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Stock photos

arno — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:35:07 +0000

Stock photos are professional photographs that are bought and sold on a royalty-free basis and can be used for limited purposes. It is a cost-effective method for designers, commercial advertisers and marketing organizations to obtain professional quality photos and images without the costs of hiring a full-time professional photographer. The stock photographer or distributor retains ownership of the images and the purchaser acquires limited usage rights set by the Terms of Service Agreement. Terms of Service policies differ among stock photography distributors and should be read carefully. Stock photos can be purchased through a subscription and downloaded from a stock photography distributor’s web sites.

Here is a list of sites that sale our stock photos: Shutterstock, iStock Photo, Dreamstime, Fotolia, 123rf, BigStock

Which Wacom Pen do you use?

arno — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 16:17:09 +0000

If you are a traditional artist used to working with a number of different tools the Wacom Cintiq Display might just be for you. They have an assortment of different pens each designed to mimic a traditional instrument. I use some more than others but they are all part of the arsenal of tools I use daily. Having a Wacom Cintiq has changed my entire workflow. From illustrations, to design and photo editing, I do almost all of it with the Cintiq Display.

Grip Pen
The Grip Pen is the standard pen that comes with both Wacom Cintiq and Intuos Tablet. It features 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity, an eraser, and a selection of nibs for customizing the feel of your pen to your taste. This is still my go-to pen for most of my tasks. It’s comfortable and the cushioned barrel makes it easy to work with for hours.

Classic Pen
The Classic Pen is my second most used pen it’s has all the same features of the Grip Pen without the cushiony padding. It has the feel of the Micron pens I like to use.

Airbrush Pen
I’ve airbrushed for over twenty years and aside from the clean up I still enjoy working in the medium. Using the Wacom Airbrush is a lot like my faithful Iwata airbrush but for me it has a couple of drawbacks. The Wacom airbrush is super light. It weighs about as much as a pencil which, to me, makes it feel more like a toy. The second drawback (and the biggest for me) is the wheel. After years of using a Dual-Action trigger I’ve become accustomed to controlling both air and paint flow through two independent actions: push down for air, pull the trigger back for paint. With the digital airbrush it doesn’t give you the same type of control. On the plus side, if you want to take the time to set it up properly, Wacom has done an amazing job allowing you to configure the airbrush in Adobe Photoshop to work just like a traditional dual-action airbrush.

6D Art Pen
Most of the pens have the same features. The 6D Art Pen however doesn’t have the eraser and control buttons. This slows down my efficiency. I like not having the keyboard in the way when I’m working on an illustration so I’ve programmed the buttons on the other pens to do specific tasks in whatever program I’m working in. For example, in Photoshop I toggle up and the brush gets larger; down and the brush gets smaller.

I love the feel of this pen and for some things it’s great, but it is the one I use least in the set.

Conclusion
All the pens are great and Wacom has made my creative life easier and much more enjoyable. I can paint without using nasty chemicals and no cleanup. Photo editing is quick and painless. Each one of them has helped me become a better artist in one-way or another.

Would I purchase them again?
With the exception of the 6D Art Pen I would say yes. I just haven’t used it enough to justify its cost.

Do you have a Cintiq Display or a Intuos Tablet, which pen do you use?

Color calibrating your monitors

arno — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:58:10 +0000

As a graphic designer and photographer I want to insure that the colors I show my clients during development match what they see when the final product comes back from the printer or lab.

To do this I color calibrate my monitors every week. I believe it is one of the most important things I do.

Color balance, contrast, brightness and back-lighting settings all factor into how an image is displayed and since no two monitors are alike regardless of brand or model it is important to calibrate all of them . Even those of the same model can have noticeable differences. After you calibrate your monitors your images should look the same on all of them and the prints you get back from the printer should look as you expect.

Calibrating your monitor should only take ten to fifteen minutes to complete (per monitor) and really should be done once a week. It’s something most people overlook or are not aware of but if you don’t want to explain why the print doesn’t match what you showed them it’s worth the fifteen minutes.

For more information on calibrating your displays checkout Datacolor, Pantone, x-Rite.

Taking the Thunderbird Lodge back to the 60’s

arno — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 23:39:19 +0000

What can I do with a photo of the Thunderbird Lodge neon sign? I love these old neon signs with so much character and always think they’d look great in a photo but when I return home and revisit them for the most part I end up finding these photos boring and I have no idea what to do with them. Today that all changes with the help of Adobe Photoshop and the add-on Color Efex 3.0 Pro by NIK Software. Today I’m going to create a textured vintage looking postcard with this photo.

Here are the steps I used to create this image

Beginning ImageTonal Contrast Cross ProcessingPolaroid TransferLevels & CurvesAdd color contrastAdd TextureMore TextureHigh Pass FilterMore Level & Curve Final Image

First I opened up the image in Photoshop and cleaned up of any sensor dust spots using the [Spot Healing Brush Tool].

Note: To preserve the original image a trick I like to use is to create a new layer for the edits I’m going to make. To do this, first I create a new layer. Then while in the new layer, I select the [Spot Healing Brush Tool] and change “Type” to Content-Aware and Sample all layers. Then I do all of my cleanup in the new layer with the [Spot Healing Brush Tool]. When I’m finished I “Merge Visible” layers.

Then I took the image into Color Efex 3.0 Pro’s “Tonal Contrast” filter to give the neon sign a little more contrast. Since I only wanted to influence the contrast on the Thunderbird Lodge sign and I didn’t want the sky or buildings to change, I added a few control points with a 0% opacity to the sky and buildings below.

I could have been a bit more accurate on which portion of the image was going to be affected by clicking on the [Brush] button and painting on only the areas I wanted contrast applied to but for this project it wasn’t necessary and I was happy with the preview using just the control points so I hit [OK].

Note: One of the nice things about Color Efex is that it creates a new layer every time you apply a filter making it easy to undo if you don’t like the results

Next I ran it through Color Efex 3.0 Pro’s “Cross Processing” filter giving the image more aged colors and a little more color contrast. After playing with different settings, I found that I liked Y02 with a strength of 65%.

Note: For more information about the history of Cross Processing (or x-pro) checkout Crossprocessing.info and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_processing.

In this step I used Efex 3.0 Pro’s “Polaroid Transfer” filter to give the image some imperfections and a rough border.

Here are the settings I used:
· Border: 62%
· Outer Color: 37%
· Saturation: 34%
· Smear: 0%
· Tear Off: 0%

Next I made some adjustments to both the colors & brightness of the image using Photoshop’s “Adjustment” tool and I adjusted the “Levels” and “Curves”.

Since the adjustments are in their own layers I was able to make small tweaks to them before moving on to the next step.

Note: A great place the learn more about using Photoshop is Adobe TV.

I wanted to add some contrast to the background so I went back in to Color Efex 3.0 Pro’s “Tonal Contrast”. Then using Photoshop’s [Quick Select Tool] I highlighted only the neon sign and then clicked on the [Add Vector Mask] button to created a mask for the layer.

Since I had the Thunderbird Lodge sign highlighted when the mask was created the sky was hidden not the sign. I inverted the mask using the [Command+I] keys, this exposed the sky and hid the sign. I then changed the layer style by going to Layer > Layer Style > Blending Options and selecting “Soft Light” with opacity set to 70%.

I wanted to add some texture to the image to give it a weathered look so I placed a gray scale image of a flattened crumpled sheet of paper in a new layer. To do this I went to File > Place and selected the image I wanted to use for the texture, then I sized and positioned it, hit “enter” on the keyboard to apply the changes. I then rasterized the layer by going to Layer > Rasterize > Smart Object.

I wanted to apply a different level of texture to the background so I copied the mask layer I just created in the previous step (Add color contrast step) by clicking on the mask layer and holding down the ‘ALT’ key and dragging the mask layer to the crumpled paper layer. This should hide the area where the neon sign is. Finally I changed the layer style blending option to “Multiply” and set opacity to 40%.

Next I duplicated the layer I just created (Add texture step) using the [Command+J] shortcut. With this layer I want to add texture to the neon sign and not the background. Since I duplicated the layer the mask layer was also copied. Again using the [Command+I] shortcut on the mask layer I inverted the mask exposing the sign area. I left the Layer style blending option set to “Multiply” and changed opacity to 20% to apply less texture to the sign area.

I wanted to sharpen up the image a bit so I duplicated the “Polaroid Transfer” layer and moved it to the top layer. Next I changed the new layers blending option to “Soft Light” at 100% opacity. Finally I used Photoshop’s “High Pass Filter” with a setting of Radius 3.9 pixels.

I wasn’t completely satisfied with the colors so I made a few more tweaks using Photoshop’s “Adjustment” tool by adjusting “Levels”, “Curves” and “Hue/Saturation” .

I saved the image in Photoshop’s .PSD format with all the layers in case I wanted to make changes. Then I flattened all the layers and saved the image in both a high-res .Tif format for my printing needs and a .jpeg for any web use.

Promoting Vision Capital Management

arno — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 16:45:01 +0000

After designing Vision Capital Management’s new logo and stationery set they were ready to start promoting their new look. They wanted us to design a new brochure and a custom two-pocket folder that they would leave with potential new clients.

We had a few objectives with this piece. It needed to showcase the people of Vision Capital Management, white space was also a key factor, and they wanted something that didn’t look like every other dreary technical document out there.

For the brochure we played around with various designs, shapes, and sizes until we came up with the final design, a five-panel layout that folded down to 6½” x 11” (25½” x 11” flat). When the brochure was collapsed it was very clean with very little information on the outside, but when you opened it, it was full of bold colors, photos, and plenty of white space.

For the folder we needed to come up with something that would hold all of the documents for the client including a brochure, business card, and any other paperwork. The pocket on the left would keep the brochure safe & secure. The pocket on the right was larger for other documents with a slot for a business card cut into the panel. Finally, by adding the radius die cut to the front panel we broke up the vertical lines by mimicking the curves in the brochure.

Both parts of this project had challenges but we knew we could turn out something that Vision Capital Management would be proud to show their clients, and we did.

Adding a little more flair

arno — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 04:24:16 +0000

Vespa’s are cool any way you slice it but sometimes you need just a little something more to make it yours…some flair. Here’s the seat we designed for our GT200 Vespa.

Creating a multi-photo composite

arno — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 17:56:25 +0000

I’ve seen this type of thing done a number of times but have never taken the time to do a multi-photo composite of myself. Until now.

To start out, I found a deck of cards and some poker-chips I’ve had lying around for years and I setup the table (made sure I could get to every seat without moving things). Next, light setup…one fill light with a softbox and one Canon Speedlite 580EX II with a Gary Fong diffuser on it. Done. Then I did a couple test shots to check the lights, focus, and composition.

Here’s a quick list of steps I took to complete this project

Photo 1Photo 2Photo 3Photo 4Photo 5Adobe BridgePhotoshop

The first shot was in the chair furthest away from the camera. Using Canon’s TC-80N3 timer and remote controller I set the timer to start in 15 seconds and bracket three shots. I would do this same setup for the next three shots as well.

Without moving anything around the table I walked over hit the remote and moved to the next chair, put on my poker-face and waited…(notice the Ace in my pocket…just a fun little detail I wanted to add)

In this photo I wanted to show my hand to the camera (but not block the entire scene). I picked up the cards, practiced my pose, quick test shot, checked results, hit the remote once more, waited and done.

Moving on to the last position at the table. Fired off three shots and done, almost. My dog Brutus decided he wanted to check out what I was doing so he joined me for this one. After checking the images on my camera I didn’t see any problems with him being in the shot (I could edit it out in Photoshop).

Here I planned on adding some of the small details to the final image that would make it more believable. I set the camera remote up to take 10 photos with a 3 second break between them. This would give me time to toss a card out and hopefully if the timing was right catch it mid flight.

Putting it all together and compositing the images. I started out going into Adobe Bridge, highlighted all the images I want to use and opened them into one Photoshop file with each image in a layer (Tools > Photoshop > Load Files into Photoshop Layers…). The reason you want to do it this way is that all your images will be aligned perfectly and centered in the Photoshop file (a big time saver).

I rearranged the layers and started masking out the background (and Brutus). A little clean-up, some color corrections, then checked the masks. Then I used Nik Software Color Efex Pro™ to play with the contrast a little, made a copy of the final layer and converted it to grey (and set it to Multiply, Opacity 25%) so I could add some depth to the image. Done.
So what did I learn? That it’s good when you take a little time to play…the entire project only took about two hours.

Classic Scooter & Cycle

arno — Fri, 13 May 2011 02:31:35 +0000

Our client wanted a logo that was straightforward and had that clean, vintage look to it; something that set them apart from all the other scooter and motorcycle shops in town. It also had to work on apparel, (caps and t-shirts), and all their other marketing materials (stickers, flyers, brochures, business cars, letterhead, etc.) This is what we came up with. What do you think?

They would become Kore Group

arno — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 16:02:20 +0000

When Paper Power Inc. decided it was time for a corporate facelift, they came to us for help. They felt their brand had become stale and outdated, and they wanted a fresh, modern public identity that reflected the company’s new direction.
We had worked with them on other product rebrandings over the years but this was going to be different. Paper Power hadn’t upgraded it’s corporate image in over twenty years and now they wanted a whole new look, including a name change. They would become the Kore Group and they wanted a logo, brochures, letterhead and all the miscellaneous supporting materials that would tell the world what they did and who they were.
We met with them to get a feel for where they wanted to go, spent some time brainstorming and going over a myriad of details, arrived at a clear understanding of their objective, committed to a project timeline and went to work. We presented them a handful of concepts and color combinations for their consideration. The possibilities were then narrowed down to three before committing to the final design concept. We then developed their new logo, business cards, letterhead, and brochures and proposal portfolios they would use as they presented their new look to their customers and clients, both current and future.

Vespa Milwaukie, a new look

arno — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 01:53:21 +0000

The guys over at Vespa Milwaukie asked if we could help them out with getting their web site updated with a new look, graphics and anything else we thought the site needed…
Things they told us that the needed were capability of showing all of the current promotions going on and something easier to update than what they had been using.
Go check out their site with the new look when you have a minute.

Hipstamatic Project

arno — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 22:08:50 +0000

So the holidays are behind us for another year and now it’s time to get back to work. I thought I’d share one of the projects I worked on over the holiday break. I really like the Hipstamatic app on my iPhone and have been taking pictures like crazy, mostly of just random things I run across throughout my day…things that I find interesting.
So what to do with all of these photos?
I had some MDF board (Medium-density fibreboard) lying around so I cut it into 4”x4” squares, painted them, and glued on the photos. To finish them off I covered them with a clear varnish. This was a fun little project and a great way to show off my Hipstamatic photos…

Shooting the messenger…bag

arno — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 21:04:56 +0000

When Bradford over at Corazzo asked if we could take some product photos of their new messenger bags we said of course we could when can we pick them up?
The next morning we met with Bradford to checkout the latest in their accessory line and to also see what type of photos he wanted. Here’s what Bradford said “we want this to be like a mullet, business up front and party in the back…”. He went on to explain that the bag is very versatile and they wanted to show that off in the photos. If you are going to a meeting and you need to bring a laptop, this is your bag. Going to a party after work, this is the bag for you. Oh and one last thing, the bags look awesome!

Amerivespa 2011 in New Orleans

arno — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 00:03:53 +0000

Amerivespa 2011 will be held in New Orleans next year and for the third year in a row Mush Studio is pleased to design the site for the event. The Vespa Club of America will be hosting the 19th annual scooter rally along with New Orleans Scooter Cooperative.
Not familiar with Amerivepa? That’s okay. Amerivespa is the largest scooter rally in North America. People from all over the world get together for a good time and the guys in New Orleans tell me they’re planning an Amerivespa to beat all Amerivespas…should be a great time!

Help the creative process…step away

arno — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 17:51:04 +0000

Every once in a while your creative process just stops and nothing appears to work. It doesn’t matter how hard you try nothing works for you. When this happens I like to pickup my sketchbook and just start doodling…after a few minutes I’m captivated, and the creativity is back. The biggest problem now is I don’t want to stop sketching, to many ideas in my head and I just want to keep going.
Sometimes stepping away from the computer helps in the creative process…some good music, coffee and a sketchbook. That’s all I need this morning.

Newsletters…mixing it up

arno — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 17:14:28 +0000

A lot of companies send out newsletters, the problem is getting your customers to open and look at them.
One of our latest projects was to revamp the customer newsletter for Corazzo Design.
What they wanted was something that resembled an old newspaper…but the goal was still the same, get the customers to their site. Most email marketing newsletter templates are the same…they’re boring.
We’re trying to change that!

Having fun working in the studio

arno — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 22:07:37 +0000

This week I thought it would be fun to make a short movie showing what happens here at Mush Studio. A couple of hours of my day condensed down to about a minute and a half…
I set one of the cameras up on a tripod to take a shot every 10 seconds for a couple hours, this ended up being over 500 photos (11mb each). After bring them into Adobe Lightroom I went to ‘Slideshow’ on the menu bar, set the ‘Slide Duration’ to Slides=0.5 Fades=0.0. Selected a soundtrack, in this case Stripped by Rammstein. An awesome band from Germany. ‘Export Video’ and done. Here’s the results, enjoy!

Working Rhinoceros Longboards

arno — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 15:57:37 +0000

It’s been a busy couple of months here at Mush Studio working on some fun projects. One of the things we recently wrapped up was a deck design for Portland’s Rhinoceros Longboards. The Jay over at Rhinoceros Longboards was open to our ideas so we ran with it. After showing them a couple concepts we started on the final renderings…very fun project. Can’t wait to start the next one.

Cha Cha Changes…

arno — Fri, 21 May 2010 23:45:49 +0000

Giving up the old way of doing things (Iwata Airbrush vs Wacom Cintiq).
I’ve been airbrushing for over 25 years now but for the last six mounts I haven’t even looked at my trusty old Iwata airbrush. I recently picked up a Cintiq 21ux by Wacom to replace my Intuo3, this thing is simply amazing! You can use most of the same techniques you would with traditional tools without slowing down and now with Adobes Photoshop CS5 the brush handling is even tighter…
A couple years ago I couldn’t imagine not having an airbrush as part of my tool set. But the more I use this drawing tablet the more I’m thinking I’ll most likely never use my airbrush again. I just don’t see a need for it any longer.

Do you backup your files?

arno — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 18:12:32 +0000

Recently we received a call from a client about restoring their web site. This is a site we designed a few years ago and have made small changes to once or twice over the years, but for the most part it’s maintained by the client…not a problem, we can help you out. We then asked about their backup, “did you backup the updated site?”. Long pause…no. This is not the reply we’d hoped for but it’s the reply we hear way more than we’d like.
As a design firm we do the project and then pass it back the client, we’re a small company with limited resources. Managing archived projects is very time consuming and would add to the cost of every project. Also, how could we guarantee this service? We couldn’t. But there are companies out there that do offer those services. It’s what they do, it’s all they do…it’s just not what we do. We do keep archives of all our completed jobs we’ve worked on (both on hard-drives & DVD) but sometimes things happen…updates are made to a site remotely, drives go bad, computers die, etc.
Here at Mush Studio we backup all our current projects to a local server, external drives, and to an online service everyday. The question is, do you backup your files? If so, how and how often?

Hit print

arno — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:33:14 +0000

After working on the Corazzo catalog for the last couple months we’re going to print today!!!
We’ve been working with the gang over at Corazzo really hard for the last couple months making sure we have all the details right on the new product catalog. Corazzo asked us to come up with something they could send out to their clients to show-off all the great scooter & motorcycle gear they make.
This ended up being a full color 32 page booklet finished off with perfect binding to give it that clean look they wanted. It’s a very exciting day…

Going live.

arno — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:40:52 +0000

After a couple years of looking at the same website design Bradford over at Corazzo said it was time to update the site with a fresh new look. “One that would showcase our products, how they look on, what makes them better than our competitors”…he wanted to show more photos of the products and give their customers as much information as possible.
We’ve been working hand-in-hand with them from concept to completion to make this happen. After months of layout, coding, and test we went live today. Checkout the site when you have a minute: corazzo.net.

Printing halfway around the world

arno — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:40:39 +0000

After a nice break we’re back to work here at Mush Studio. The first project we needed to get busy on was a catalog for a trade show in the UK that Corazzo would be attending.
The team over at Corazzo wanted something that would showcase there new line of products along with the existing ones. This needed to be designed here and printed quickly in the UK. Over 6000 miles from Portland, Oregon. Which also meant we’d not get to see a hard copy of the catalog until someone brought us one back (a week after the show). So we had one chance to get this right.Next up the US version…

Happy New Year!

arno — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 13:22:17 +0000

We here at Mush Studio would like to wish everyone a very Happy and safe New Year!
As we say goodbye to 2009 and welcome in the new year we here at Mush Studio are very grateful to all our clients, friends, and family for their support in 2009. It’s been a interesting year with many changes, some good and some not so good. But looking back at 2009 it was a fun year. We got to work on a number of great projects, meet some new friends, and be creative…how can that be a bad thing?
Thank you. We’re looking forward to a great year in 2010…

Having some fun around town

arno — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 00:40:49 +0000

Sometimes you just need to go outside and have some fun. We decided to get away from the studio and walk around downtown Portland to see what was going on. With cameras in hand we found some great inspirations around town…beautiful colors, textures, and amazing lighting.
Sometimes it pays off to skip out of work for a couple hours.

Helping PBSI with marketing materials

arno — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 21:56:42 +0000

When PBSI came to us asking for help with some marketing materials we started with the printed brochure. This would involve coming up with a unique piece for them to leave with a potential new client. They wanted something that had a lot of white space, clean lines, and something people would remember. After completing a couple concepts the final look & size was achieved.
We then moved on to the web site which PBSI wanted to match the look & feel of the printed material. They also wanted a site that they could update when they needed to. The site was done using a Content Management System (CMS) witch would give them the flexibility to add, remove, or change the sites content on their schedule.

Rebranding The H Group

arno — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:42:25 +0000

The goal on this project was to keep some of the elements and colors of the original The H Group logo. We created a sophisticated look that combined both a bold and very clean look, we delivered the style the client wanted.
The H Group – New Logo
The H Group – Old Logo

Crowne Plaza Wedding Brochure

arno — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 22:32:55 +0000

Starting with nothing more than we “need a brochure to promote our new wedding service” and “we need it fast” we started playing with concepts for the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Portland, Oregon. After receiving the pictures from the photographer we could work on finalizing the look & feel of the piece. With fonts, photos, and paper type all selected this project was really starting to come together.
Concept to Completion was done in under a month meeting the clients quick turn around request, just in time for the wedding season.

Getting the word out…Amerivespa 2009

arno — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 17:30:22 +0000

When we were asked if we’d like to work on the 2009 Amerivespa promotional project we jumped at the opportunity. This is the largest scooter rally in North America. The goal was to build a web site that could be updated quickly with information, take reservations for the rally, and accept payments. Using a content management system (CMS) called Drupal we were able to achieve this quickly and incorporate all the elements needed; a blog, eCommerce support, a gallery for the sponsors, event information, guidelines and FAQ.
Once the site was done we were asked to create the credential badges, the program guide and event banner. All of which needed to be turned around within 3 weeks in order to be ready for the event. Sponsor changes, event updates, and various other changes to the material made meeting the deadline a challenge, but we were up to the task and got it all done in time to promote the most successful Amerivespa event yet.
Here at Mush Studio we happen to be big fans of the scooter and we were proud to be a main contributing sponsor of the 2009 National Rally of the Vespa Club of America – Amerivespa. So…once our work was done we rewarded ourselves by attending the event. A great time was had by all! After four days of hanging out with scooterest from all around the world it was time to get back to work. Joined by some of our good friends from Corazzo off we went on our 940 mile ride back to Portland, Oregon. Click here to see a map of our journey.

Mush Studio has again been asked to participate in promoting the 2010 Amerivespa event which will be held in San Antonio, TX. Look for our designs and event information at www.amerivespa.org.

The Rebranding of Compensation Systems NW

arno — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 22:21:39 +0000

Mush Studio was asked to develop a new identity for Compensation Systems NW that was more contemporary while maintaining the essence of the company’s well-known identity.
The biggest challenge here was designing an identity that would tie the old look with the new one. Compensation Systems NW wanted to stay true to what had made them a successful company over the years. Not to “hip” but yet not “stuffy”…
The collaborative outcome was a design that stuck to the basics using colors and type treatment along with white space which made for a clean, clear statement that would let their clients know they are still the same company with a fresh look and an eye for progress.