Need Brewery Logo Critiquing

[OprFilth]

Howdy everybody. First time poster, long time lurker here.

Below is my brewery logo that I designed and looking for some help on. I was kind of going for that old time saloon sign feel but feel like it's a bit lacking and was hoping some of the pros on here could offer up some advice/help.

TIA

 

[carnevoodoo]

The mug looks very... placed on there. It is out of sorts with the rest of the image. You're also pushing down the name to fit it in, and your "EST" and "1995" are not aligned properly. And the background looks like one of those pictures you stare at and a shape pops out. I guess it is because the grain is just repeated at such a high rate.

Try one without a mug or pick one that doesn't look like clip art and out of place. Try to add dimension to the border. I like the shape, but I think you need to give it life and depth.

 

[CromBrew]

I like the clean look. Id work on the text a bit.

 

[sethful]

Personally, I don't understand why people put Est. xxxx when it has been a short amount of time... that's just me though.

+1 to what Carne said.

 

[OprFilth]

The mug looks very... placed on there. It is out of sorts with the rest of the image. You're also pushing down the name to fit it in, and your "EST" and "1995" are not aligned properly. And the background looks like one of those pictures you stare at and a shape pops out. I guess it is because the grain is just repeated at such a high rate.

Try one without a mug or pick one that doesn't look like clip art and out of place. Try to add dimension to the border. I like the shape, but I think you need to give it life and depth.

Yeah, now that you mention it the mug is definitely not fitting in well with the rest of it. I actually borrowed that mug off a real wooden sign (photo) thinking that it might match up well, guess not. I'll also adjust the background so it doesn't get repeated so much.

When you say the "EST" and "2005" are not aligned properly what do you mean? The reason I ask is because I have the "EST", the mug, and "2005" horizontally aligned along and evenly distributed.

Thanks for the help.

Personally, I don't understand why people put Est. xxxx when it has been a short amount of time... that's just me though.

+1 to what Carne said.

Not sure why but I've always like it when breweries put their date of establishment. For me it's a bit more personal that way even if they've only been in operation a short while.

 

[OprFilth]

Working off the suggestions I have a couple new versions of the logo. All versions have a new wood grain so that it doesn't look like a 3-d poster.

Regular Text/Regular Plaque

Regular Text/Cracked Plaque

Cracked Text/Cracked Plaque

As you can tell I'm not very good at this but I'm trying my heart out.

What do you guys think?

 

[Boerderij_Kabouter]

Much better! All three new ones are getting there. Now you need a fitting image up top and to figure out how to manipulate that image to fit with the sign style.

 

[cimirie]

To answer your direct question first...

I agree with the mug assessment. Good idea to get rid of it. Truth be told, however, I preferred that plaque to the others. Having said that...

OK, so I'm going to go analytical on you. Your brewery name is Two Track Brewery. Your logo has nothing to do with "two tracks." You don't need a picture, but the purpose of a logo is to represent the feeling/purpose/direction of your brand. So my question to you is, what does a wooden plaque say about your brand or how does it tie into "two tracks?"

If the answer is "I don't know" or "I thought it would look cool" then perhaps you should think about what what you want your logo to say. You took the time to name your brewery so your logo should somehow relate to that and both should say something about your brand (why that's important to you, what you want people to think about when they hear/see your beer, etc). Believe it or not, people will form an impression on a product or company based on your logo - even when the logo is for somebody's hobby.

Sorry to dive so deep. My wife is a graphic designer and I've heard this conversation a million times with her and her clients.

 

[cimirie]

Much better! All three new ones are getting there. Now you need a fitting image up top and to figure out how to manipulate that image to fit with the sign style.

You don't need an image. I'm not saying you can't have one, but think about all of beer labels you can. How many of them actually have a picture? Definitely some, but not most.

 

[gee8648]

try taking the beer glass image and upping the transparency so it incorporates some of the wood grain and wood texture, plus it will help blend it to make it look like it was painted on some time ago

 

[riromero]

I like the original frame best. But the wood grain, text and frame still look a little flat. Going against the Keep-it-Simple rule, I suggest adding more details. Check out this web page...

Label Design Link

Notice the close-up view. That guy has like 5 different borders around the outside of his simple oval frame. It's pretty easy to do if you select your current border, shrink/grow the selection and fill with another color. Or maybe you can emboss your current border to give it a slightly raised, 3D look? The guy also uses pretty simple text fonts but notice in the zoomed view that he repeats it 4 times with a slight offset and color shift. For a background he uses very subtle shaded gradients instead of plain solid colors or fancy textures.

I suggest keeping your same simple overall design but add more subtle detail. The point is, if you make your label design process as time consuming as possible, then you aren't checking the FG in your fermenter every hour, you aren't thinking about cracking a beer that's only been in the bottle for two days and you aren't constantly thinking of possible mistakes that will screw up your current batch. It's my method to RDWHAHB.

 

[OprFilth]

To answer your direct question first...

I agree with the mug assessment. Good idea to get rid of it. Truth be told, however, I preferred that plaque to the others. Having said that...

OK, so I'm going to go analytical on you. Your brewery name is Two Track Brewery. Your logo has nothing to do with "two tracks." You don't need a picture, but the purpose of a logo is to represent the feeling/purpose/direction of your brand. So my question to you is, what does a wooden plaque say about your brand or how does it tie into "two tracks?"

If the answer is "I don't know" or "I thought it would look cool" then perhaps you should think about what what you want your logo to say. You took the time to name your brewery so your logo should somehow relate to that and both should say something about your brand (why that's important to you, what you want people to think about when they hear/see your beer, etc). Believe it or not, people will form an impression on a product or company based on your logo - even when the logo is for somebody's hobby.

Sorry to dive so deep. My wife is a graphic designer and I've heard this conversation a million times with her and her clients.

Actually, I thought I was doing pretty good with the wood theme. Being that my brewery (home) is located way back off the road, out in the country, on what could be considered a two track I thought the name fit pretty well. When I think of a two track I think of an unmaintained path that is pretty rural and rustic. On top of that if you're ever driving any of the state maintained off road "two tracks" many times you'll run into wooden signs.

So I guess the short answer to your questions is that I believe a wooden sign in the shape of a saloon sign with a name like "Two Track Brewing" gives me the impression of a rustic/rural brewery. And given the nature of my locale I'd say that is pretty accurate. What does it say to you? J/C

No need to apologize for getting in too deep as this is all for fun and fun is what I'm having with it.

 

[OprFilth]

try taking the beer glass image and upping the transparency so it incorporates some of the wood grain and wood texture, plus it will help blend it to make it look like it was painted on some time ago

Not sure if it is Inkscape or what but when I try that the image progressively gets darker. By the time the mug picks up any texture it is pretty dark and hard to see. Maybe I'm doing something wrong.

 

[thedigitale]

I think the text looks too new for an old sign. As stated before, try playing with the text to get some wood grain in there or maybe try embossing the text in the wood. You want to match the wear and tear of the paint to the sign, otherwise it looks like someone took an old plank of wood and painted a name on it.

 

[OprFilth]

Alright guys I have a couple more logos worked up. Let me know what you think. I decided to keep the same wood grain background as the original was just too small to work with and I think I like this new darker one better.

Clean Logo

Cracked Plaque

Cracked Plaque/Cracked Text

Better? Worse? Or good lord this guy has the Inkscape skills of a drunk monkey?

 

[OprFilth]

I think the text looks too new for an old sign. As stated before, try playing with the text to get some wood grain in there or maybe try embossing the text in the wood. You want to match the wear and tear of the paint to the sign, otherwise it looks like someone took an old plank of wood and painted a name on it.

Any idea how to emboss text with Inkscape?

 

[TheAleMaster]

I like it if you consider your target market. I had no idea that two tracks meant an unmaintained path. I was thinking a rail line of some sort. If your target market gets it, I say go for it. I like either the all clean or all cracked.

 

[Ragutis]

Alright guys I have a couple more logos worked up. Let me know what you think. I decided to keep the same wood grain background as the original was just too small to work with and I think I like this new darker one better.

Clean Logo

Cracked Plaque

Cracked Plaque/Cracked Text

Better? Worse? Or good lord this guy has the Inkscape skills of a drunk monkey?

click free!

 

[BrewToppers]

I think there's some interesting concepts you have going. The main issue I see is a lack of cohesion, all the elements looking like they belong together, same style, etc.

As far as the woodgrain background, honestly I think it's got to go. If you end up having this sign carved from wood or hard foam then I think you can still have your cake and eat it too, without having to have a wood grain background.

Not that you asked for it, but I've cooked up a little something to try and give you an idea by what I mean. Take the beer mug for example, an obvious and fun idea, but maybe it would work better as part of the background. Also, I think it looks a bit better to emphasize Two Track as much as possible and to incorporate Brewing Co. below.

Let me know what you think. It may be rubbish, it may be what you're looking for. If you like it, its yours. I'll send you the artwork and you can tweak it to your liking.

Cheers!
Ben

 

[wlampe]

I like brewtoppers design if you could build on that.

 

[bionicbrew]

i really like the cracked on cracked. i like the wood grain idea, but the wood needs to look more weathered and old, like old barn wood. i like the concept, and you are almost there.

 

[scrambledegg81]

Thinking a two-sided hop-vine on either side might do the trick. Fill in the empty space but make it transparent enough not to override the wording.

 

[OprFilth]

Sorry guys, for some reason I didn't notice the new posts to my thread here. I did some more work on the logo trying to make everything fit together a bit better and added multiple borders. The wood grain still looks a bit out of place when blown up on a computer screen but not too shabby when printed out on a bottle label since it is only 1 1/2 inches wide. You can see it below.

With all that being said I think I'll just be going with BrewToppers design as it looks much nicer than mine.

 

[rigs]

If you want to take it in a more realistic looking direction, I think something along the lines of this effect would look really cool. Obviously you would have to decrease transparency with the text, but it would look really good if you had a quality wood texture to use (I'm sure they are available free online).

That text effect + wood grain logo is something I could see hanging in a rustic style ale house, especially one I would frequent if they had good BBQ, ha ha. I don't know how well it would transfer to a bottle label though, and I could understand if a more cartoony style vector logo would be necessary to transfer well to a bottle.

 

[Moe]

Another thought. If you wnat to stay with a wood grain background, what about using an old wooden beer keg image in place of the beer mugs?