Dragon Donut logos WIP

Hotlead Junkie

Hey, cant remember the last time I posted stuff here.

I'm working on some logos for a ficticious brand of donuts with this chubby fellah below as the mascot. I really want to get these looking professional and like something you would see on the side of a bag/box of donts.

I plan to get at least 5 done. Here's the first so far with it's sketch. It's unfinished but I'm just taking a breather from it before I put the finishing touches onto it. I'm probably going to done down the colours a bit, but your opinion would be appreciated.



I'm not sure what to do with the text, maybe put some frosting and sprinkles on the two D's. Ideas would be nice



Here are the other 4 sketches. Obviously there is text missing on a few but I'll just re-use the text from the first finished logo for all 4. Most of these woill have a circular background much like the first, but as always, suggestions for layouts and text positioning an such would be great.

I'm aware my anatomy on these aren't perfect but I tried to do the best I could. Any glaring errors or suggestions would be great, thanks (sorry about those ad banner things)









I'm planning to push his nose up/bring his forehead down and tighten up his stomach a bit on that last one. Thanks for any input.

NibCrom

You need to greatly simplify this. Think of memorable logos like Apple, Nike, McDonalds. Waaay too much going on here. Too many colors, the text seems like an afterthought. Try setting up a type treatment with "Dragon Donuts" and implement the dragon with the type.

Hotlead Junkie

NibCrom wrote: »

You need to greatly simplify this. Think of memorable logos like Apple, Nike, McDonalds. Waaay too much going on here. Too many colors, the text seems like an afterthought. Try setting up a type treatment with "Dragon Donuts" and implement the dragon with the type.

Erf, you are totally right

I'll probably try a shillouette approach on a couple of these.

NibCrom

A silhouette would be a great way to simplify it. You're on the right track!

Hotlead Junkie

NibCrom wrote: »

A silhouette would be a great way to simplify it. You're on the right track!

Heh, thanks. I'm extremley rusty from my days at my graphics course, I'll try some more text focused ideas too instead of character focused ones too.

Scosglen

Is this fictitious brand aimed primarily at children? Is it even a good idea to market donuts to children?

Because if it isn't you may want to reconsider the direction of your mascot and tone.

Guy Bell

I think the drawings are really good.
Just from a marketing viewpoint you probably don't want to remind customers that your product is going to make them fat.

ManonvonSuperock

the mascot design screams furry-internet-fantasy-element, not donuts.

I would simplify even that. fire shaped markings? why? fluffy mohawk?

also, cut back on the number of wrinkles and folds being shown in this fat dragon. you're dangerously out of the "cute fluffy cartoon character" area and into the "filthy bbw amateur hentai" area.

Hotlead Junkie

Scosglen wrote: »

Is this fictitious brand aimed primarily at children?

Because if it isn't you may want to reconsider the direction of your mascot and tone.

Honestly I just had a character I'm fond of drawing and wanted to try and use to get back into the graphic design thing. I just made sure to have him in each pic with a large donut, but I guess this all does look very kiddy. I should of probably made the breif a bit more solid for myself to work from since honestly I'm not entirley sure who I'm aiming for. Hmm, a major oversight if you ask me :P

Ah well, at least all this stuff is coming back to me now, I'll go back and try and make my breif more specific to make this project work but in the future I'll make sure to solidify my breif and goals first.

Like I said, I'm just getting back into things and simply put I'm pretty fond of toony/bright colours and designs so this is my 'fun' project I guess to keep my interested.

Thanks for the input.

Hotlead Junkie

ManonvonSuperock wrote: »

the mascot design screams furry-internet-fantasy-element, not donuts.

I would simplify even that. fire shaped markings? why? fluffy mohawk?

also, cut back on the number of wrinkles and folds being shown in this fat dragon. you're dangerously out of the "cute fluffy cartoon character" area and into the "filthy bbw amateur hentai" area.

Thanks for the honesty, hope I didn't touch a nerve or anything :P

Frankly I just grabbed a character I drew a while back for a defunct game project and 'recruited' it for this project. It's probably not a perfect fit.

I'd better slim him a bit too :P

Hotlead Junkie

Guy Bell wrote: »

I think the drawings are really good.
Just from a marketing viewpoint you probably don't want to remind customers that your product is going to make them fat.

Thanks, and very true, kinda didn't think of that but it seems so obvious now, hah.

Jake!

The last one, cut the body completely, done.

beavotron

i agree 100% with jake
if you cut out the body and just have the head poking through the donut with the little hands, you've got a logo that, while it's cute and a little kiddish, could work.
i think of that donut kid that they have in the states... you know the one, i think his name is big boy or something

bombardier

ManonvonSuperock wrote: »

the mascot design screams furry-internet-fantasy-element, not donuts.

Exactly.

http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=fat+dragon

Hotlead Junkie

I'll re-think my breif then. Guess I went the wrong way about this. Thanks for the tips, guys.

beavotron

it sucks that a very strange fetish ruined something that would probably otherwise be cute out of that context
it's just hard for someone who's seen too many corners of the internet to look at a chubby dragon without that context now.

Hotlead Junkie

I'd honestly, really rather the thread be locked if it gets into one of those discussions.

I realise that my work here isn't to everyone's tastes (I just seem to like to draw that kind of thing) but i have definatley gotten a ton of good criticizm and plan to plan my next project a lot better. I didn't realise I was basically advertising fattening donuts to kids here :P

I'm glad I posted this here even though it made me reaslise I went about things the wrong way, should just make my next attempt at something graphic-designey a lot better.

beavotron

oh hell naw it won't dissolve into that.

you have taken the crits with grace, and take them as you will, honestly
if this is what you like to draw, then this is what you like to draw!

but for doing design work for the public, sometimes you just have to be aware that personal tastes need to be backburnered to public perceptions,
it's just part of being a designer... or really anything
if you had a fetish of some kind, you wouldn't really show it off around the office

get what we're saying?
we're thinking more of marketing this to a larger audience and what the views will be, not criticizing you for your personal tastes.

Hotlead Junkie

beavotron wrote: »

oh hell naw it won't dissolve into that.

you have taken the crits with grace, and take them as you will, honestly
if this is what you like to draw, then this is what you like to draw!

but for doing design work for the public, sometimes you just have to be aware that personal tastes need to be backburnered to public perceptions,
it's just part of being a designer... or really anything
if you had a fetish of some kind, you wouldn't really show it off around the office

get what we're saying?
we're thinking more of marketing this to a larger audience and what the views will be, not criticizing you for your personal tastes.

Oh I understand what you are saying completley, I know that I'd definatley need to stick to what the client wants rather than do my own thing like this, this project was just something simple to get myself into gear and it's worked great like I mentioned in my above post. I'll probably ask people for specific breifs or start a thread asking for one a week or something, but during this week I'll try and plan a better breif out for myself instead of mashing something together like this.

EDIT: And yeah I've not shown my work here or to people after my games deisgn course for over a year, just trying to get 'back out there' and get the general opinion of my work instead of opinions from the few freinds I show my stuff to.

beavotron

Hotlead Junkie wrote: »

beavotron wrote: »

oh hell naw it won't dissolve into that.

you have taken the crits with grace, and take them as you will, honestly
if this is what you like to draw, then this is what you like to draw!

but for doing design work for the public, sometimes you just have to be aware that personal tastes need to be backburnered to public perceptions,
it's just part of being a designer... or really anything
if you had a fetish of some kind, you wouldn't really show it off around the office

get what we're saying?
we're thinking more of marketing this to a larger audience and what the views will be, not criticizing you for your personal tastes.

Oh I understand what you are saying completley, I know that I'd definatley need to stick to what the client wants rather than do my own thing like this, this project was just something simple to get myself into gear and it's worked great like I mentioned in my above post. I'll probably ask people for specific breifs or start a thread asking for one a week or something, but during this week I'll try and plan a better breif out for myself instead of mashing something together like this.

EDIT: And yeah I've not shown my work here or to people after my games deisgn course for over a year, just trying to get 'back out there' and get the general opinion of my work instead of opinions from the few freinds I show my stuff to.

well this is a good place for that

Mustang

I actually don't think you need to simplify this at all. Providing what you're drawing here is a mascot and not a logo. Like a Ronald McDonald, but you also need your Golden Arches to back it up.
However, I'd go a little easier on the colours, especially if your going to saturate them this much.

Hotlead Junkie

Mustang wrote: »

I actually don't think you need to simplify this at all. Providing what you're drawing here is a mascot and not a logo. Like a Ronald McDonald, but you also need your Golden Arches to back it up.
However, I'd go a little easier on the colours, especially if your going to saturate them this much.

That's a good view on it, but I really need to rethink what I'm 'doing' with this, be it a logo, mascot, etc.

Jake!

If you're doing this as an exercise, then just changing what you're doing to fit what you've done means you're learning very little.

Hotlead Junkie

Jake! wrote: »

If you're doing this as an exercise, then just changing what you're doing to fit what you've done means you're learning very little.

That's why I'm planning to stop doing this project and restart a new one with a much tighter breif. I've been reminded of a ton of stuff I should do to make a sucsessfull peice of graphic design work so I've actually learned a lot from this thread.