In the business of television news, we are always looking for new and innovative ways to disseminate our content and promote our brand. A few years ago, I came up with the idea to create a podcast that focuses on weather in the Pacific Northwest. The podcast format would give us a more casual setting and more time to talk about local weather phenomena, interview weather experts, and give a behind the scenes glimpse at what it is like to work in the news business. After taking a break from the podcast, we are going to revive it in the coming months and I wanted to give it a new logo.
It was important to incorporate weather and audio elements into the design, but I did not want it to be too busy. I sketched out some ideas and found that with many of my ideas, there was too much going on. I am more familiar with Photoshop projects, like posters, which can include a bunch of information and elements. Initially, a more simplified look was harder to wrap my head around, but I was able to come up with a design that works nicely.
For the cloud, I used the elliptical tool and created four circles of different sizes. To fill in the gaps at the bottom, I used a rectangle and then used the pathfinder tool to make it one piece. I filled it with blue and added a small darker outline to give it a little more pop.
The sun was made using the elliptical tool. I added a gradient to the yellow and orange colors to give it a more interesting look.
I really struggled trying to figure out how to incorporate the microphone. Did I want to make it small or big? Should it be in the foreground or the background? I went looking for some logo ideas that involved microphones. I considered using a handheld mic or a studio standup mic for the design. I liked the look of the studio mic better. I found this tutorial on how to draw a microphone. I followed those instructions, which included making a rectangle and bringing in the edges so they were rounded. Then I made another larger one and deleted some of the points using the direct selection tool for the curved part of the stand. The rest of the stand was made with the line tool. I also added my own twist by including the white line just below center and the white dots on the top half. I arranged the dots to make a “W” for “weather.” It’s a small detail that others might not notice, but I liked it.
I picked the font Copperplate for this project. I put that at the bottom instead of incorporating it into the drawings. The separation looks better. I added some width to the letters in the word “podcast” to give it a little more emphasis.
This is a challenging, but powerful program. I’m looking forward to hearing some feedback so I can improve this design!
Brian MacMillan's Blog 
Brian,
I like your first draft. I found it to be visually appealing and loved the contrast with the colors in the background and the microphone in the foreground. You made a great choice picking the weather elements and giving them a subtle version of their colors, making the microphone in black, stand out.
As for technical elements, I think it would be great to take away the outer lines and add a softer edge. Clouds have soft round edges and I feel this one was a bit too “stiff” with the stroke you have. I love the concept of the sun, but would love to see the gradient start yellow on the inside and move it’s way out into orange. This would still give you the concept that you were going after, but by making a smoother transition, which would be easier on the eye and not have the harsh contrast of yellow to orange.
I know you struggled a bit with your microphone, but I love it how you have it. It stands out perfectly, it has a great shape and I think you picked a great font choice. It is legible and definitely gives me the PNW feel and your choice on separating the words and the letters gave it more pronunciation and a good visual punch!
I found that I would choose this podcast to get all of my weather-related needs, based on the logo. The overall emotional reaction I got to this logo was soothing and that’s important to me as a Podcast listener. I want to know that I am not getting information aggressively delivered to me, and I feel this podcast would be enjoyable to listen to. Great job!
Lauren
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Hi Brian,
I’ll start with my favorite parts of the logo. I really like the design of the microphone. It’s simple, sophisticated and makes a great central image. The subtle “W” was a nice touch as well. The microphone clearly explains that the logo represents, a podcast. I also think the font you used ties in perfectly, and its positioning creates a nice overall composition.
I tend to agree with Lauren about the stroke on the cloud. I don’t think it’s necessary for your logo. Some kind of softer transition (even just removing the stroke effect) would seem more appropriate.
That kind of ties in to my next comment about the sun. I had a little trouble with the opacity of the left side of the sun. Since you chose to do a very simple cloud, with hard edges, I feel like the sun needs to be the same. Or, alternatively, if you wanted to soften the edges of the cloud, you could do them both in that format.
Well done!
Justin
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I really appreciate the comments from my fellow classmates on how I can make this logo better.
First off, I will remove the dark blue stroke from the cloud. My peers are right that the stroke really doesn’t fit in with the rest of the composition.
I like Lauren’s idea of using a gradient to go from yellow in the center to orange on the outside, instead of the two circles I used in this draft. That will simplify it, but still give it an interesting look, as opposed to just being yellow. However, I will try a solid yellow color as well to see if that fits in better with the overall composition, since the cloud will not have any gradient. I was worried about oversimplifying this logo, but after researching many others, I discovered that there is a sophistication to simplification.
I feel good about how the microphone turned out, so I don’t think I’m going to tweak that much going forward.
The font turned out well, but I may experiment more with the word “podcast” to see if widening it more looks better.
Thanks for your feedback. I’m looking forward to finishing this up!
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Brian,
I have two podcasts and a local radio show so I am immediately intrigued and interested in this design and project! I think you have a great draft here. Your shape creation here has really worked for you. The cloud is very well done. Furthermore, I really like the flare affect that you created on the sun by using a gradient.
My first suggestion would be to possibly thicken the stroke on your cloud shape to have it match the rest of the graphic. Because your microphone and font is so bold and black, maybe adding some darker lines throughout could help balance it. However, even with this suggestion, I wonder how your sun might seem out of place without a black line once that cloud has been change. Maybe play around with the strokes of those shapes and see how it feels overall.
Another suggestion I have comes from what I have seen done with other podcast images or graphics. With the font at the bottom of the graphic, it may help the title stand out if you differentiated “podcast” from the rest of the title. This can be done by choosing a different font, making the word a different color, or warping the text in a way. I don’t necessarily think that adding width or making the words larger makes it stand out. Sometimes just making it slightly different can do that. If you want clarity, feel free to email me and I’ll send you an example that I am thinking of. Great job!
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