posts: 1,988
    The bottom terminal of /s/ looks frayed to me. Maybe follow the lead of the top terminal, or try something with a small vertical stroke to emphasize the serif?
  • AbiRasheed
    AbiRasheed Posts: 238
    edited December 2019
    I think /n needs a tad more whitespace between the inline strokes. I also feel /P looks quite different with the 3 inline strokes, I think 2 would be better and consistent with the rest.
  • Jasper de Waard
    Jasper de Waard Posts: 641
    I think three line for the caps is cool, but they do look a little wide to me, as mentioned before. For the t, I'd go with the top option. I'm not sure changing the contrast axis in the o and e from vertical to diagonal was a good idea.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Hey! Sorry for kinda ghosting. I will address the comments.
    Craig Eliason said:
    Lots of kerning work to do. And I wonder if the bowls of the Ps should be a little narrower.
    There was, in fact, someone that suggested that the bowl of the P should be a bit wider. I guess now that this point comes from personal preference?
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited December 2019
    Hrant H. Papazian said:
    Just the "ti" is loose.
    And I think the "P" is nice.
    I'm kinda trying to figure out how to kern "ti" properly. I have been google searching about kerning lowercase letters, but I can't find anything about them. Problematic cases like that "ti" where there is too much white space confuse me in how much to kern.

    Is there a proper "formula" or "method" for how much negative kerning is actually good?
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    Cristóbal Alarcón said:
    Is there a proper "formula" or "method" for how much negative kerning is actually good?
    No.
    :-)

    Just tighten it up until it matches "et" and "it".
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Christian Thalmann said:
    The bottom terminal of /s/ looks frayed to me. Maybe follow the lead of the top terminal, or try something with a small vertical stroke to emphasize the serif?
    OOh yeah, I kinda wanted the serif to be consistent with the "i" and "n" serif, but now looking at the fonts that I used as inspiration, they are mostly vertical rather than similar looking to the other serifs.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    Ok, so this is how the P looks like with only 2 inlines. I must say that the Baroque feel gets completely lost for me, the thought of the 2 inline version being used as an icon makes my blood boil. Maybe it could be an alternative with fewer decorations for headlines, but for brand recognition, with 3 inlines becomes way more appealing.
  • Cristóbal Alarcón
    Cristóbal Alarcón Posts: 78
    edited December 2019
    Jasper de Waard said:
    I'm not sure changing the contrast axis in the o and e from vertical to diagonal was a good idea.
    About that, why do you think so? Is it too much axis rotation? I double-checked Baskerville and it has indeed a tiny bit of axis rotation. Really subtle, but it's there.

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