Latest Wireframes and Logo concept

[Bobby Grace]

Hey folks,

I posted the latest wireframes. These mostly get at the header and
other global page layout things.

I also posted a logo concept. I'm using a bunch of colors for
comparison's sake.

Let me know what you think.

-Bobby

[Ralf Haring]

The different scales look good.

For the logos, the blue in particular stands out as having the
background word balloon almost disappearing into the bar color. The
rest seem to contrast more with their backgrounds.

And please design a new favicon, too. :-)

-Ralf

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[Bobby Grace]

> The different scales look good.

Thanks! I didn't want to cut out editing/user stuff or the search
options for any particular browser size (especially mobile). This
design should handle both.

> For the logos, the blue in particular stands out as having the
> background word balloon almost disappearing into the bar color. The
> rest seem to contrast more with their backgrounds.

I agree, not sure how I missed that. :P I'll tone down the saturation
a bit.

> And please design a new favicon, too. :-)

Planning on it, but it will probably depend on the color. I toyed
around with one and it's difficult to get the both the bubble and text
in with having it become unreadable. Working on it.

[Ralf Haring]

Three letters is almost unworkable in that small an area. Most use one or at most two. When we moved the site I tried my hand at one, but I am no artist. I wound up just using a G inside a word balloon. The files are in svn in the history somewhere, in the media folder most likely.

-Ralf

On Aug 5, 2010 5:35 PM, "Bobby Grace" <johnrobe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> The different scales look good.

Thanks! I didn't want to cut out editing/user stuff or the search
options for any particular browser size (especially mobile).  This
design should handle both.

> For the logos, the blue in particular stands out as having the

> background word balloon almost ...

I agree, not sure how I missed that. :P  I'll tone down the saturation
a bit.

> And please design a new favicon, too. :-)

Planning on it, but it will probably depend on the color.  I toyed
around with one and it's difficult to get the both the bubble and text
in with having it become unreadable.  Working on it.

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[Bobby Grace]

I've updated the logo (gcd-logo2.png) if you want to have a look.
Still a simple, bold blue, but much less saturated.

-Bobby

On Aug 5, 4:41 pm, Ralf Haring <ralf.har...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Three letters is almost unworkable in that small an area. Most use one or at
> most two. When we moved the site I tried my hand at one, but I am no artist.
> I wound up just using a G inside a word balloon. The files are in svn in the
> history somewhere, in the media folder most likely.
>
> -Ralf
>

[Donald Dale Milne]

The logos in general look good, nice work. The angular look grabs
hold of me more than our existing word balloon. And it looks good in a
variety of colors. My favorite is the orange. I think the green might
need a little more contrast, like you did with the blue.

- Don Milne

[Alexandros Diamantidis]

* Donald Dale Milne [2010-08-05 21:23]:

> My favorite is the orange.

Mine too! I don't have anything to add, but I do like everything I've
seen so far.

[Henry Andrews]

My favorite is actually still the super-saturated blue. I agree that the logo
needs something to make it pop a bit more, but I love the vibrancy of that
color.

Second favorite: Red :-)

None of the other colors grab me as much.
Blue speaks to stability and reliability, which are characteristics that we
consider distinguishing points for ourselves. Red speaks of excitement and
energy, which is something we're trying to increase after a long period of
relative lethargy. I think the saturated blue adds a bit of excitement to an
otherwise sedate color.

I'd rather avoid the black-and-white or gray logos even though the top one, in
particular, looks quite sharp. Comicbookdb.com (the only similar site that gets
a comparable amount of traffic) has a gray design so I think a vibrant color is
good to set us apart.

I also really like the stacked stair-step words :-)

thanks,
-henry

[Ralf Haring]

What about blue with an orange balloon? (or vice versa, or any other two colors together)

-Ralf

On Aug 6, 2010 6:36 PM, "Henry Andrews" <andrew...@yahoo.com> wrote:

My favorite is actually still the super-saturated blue.  I agree that the logo
needs something to make it pop a bit more, but I love the vibrancy of that
color.

Second favorite:  Red :-)

None of the other colors grab me as much.
Blue speaks to stability and reliability, which are characteristics that we
consider distinguishing points for ourselves.  Red speaks of excitement and
energy, which is something we're trying to increase after a long period of
relative lethargy.  I think the saturated blue adds a bit of excitement to an
otherwise sedate color.

I'd rather avoid the black-and-white or gray logos even though the top one, in
particular, looks quite sharp. Comicbookdb.com (the only similar site that gets
a comparable amount of traffic) has a gray design so I think a vibrant color is
good to set us apart.

I also really like the stacked stair-step words :-)

thanks,
-henry

----- Original Message ----
> From: Donald Dale Milne <dond...@att.net>

> To: gcd-tech@googlegro...

[Ralf Haring]

Oh and forgot to mention I don't think we need the "the" in the full name. It would free up the words a little and you'd still get the step effect.

-Ralf

On Aug 6, 2010 6:36 PM, "Henry Andrews" <andrew...@yahoo.com> wrote:

My favorite is actually still the super-saturated blue.  I agree that the logo
needs something to make it pop a bit more, but I love the vibrancy of that
color.

Second favorite:  Red :-)

None of the other colors grab me as much.
Blue speaks to stability and reliability, which are characteristics that we
consider distinguishing points for ourselves.  Red speaks of excitement and
energy, which is something we're trying to increase after a long period of
relative lethargy.  I think the saturated blue adds a bit of excitement to an
otherwise sedate color.

I'd rather avoid the black-and-white or gray logos even though the top one, in
particular, looks quite sharp. Comicbookdb.com (the only similar site that gets
a comparable amount of traffic) has a gray design so I think a vibrant color is
good to set us apart.

I also really like the stacked stair-step words :-)

thanks,
-henry

----- Original Message ----
> From: Donald Dale Milne <dond...@att.net>

> To: gcd-tech@googlegro...

[Henry Andrews]

I like the way you've handled the search bar drop-downs.

The two links (editing and log out) currently seem slightly odd to me grouped
into one box. If there were three it wouldn't seem as odd but it makes the box
look kind of like a weird double-button to me. Don't put too much stock in this
comment, though, I'm still getting used to it. I just tend to write down all of
my reactions :-)

thanks,
-henry

[Henry Andrews]

I actually like the emphasis that the "The" puts on it.  Removing the "The" would also take up more horizontal space overall (although I do see your point on readability- the overall size of things once we have more of the design might be a factor here).

thanks,

-henry

From: Ralf Haring <ralf....@gmail.com>
To: gcd-...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Fri, August 6, 2010 3:41:11 PM
Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept

--

[Henry Andrews]

I'm liking the single color, myself.  But what about a light/bright blue for the balloon instead of a darker one?  I was just looking at the white-balloon-on-gray version and thought of that.

Or possibly a lighter but still saturated background blue?

thanks,

-henry

 

From: Ralf Haring <ralf....@gmail.com>
To: gcd-...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Fri, August 6, 2010 3:38:57 PM
Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept

--

[Lou Mazzella]

My order of preference: 1) orange 2) blue 3) red 4) green The others don't really do much for me. -Lou --- On Fri, 8/6/10, Henry Andrews <andrew...@yahoo.com> wrote:

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[Donald Dale Milne]

I would like to see that combination too. Complimentary colors
always "feel" good to me, and maybe together thy would have that "pop."

- Don Milne

Ralf Haring wrote:
>
> What about blue with an orange balloon? (or vice versa, or any other
> two colors together)
>
> -Ralf
>
>> On Aug 6, 2010 6:36 PM, "Henry Andrews" <andrew...@yahoo.com

[Bobby Grace]

What, no love for pink?!

The bubble and search box background are actually a semi-transparent
black (25%), it's supposed to automatically complement the base
color. Most of the colors are fully saturated and using a lighter
color or a transparent white looks kind of ghost-y, if that makes
sense. It also doesn't create the same contrast effect because the
white text is now closer in color to the background. I'm still for
single color plus transparent black.

I support the idea to drop the "The". There's less to mentally
process in the image and it makes it more readable, even though I'm
likely to say the "The" out loud when talking about GCD.

I'm liking the orange the most at the moment. Orange is used in fewer
places and would give more distinction. FTR the black and white logos
weren't really intended for use on the site header, more for printing/
impressions/watermark, things of that sort.

There are some newer logos posted. The show the logo using a white
bubble and with a white background. I've cut the colors down to blue,
red, orange, and black/white.

On Aug 6, 8:02 pm, Donald Dale Milne <dondmi...@att.net> wrote:
>     I would like to see that combination too.  Complimentary colors
> always "feel" good to me, and maybe together thy would have that "pop."
>
> - Don Milne
>
> Ralf Haring wrote:
>
> > What about blue with an orange balloon? (or vice versa, or any other
> > two colors together)
>
> > -Ralf
>

> >> On Aug 6, 2010 6:36 PM, "Henry Andrews" <andrews_he...@yahoo.com

[Henry Andrews]

I think my avoidance of orange is that it's a "work" color to me. A few years
ago some study said that orange was the least corporate color, so naturally
companies started branding themselves with it like mad. Everything's orange at
my day job so I probably just automatically shy away from using it here- the GCD
has enough parallels to the web dev work I do already. If it's orange, then I'm
just not going to be able tell them apart anymore :-P

This is not actually a reason not to use orange for the GCD. It's just an
explanation as to why I am personally unlikely to ever favor it. If everyone
else loves it, I'll go along. Reluctantly :-)

I see what you mean about the white overlay. I think it looks pretty good on
the blue, but not as good. And it doesn't work well for me on the orange or
red. The blue with black overlay still looks best to me, with the red a close
second, but as noted, I'm biased against the orange.

thanks,
-henry

----- Original Message ----
> From: Bobby Grace <johnrobe...@gmail.com>
> To: gcd-tech <gcd-...@googlegroups.com>

[Henry Andrews]

I also like the color-on-white-background variations, although I still think we
need a band of color so that would be used in different situations.

BTW, one of the things I was suggesting was a lighter blue- in the direction of
turquoise perhaps? not *that* much lighter/greener, but it would make the black
overlay more contrast-y. Also thanks for explaining the color effects in
addition to showing them to us. It's helpful to understand the principles
behind the impressions.

thanks,
-henry
(who is now recalling that it's not just his current job that uses orange- two
jobs ago I worked somewhere for nearly four years that used orange as an accent
color and in a lot of the hallway paint colors. Orange == corporate to me :-)

[Jochen Garcke]

I don't like the red too much, I associated it too much with newssites
like spiegel.de (or times and newsweek in the US). I would think we go
with our long standing 'some kind of blue' corporate identity ?

The new design will be obvious enough something new so that we don't
need to change the colour...

I like the search box with the selection boxes below the text box. The
'Editing' and 'Log Out' maybe could use a bit of visual separation, i.e.
a bit of light red inbetween ?

The general links in the footer work nicely, it is the place where these
things are found nowadays.

Can't say too much about the design inbetween since I don't know what
would be where :-)

Overall, like the changes. Less border lines...

Jochen

[Lionel English]

On Sun, Aug 8, 2010 at 1:27 AM, Jochen Garcke <gcd...@garcke.de> wrote:

I don't like the red too much, I associated it too much with newssites
like spiegel.de (or times and newsweek in the US). I would think we go
with our long standing 'some kind of blue' corporate identity ?

I find myself swinging back around to the blue as well.  I like the middle  blue, with the darker overlay.

We could also use the other colors to brand our sister sites:  red for beta.comics.org, black for docs.comics.org, orange for dev.comics.org (to make Henry feel at home... :-) or the proposed my.comics.org, .... 

--
Lionel English
lio...@beanmar.net

[Henry Andrews]

----- Original Message ----
> From: Jochen Garcke <gcd...@garcke.de>
> Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept
>
> I like the search box with the selection boxes below the text box. The
> 'Editing' and 'Log Out' maybe could use a bit of visual separation, i.e.
> a bit of light red inbetween ?

I like staying with one color. So if we're going to put in dividers I'd rather
see a different shade of blue, or white/black/gray. Although I'll defer to
Bobby's understanding of color here.

> The general links in the footer work nicely, it is the place where these
> things are found nowadays.
>
> Can't say too much about the design inbetween since I don't know what
> would be where :-)
>
> Overall, like the changes. Less border lines...

Indeed.

thanks,
-henry

[Henry Andrews]

I really like the idea of branding my.comics.org with a different color but otherwise the same / similar design.  The research side can then be a soothing reliable color linking to our past (blue), while if/when we do my.comics.org, it can be a more dynamic color like red or (eek!) orange (ahem.  not on dev ;-)

thanks,

-henry

--

[Jochen Garcke]

Am 08.08.2010 21:27, schrieb Henry Andrews:
> ----- Original Message ----
>> From: Jochen Garcke <gcd...@garcke.de>
>> Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept
>>
>> I like the search box with the selection boxes below the text box. The
>> 'Editing' and 'Log Out' maybe could use a bit of visual separation, i.e.
>> a bit of light red inbetween ?
>
>
> I like staying with one color. So if we're going to put in dividers I'd rather
> see a different shade of blue, or white/black/gray. Although I'll defer to
> Bobby's understanding of color here.

I meant the background color in use. In the wireframe it is red,
although some of us prefer blue, so whatever we choose.

But as you said, wait for Bobby.

Jochen

[Henry Andrews]

----- Original Message ----
> From: Jochen Garcke <gcd...@garcke.de>
> Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept
>
> Am 08.08.2010 21:27, schrieb Henry Andrews:
> > ----- Original Message ----
> >> From: Jochen Garcke <gcd...@garcke.de>
> >> Subject: Re: [gcd-tech] Re: Latest Wireframes and Logo concept
> >>
> >> I like the search box with the selection boxes below the text box. The
> >> 'Editing' and 'Log Out' maybe could use a bit of visual separation, i.e.
> >> a bit of light red inbetween ?
> >
> > I like staying with one color. So if we're going to put in dividers I'd
>rather
>
> > see a different shade of blue, or white/black/gray. Although I'll defer to

> > Bobby's understanding of color here.
>
> I meant the background color in use. In the wireframe it is red,
> although some of us prefer blue, so whatever we choose.

Oh right. One thing I noticed is that when I load the wireframes, the scaling
makes the link underlines for "Editing" and "Log Out" disappear, which is what
made me think they needed some separation. When I resized it to full size the
link underlines are clear and they provide enough separation for me.

thanks,
-henry

[Ralf Haring]

http://grandcomic-book.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/grandcomic-book?view=revision&revision=263
http://reviews.comics.org/r/38/

If you want to look at an unsuccessful attempt.

-Ralf

[Bobby Grace]

That's it, we're not going to use any color! :P

Seriously though, on one hand, the color should reflect the GCD
'brand', on the other hand, this is an application that indexer are
looking at for perhaps long periods of time and it's no good if the
color affects the usability or experience. It's really up to the
users/board what color they want to use, but I would want a color
that's eye-catching, something bright where the dark contrast will
still work. I'm still most fond of the orange (sorry, Henry!), but
blue is pretty versatile.

I'll have more wireframes up soon.

-Bobby

On Aug 8, 8:33 pm, Ralf Haring <ralf.har...@gmail.com> wrote:
> http://grandcomic-book.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/grandcomic-book?vie...http://reviews.comics.org/r/38/

>
> If you want to look at an unsuccessful attempt.
>
> -Ralf
>

> On Thu, Aug 5, 2010 at 17:41, Ralf Haring <ralf.har...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Three letters is almost unworkable in that small an area. Most use one or at
> > most two. When we moved the site I tried my hand at one, but I am no artist.
> > I wound up just using a G inside a word balloon. The files are in svn in the
> > history somewhere, in the media folder most likely.
>
> > -Ralf
>

[Henry Andrews]

:-)
In all seriousness, I think we've discussed colors enough for now. We've got
three "finalist" colors and we'll need to get a broader survey reaction and/or
send it to the board for a vote at some point, but we should proceed to other
aspects of the design now so we have a better overall picture for the members to
consider when we get there.

Bobby, I'd say feel free to use orange (or whichever finalist color strikes your
fancy) as you move on with other parts of the design. We'll come back to
finalize the color, and that would be a good time to bring up how colors might
impact usability, too.

thanks,
-henry

----- Original Message ----
> From: Bobby Grace <johnrobe...@gmail.com>

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> GCD-Tech mailing list - gcd-...@googlegroups.com

[Tony Rose]

Though I haven't decided which one i like the most, I am going to create some stationery using one of them.




tony