OCAD University

Founded in 1876, OCAD University is Canada’s largest art and design institution, located in Toronto, Ontario. Formerly known as Ontario College of Art and Design, the school changed its name in 2007 to OCAD University when it received degree-granting status. Despite the “C” in the name still standing for “College” the acronym was kept as it had substantial equity and recognition. In 2004, OCAD University moved into its new campus, a radical structure designed by Alsop Architects that looks like a cross between a crossword puzzle and those super tall robots from War of the Worlds, with some color sprinkled for good measure. It may sound like a jab at the building, but the thing is truly jaw-dropping when you are standing below it. Anyway. Last night, at the 96th Annual Graduate Exhibition, the school unveiled a new identity, created by Toronto-based Bruce Mau Design (BMD), as well as another slight name change, to OCAD U.

OCAD U’s building, designed by Alsop.

The old logo wasn’t anything too exciting, just the name of the institution set in Jonathan Barnbrook’s Priori inside a rectangle with the letters cropped off on both sides. Decent. But lame. And it could have any name, of any school, from anywhere in the world. The new logo draws its basic structure from the black and white square pattern on the building, giving it a delightful relevance and reason for being. The big square acts as a “window”, a concept that gets thrown around a lot and hard to improve upon but I think this identity is able to offer a slight variation on the theme by not just populating the inside of the square but having some fun with it and letting the odd “things” come in front, behind, and all around the main square. It’s almost like a cross between the visual diversity of the Aol. work and National Geographic’s and Time’s idea of the color frame capturing a moment in time. The idea of putting student work in there is the exact kind of conceptual move that makes the difference between students and alumni hating a redesign of their beloved educational institution or loving it. I bet we won’t be seeing any petitions to get rid of this logo.

The logo and identity are set in Gotham but strangely enough it doesn’t feel too Gotham-ey, perhaps because there are no “a”s, “R”s, or “M”s which are the most telling characters of Gotham. The logo also does a nice job in acknowledging that this is still OCAD but that it happens to now be a U (for Univesity)… the counter argument is that it encourages people to keep calling it “OCAD” not “OCAD U” as is the new intention. The applications are really great and demonstrate the versatility that this identity will have. It has a very good combination of serious starkness with creative whimsiness. 

Fonte: http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/ocad_u_all_new.php#.VD5cxtTF-xU

A key frame from the animation above, showing that the logo comes from the pattern on the building.

Alternate lock-ups.

Logo with student’s work.

Groovy paper cups, above, and stationery, below.

Identidade Visual - Roterdão 2001

Identity Design for the City of Rotterdam

by Mevis en Van Deursen 

Rotterdam needed to promote the cultural aspects of the city and enhance the perception of the city’s attractiveness, both to citizens and to visitors. The design problem was to develop an identity that would connect all various cultural activities in Rotterdam. The identity had to function as a logo system, and it needed to be flexible enough to allow other designers to use it. Users needed to receive clear guidelines in order to be able to play with the system.

Fonte: http://downtownsa.wordpress.com/graphic-design-driven-community-research-projects/

Porto / City Identity and Branding Proposal

Fonte: https://www.behance.net/gallery/19950165/Porto-City-Identity-and-Branding-Proposal

City of Melbourne's new corporate identity

In 2009, the City of Melbourne launched a new corporate identity.

This identity was created to: 

- Become an icon for Melbourne and for the City of Melbourne
- Capture the city's status as a leading capital city with an international reputation for excellence, innovation and leadership represent our organisation as a single entity while allowing for a variety of sub-brands with distinct personalities. A flexible identity for the future

The logo becomes immediately recognisable as the City of Melbourne, even when used in different ways for different projects.

The logo uses a flexible design that: 
- Can be translated for use in any medium, allowing for creative interpretations that match a project’s personality will become part of our many, diverse branded activities, from events to strategies, from websites to brochures and from banners to business cards connects all our projects and programs to the City of Melbourne.

Why did City of Melbourne decide to rebrand?

It was deemed necessary to rebrand when an extensive audit and review revealed our ‘leaf’ logo to be outdated. After 15 years this was understandable.

The creation of one strong masterbrand represented an opportunity to build a new identity that resonates with our staff, our community, our customers and for the City of Melbourne as an local, national and international destination. Looking at other cities such as London or New York you see the strength of their single brand.
What was wrong with the old 'leaf'?
The ‘leaf’ was found to be weak when stacked up against other national and international city brands and there was also little understanding of what the ‘leaf’ represented. In addition, the proliferation of additional logos resulted in a lack of shared understanding of the City of Melbourne exposing a fragmentation of our identity.

How much did the branding exercise cost City of Melbourne?
The cost for design was $147,906, in addition to developmental work which cost $91,652.
The review we undertook included an audit; research into world’s best practice; internal and external stakeholder consultation which included a range of focus groups and comprised the aspirations of Future Melbourne community plan. The result of the review was for the City of Melbourne to proceed with developing a new corporate identity. This represented not only future savings to ratepayers but was immediately recognisable as the City of Melbourne locally, nationally, and internationally.

Who designed the new corporate identity?
Landor Associates was engaged to develop the new corporate identity. They are one of the world’s leading international strategic brand consulting and design firms.

 


Fonte: http://www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/ABOUTMELBOURNE/MELBOURNEPROFILE/Pages/CorporateIdentity.aspx

Tate Brand

The Tate logos were designed by Wolff Olins. Not just one logo, but many.
The logos supported the modern approach by moving in and out of focus, suggesting the dynamic nature of Tate – always changing but staying recognisable.

“We designed a range of logos that move in and out of focus, suggesting the dynamic nature of Tate – always changing but always recognisable.”
Wolff Olins

With a constantly changing logo, the effect on brand recognition and the design is far enough away from the norm to allow for slight variations across the board.

There are a number of variations of the Tate logo, or mark. They range from a standard logo to a blurred version, a faded version and a halftone version (dots rather than smooth fading). The marks have no fixed size or position and they are not connected with one particular Tate site. The Tate mark helps to build a brand that is fresh and fluid, but has some consistency – one Tate, with constantly changing expressions.

So, this make the identity more distinctive and effective.The logo is memorable in that it’s consistently in different focus.The constant change in form presents the viewer with a modest “challenge of recognition”. This only works of course if the variation between the different logos is limited to the same basic shape determined by the letterforms.

Nordkyn

A península de Nordkyn na Noruega é um local onde impera o frio do árctico, natureza. Deste modo, de forma a promover a região como um destino turístico, o Neue Design Studio desenvolveu uma identidade que reflecte literalmente a natureza deste destino.
A identidade desenvolvida foi baseada no slogan “Where nature rules,” e nas estatísticas do instituto meteorológico da Noruega. A forma e as cores da marca gráfica são afectadas de acordo com as estatísticas do tempo (a direcção do vento e a temperatura). Foi desenvolvido um “logo generator” que permite aos visitantes do site “Visit Nordkyn” efectuar o download do mesmo e saber exactamente quais as condições climáticas do momento. Uma identidade dinâmica com um conceito muito forte e uma qualidade e criatividade absolutamente singulares. A identidade ao serviço da diferenciação e promoção de uma determinada região absolutamente inóspita.

MIT Media Lab

Nova Identidade Visual desenvolvida para o MIT Media Lab, inspirada na colaboração, visão de futuro e diferentes valências existentes na instituição. O conceito desenvolvido por TheGreenEyl, está assente na constante redefinição dos significados dos media e a da tecnologia actuais. Foi desenvolvido um interface através do software Processing.org, que permite a cada pessoa do laboratório escolher a sua marca gráfica para aplicação no seu cartão pessoal assim como diferentes tipos de animações que possam ser aplicadas a qualquer vídeo de apresentação do MIT Media Lab.

MIT Media Lab Identity, 2011 from readyletsgo on Vimeo.


Data: 2011
Estúdio: TheGreenEyl
Direcção Criativa e Design: Richard The, E Roon Kang
Programação e Design: Willy Sengewald
Software: Processing.org