Trails Brandmark, Logotype, and Theming

[nogtini]

Hi everyone, just wanted to share with you our current branding efforts courtesy @jonhargreaves .

The second photo is a quick mock of the logo applied to the TrailsMix app, wanted to show a quick sense of it "in action" 🌲

[mikehostetler]

I like it a lot.

Few nitpicks:

• The sentence should read, "Blaze your own Trail" (drop the S)
• I prefer the darker background (Kilamanjaro) with the lighter logo. The contrast says "Forest" to me, which is where Trails typically lead.

I'd love to see a full style guide played out a bit more, so there's consistent fonts and such. Not sure if @jonhargreaves does any illustration work, but more illustrations with a campfire or something would be cool too.

What about a extended logo for "Trailpacks" as well?

[nogtini]

@mikehostetler

Yea I can change that, was trying to be clever/co-tangent with the branding with the added 's', similar to "TrailsMix":

[mikehostetler]

Ahh, I see that now! I like that, it almost keeps the "Trails" as the anchor and allows us to build brand extensions off of it.

[disciple-dev]

+1 Kilimanjaro!

[jaumard]

My favorite is the one use for TrailsMix :) (love the colors) so cello/light forest. Doesn't need a background in my opinion ^^, it make logo heavier

[troy0820]

+1 with what @jaumard said. I like tent :+1:

[jaumard]

This PR is related guys :D https://github.com/trailsjs/trailpack-core/pull/3 ^^

[nogtini]

Hi everyone, it's come to our attention that our brandmark (the tent icon) is very similar to the brandmark at http://tent.io

We're actively working on a new brandmark but of course we'll keep the pallette/colo scheme and logotype (the stylized trails word) to ensure that the new voice speaks loudly, clearly, and coherently with the new brandmark and towards our overreaching goal with Trails.

Be on the lookout for the new designs coming soon :)

[kokujin]

I think the "tent" is overkill anyway, what does it have to to with trail-blazing? The "trails" text logo would suffice, a little simplified perhaps as it is with good logos

[tjwebb]

@kokujin we do need an "icon" though, like for Twitter and so forth.

[kokujin]

agreed @tjwebb, may I then suggest that the icon should show an abstraction of a trail? Look at the "Grandad" of these frameworks, Rails a.k.a Ruby on rails. The icon logo has a stretch of rail tracks in it.

[tjwebb]

I sort of like the idea of turning the github fork icon into a trail of some sort. @yejodido @jonhargreaves how are things going on the update?

[nogtini]

@tjwebb sort of like...

Also for consideration

[tjwebb]

first one: "solidify" leaves, remove some of the lines second: make it look more like a real leaf 3rd: like a lot, try some variations. try using golden ratio for the rectangles

[jaumard]

@yejodido nice work :) I prefer the ones with 2 and 3 leaves. For the one with 2 leaves make the left leaf above the other one, cause the "fork" will surpass the original project ;)

PS : But the tent looked better lol

[troy0820]

Question concerning the fork one. Do we want to do that? Big issue about this being an unintentional fork of sails (I know it's not but you know). Didn't want a logo to have that distinction. The leaves are great IMO but we don't want to copy a company like mint but an evergreen leaf is something cool. I like the rectangles. The tent was cool :disappointed: . We can always make a path somewhere with a whole bunch of server options. Like a cluster of options with a guy exploring the trail or something.

[jaumard]

:+1: yeah @troy0820 about fork :/ a lot of people will make the shortcut easily. Why not a comet trail ? The nail can make the T bar and the comet the i point...

I try something more traditional about leaf also :

[codingcampbell]

Disclaimer: not a graphic designer by a long shot, but throwing in my .02c anyway.

I like the leaf direction better than the tent, but it also seems kinda generic and not directly related to trails. I feel like there's a ton of leaf logos out there, maybe that's just because of where I work.

The tent itself would better if you dropped the side of it to square it off (good for iconification too):

Regardless of direction you choose for the symbol portion of the logo.. I think you should leave the typography WordArt behind. IMO it comes off as too try-hard like it really wants me to notice the "nature" of the theme.

Good luck!

[codingcampbell]

Oops, nevermind, it looks like https://tent.io/ uses exactly that logo anyways :sweat_smile:

[tjwebb]

@codingcampbell I agree, actually, but this is the problem with that: https://tent.io :) After we ended up on hackernews, the creators of tent.io reached out to us and kindly let us know that we were stepping on their logo. This is why we're moving away from the tent idea.

Update: Ok I see your https://github.com/trailsjs/trails/issues/47#issuecomment-169176735

[codingcampbell]

@tjwebb yeah, stanley kindly pointed that out to me after I shopped the thing >_<

One more thing I'll spam the thread with to hopefully inspire the real designers reading: Beyond leaves, there are quite a few "rugged" aesthetics people naturally attribute to camping. Perhaps a bit generic, but some quick wins would be like snowcapped mountains, bears, pine trees, etc. They are also very silhouette friendly. Some examples:

'rugged' look:

You could even adopt an animal silhouette potentially:

That's all I have to add. I hope the rest of your logo search is quick and painless.

[disciple-dev]

What if, instead of the tent, we keep the same triangular shape but have a sort of winding trail going up towards the top? Imagine a single, lonely mountain with a path to the peak.

Like this:

Except not drawn by a eight year-old.

[Eein]

Just some input: It might be a good idea to keep the text on the logo as readable as possible and represent with a mark, this way it lends well with marketing future endeavors/cons/etc. The proposed trails text is too busy wouldn't lend well to paper/marketing materials when/if that time comes.

Good luck with the project, i'm looking forward to it :)

[tjwebb]

Except not drawn by a eight year-old.

LOL :+1:

What if, instead of the tent, we keep the same triangular shape but have a sort of winding trail going up towards the top?

Hey @jonhargreaves would you mind prototyping this out as well? Just make sure it doesn't too closely evoke the Eye of Providence

[tjwebb]

@codingcampbell I like the stock mountains you sent over. We're working on some background drawings (e.g. for presentation slides and so forth) that might benefit from those ideas. We appreciate the input.

[jaumard]

It can be cool to have a logo for Trailpacks also :) with same type ect...

[nrempel]

+1 for @metzuda's suggestion

[jonhargreaves]

@tjwebb Lol! Yes, I will get you the prototype without the Eye of Providence as soon as possible.

[jaumard]

Any updates for the new logo ? :D

[nogtini]

Hey everyone! Thanks for the patience and suggestions.

pulls away curtain

Ta-da!

At this point we're actively working on the website and documentation, as well as finishing up TrailsMix for an early beta launch.