Visual Rhetoric--Logos
In this section of the course, you are going to learn about design
concepts for writers. This project will be done as a group. In order to
complete this task, you need to first start by carefully reading all of
the materials on design. We're going to learn how to create well-designed
web pages in addition to understanding basic visual design concepts.
You'll be asked to create letter head, business cards, envelopes, a
brochure template, and the opening web page for a fake company in
Statesboro. In addition, you will write up a document that explains your
decisions, drawing on theories of visual design in order to support your
position.
Your group will be assigned a company to be described later:
Brainstorming/Research
Once you've been assigned to a group and a project, you will need to
conduct research. For this assignment, you will need to provide 10
examples of logos/designs on-line for companies that are similar to yours.
You will need to assess the 10 examples based on principles in visual
design/rhetoric. The number of examples should give you a range of
possibilities; you will probably only be responsible for 2 or 3 examples
individually, but together your insights will be better for having
compared a variety of logo/design/branding decisions.
In addition, you'll need to read about logo design, and design in
general:
Let me be clear: I'm not expecting you to be great artists who figure
out logos that are spectacular (though if you did, I wouldn't be
disappointed). Rather I want you to look at logos differently after this
assignment--as an integral part of the communication for a company.
Finally, you'll want to read about web design:
Come up with designs for letter head, business cards, envelopes, and a
web page
The designs for these documents don't have to be artistic quality--they
don't even have to be in color. What I'm most interested in is your
awareness about what you're doing. Why have you decided on your logo? What
do you want to accomplish? The designs shouldn't be all that different
from one another--and we'll look at examples that demonstrate the
possibilities.
Write a memo explaining your decisions
In a two page memo, you need to explain your decisions, drawing on
experts' voices to support your designs. You'll need to read about web
design, about visual design in general and logo design in particular so
that you can support your decisions. You may want to go item by item,
(i.e., the business card, and then the letter head etc). Or you may want
to focus on concepts, and how they play out in the actual products (i.e.,
the use of balance or decisions about color). Think of this memo as a sort
of justification for your perspectives. Imagine that people reading your
argument might not realize that there's a reason behind your logo
decisions.
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