Typography is a important design aspect when creating a new logo , But common font and typography mistakes can really make or break a beautiful logo design.. Here’s a quick tutorial on what to watch out for so your lettering doesn’t make your business look bad.
In this post I want to focus your attention to three specific ways typographic mistakes can ruin your business logo design. If you avoid these mistakes, your logo is more likely too look professional and inspiring. After all, that’s the primary function of a logo – to represent your business professionally and draw the attention of your customers, right?
1. FONTS
There are literally thousands of fonts to choose from when working on your logo design. Just as you’ll find popular choices, and with good reason, there are also some very poor choices that you’ll want to avoid. You do not want to use typography that will make you look like everyone else. Plus, there are certain circles that revile particular fonts, which may actually draw bad criticism towards your business just for the font choice. Here are some fonts to avoid:
Don’t get me wrong, Papyrus is a beautiful font and I respect Chris Costello for creating it in 1982. He is certainly an accomplished designer. The problem is that it’s been used everywhere ever since. Case in point, I worked at a grocery store in high school and through college. As I was learning about typography, Papyrus was one of the early ones. I began to notice it on products in the grocery store. Before long, I could walk down any aisle of many grocery stores and find it on at least one product. While there are perfect uses for it, too many companies have unwisely tried to make it their own and used it inappropriately. Papyrus isn’t the best font for representing ice cream.
Inspired by child-like cartoon drawings, Comic-Sans is the sure sign of an amateur. While it may seem kind at first glance, there are many more interesting fonts to use that will better serve your business. If you are wanting to go for a childish or younger vibe, please look elsewhere. This isn’t just limited to my personal/professional opinion, there are entire groups dedicated to promoting not using Comic Sans and how to use it properly.
Cooper Old Style was created in 1921, and it’s age shows. Usually the go to font when someone needs something “fat” and “fun,” Cooper Black has been known as “the black menace.” If you use this font it will most likely date your company. Unless it is specifically retro, and I mean goofy retro, I recommend avoiding it. Don’t believe me? Check out FontsInUse.com’s page of Cooper Black.
Try these fonts instead:
- Helvetica – It’s the standard sans serifed font for a reason, has different type weights, and everyone has access to it. They’re just not using it.
- Boris Black Bloxx – This font is thick, but maintains a fun feel with rounded corners. Plus the stroke weight is well distributed.
- Lobster – This is a fun, script font that includes ligatures and alternates so you can customize your text even further.
2. KERNING
Since letters are all different shapes, when you throw in different styles of fonts you multiply the likelihood that they won’t fit perfectly together. This is where “kerning” comes in. It is the process of adjusting the spacing between characters to achieve a visually pleasing result.
So if you have and “A” and a “V” together in your companies name, for instance, they will automatically be set a certain space apart, usually just past the outside edge of the character. Because of the shape of these two particular letters, they leave a large gap of white space that looks too wide. By kerning them, you bring them close together, to the point that they visually match the distance between the rest of the letters.
Common letters you’ll want to make sure you check for kerning issues are: A, C, L, O, P, T, V, W, and Y. Of course this will vary by font, but these are the biggest offenders.
3. PROPORTION
Having proper proportions within your logo design is vital, if pieces are too small or too large it will be immediately hard to read. This usually occurs between the name of your company and the tagline. Maybe your tagline is too long, and gets squashed. Perhaps your name is too short, only using two to three characters. Remember that your tagline should be descriptive and use as few words as possible. If it’s telling the story of what your business does, then your name and icon aren’t doing anything for your logo.
As far as the size of your tagline goes, a good rule of thumb is to have it between 25% and 50% of the size of your companies name. Anything under 25% tends to get lost. Going over 50% makes your tagline compete for attention with your title text.
Use this knowledge to help avoid mistakes in your logo design.
I hope these explanations have given you some insight into how important the details of your logo are. There are other nuances and guidelines that you can’t be expected to know on your own, that’s why it’s important to connect with a professional designer. They can work with you to achieve a properly completed logo design. Start a contest today to work with our amazing Design Community. Browse through our Live Portfolio and invite your favorites – I’m sure you’ll be impressed!