As part of my work in a science & tech based student magazine, I investigated redesigning the logo. I noticed that a lot of similar magazines (New Scientist, WIRED, etc.) use only a stylised version of a font to create their identity/logo (without any specific colours, shading etc.). I dutifully went out to try and find a font that would represent our magazine. I found one that was close, but then struggled to take it from being 'just a font' into a logo/brand.
In essence my question is this: What techniques can I use to transform [brand name] written in a font into a recognisable logo? Or even where to start the changes to the lettering?
Things I've tried/learned:
- Always use vectors
- Keep it readable
- Be careful about kerning (people will look at this logo a lot so it needs to be as good as possible)