Team EAT | Vertek Solutions

Logo, I Choose You…!

Team EAT’s VerTek Solutions did not have a logo before it was even announced that we made it into the finals. When we found out that we indeed made it into the finals, one of those aspects of the project that made us scramble really quickly to come up with is the logo for our fictional company.

I, Fred, decided to create one realizing all too well that it won’t be the one making it into France (so, I had expectations that it could be… oh well, no big whoop). I created the logo that was on display on the main website and the wallpaper that I made for three weeks.

Firstly, let me backtrack to the inception of the company name.

The four of us in the team came up with a bunch of name for our fictional company. I still remember the time when I suggested the name Vertek (t in lower case). I came up with the name the night before I officially threw it into the hat full of names (really, it was only a couple of names). Nick, Juan, Walter, and I were discussing the names and I got quiet to prepare myself to announce the name that might sound stupid. Yes, I had to prepare to myself for the critical comments. Walter and Nick were about to leave when I shouted out, “How about Vertek!?” The three of them got quiet and I really thought that they would say no. I explained that since Imagine Cup’s theme is the environment and that the finals will be in France why not have a name that suits both. Vertek is the combination of the words Vert, the French word for green, and Technology. As cliché as the color green in association with the environment, the name works. The word Solutions came up later on. It was almost called Vetek Home Automation Solutions but it was way too long. Thus, shortening it and VerTek Solutions was born.

Now onto the discussion of the logo.

As I was saying the temporary logo that I made was inspired by the stock image that I found on stock photo website. The stock image, which is being used as the background for the website and our software, had a hazy blue sky and grass at the bottom. It reminded me of the calming effect of nature. We’ve been picturing our logo in blue and green all along so this was perfect. I created VERTEK in a strong looking font. The letters V and T were originally were bigger in size than the rest of the letters. When I added the word SOLUTIONS, I was thinking if that should be smaller but the same width as the word VERTEK or the word is smaller and aligned to right side. I added text effects on both words including bevel, shadow, and outline. The logo that I just came up with was a little plain so I decided to add a graphic treatment to it by replacing the T with an I and added a big leaf on the top-right side that evokes the image of a tree. I showed it to everyone and Juan suggested adding a smaller leaf on the left side to make it look like a T. That’s how the previous logo was created.

For the logo that we chose as our officialy identity, we hired a graphic designer. He came up with the image you see to the right. Nick, Juan, and I were discussing how we like or not like some aspects of the logo. Juan was satisfied, I was indifferent as always, and Nick not so much fancies the new logo. He prefered my old logo over the new one (thanks Nick!). Through his concerns over the new logo, I created a mash up of both the new and old logos. His first concern was that the blue in VERTEK was “too blue.” I softened the blue and kept my font. The second was to go with my original idea of making SOLUTIONS smaller and align it to the right. As you can see below, I came up with a few of them below.

Ultimately, we decided to keep the new logo since we got a poster designed based on it, yay!.

All in all, I think I’ve grown as a graphic designer (I’m reluctant to call myself one, I’m not really). I discovered new techniques and made myself find new ways of creating the effects that I want to use.

Next post: discussion about the poster.

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