Deadly Sin of Logo Design #5 Fixed: Having No Overlapping Elements

Shadows or Outlines on Signatures

Even when drop shadows are done properly, they generally do not make for easier reading, as there is more for the eye take in. Sooner or later, clients will realize this and want cleaner, easier-to-read type in their identities.

1. The Campbell’s script wordmark was designed clear back in 1869. It has served them well. Then in the 1990s someone decided to give it a black drop shadow, no doubt, to “boost legibility.” It did not last long as they saw that legibility was lessened, not improved. 2. Hershey’s use of dimensional type on its labels is another example of someone’s “good” idea that turns out to be bad. 3. The Hertz heavy drop shadow was an attempt to make yellow have contrast against black. The yellow bar underneath the new signature is much better. 4. Hobby Lobby’s orange type with white halo plus a blue border and shadow made a very complex signature. Their simpler signature is so much easier to read. 5. Even with Little Caesar’s much smaller black signature compared to the outlined orange one, it is easy to see which gives the greater clarity.

1. Avianca’s wavy lines were not a major nuisance, but the signature is more readable without them. 2. Dish Network’s original identity was created in 1996. Since then, they have altered their identity six times, usually omitting elements that were finally seen as unnecessary. Six times in twenty three years is some sort of record and must have taken a financial toll.  3. Vienna’s Stadt Wien with its hodgepodge of caps and lowercase as well as different fonts was interrupted with the shield. Now the shield is a focal point and the type can be easily read. 4. Tresorit’s former logo comes across as a hexagon with a two-toned stripe that was actually supposed to be an isometric black cube with a turquoise stripe. It obviously didn’t reproduce well. Their new logo, with a gradient can obviously also be shown in a single solid color. 5. Ebay’s mishmash of lower case with caps and different fonts plus different colors has given way to one font, all in lower case. The multi-colored treatment is still used, but a single color version is also used. 6. YouTube’s famous TV screen icon has been removed from the wordmark and replaced with a separate logo.

1. The original Alcoa logo was solid but is improved by being brought outside the containing shape. 2. Best Buy’s former signature was always subordinated to the price tag shape; now it is freed and the price tag is subordinate to it, as it should be. 3. Eventbrite’s signature can also be bigger in the same space without the containing shape. 3. The oval around the Boots signature added some mass, but little else. Now the wordmark has undergone a few modest changes and can be bigger in the same space. 4. JCPenney’s signature was dwarfed inside that square. Now it is free. 5. Principal got rid of its containing triangle, which took a lot of space, and replaced it with a logo. 6. Kashi omitted its flag shape, which didn’t match it’s straight type, and is much more effective. 7. Zillow decided that the house shape was already a container for their stylized “Z” monogram, so why have another container around that? Besides, the former logo could remind someone of a house being swept away in a tornado. Getting rid of that was also a smart move. 8. Rexall’s heavier wordmark is a big improvement over its former tightly contained identity. 9. The oval around the Boots signature added some mass, but little else. Now the wordmark has undergone a few modest changes and can be bigger in the same space. 10. Snapple straightened its type and took it out of the red racetrack shape for a cleaner identity. 11. MasterCard’s identity is cleaner with the signature separated from the logo. 12. WNBA’s monogram was so tiny inside its containment that it was often illegible. This redesign is a major improvement.

Adapted from the book Logo Design Theory: How Branding Design Really Works.