torsten's .NET blog - RSS Bandit new logo design contest

Friday, August 12, 2005

RSS Bandit new logo design contest

As my various mails to some web designers does not had any real effect to get a new set of icons for the Next Generation User Interface of my favorite feed reader, I hope I will get more responses and comments by starting a design contest for a new logo of RSS Bandit now. Currently we use this one:

The application icon is just the smiley face simulating the point of the character "i". Some professional users complains about the "unprofessional" look of our logo (they associate a game or an app to play with) while there are also users that really like it.
So I just started with some new that get rid of the smiley face, as you can see some variants here:

Variant 1	Variant 2	Variant 3	Variant 1 and 2 Eric (Thanks to Eric Winchester)
Variant 1a	Variant 2a	Variant 3a	Variant Aaron (thanks to Aaron)
	Variant 2b	Smiley Variant 1 (Thanks to Mark Allanson)	Variant Ash (Thanks to Ash)

So please vote in comments to this post, what you like or not. Send your own designs to my contact address or that at www.rssbandit.org, please. I will add them here for all to preview and vote.

Use the App Icon png found in post enclosure to create your own with the awsome smiley...

Update: as suggested I added variants; 2a with smiley and made the "RSS" a little bit more different in color than the background.

Update 2: 2b with smiley in foreground and removed "hands", and a new variant 3a for the one who liked that.

Update 3: variant 4 (Eric Winchester by mail) and Smiley variant 1 (Mark Allanson by mail to Dare Obasanjo aaaages ago ;-)

Update 4: more variants (Aaron by comment, Ash by mail)

Update 5: more variants from Eric Winchester with the bandito-mask (by mail). Jake, I got your images but they are not much different than our own or that of Mark Allanson. I only post variants here that are interesting AND different in variations. But go on with other/more samples, please!

Voting results as of Oct 11th, 2005 (53 comments, final result):


1	1a	2	2a	2b	3	3a	Eric 1	Eric 2	Aaron	Ash

So the team will go with variant Eric 1 and we do really want to say thank you all that helped with pictures and votings!

Technorati tags: RSS Bandit

Friday, August 12, 2005 12:26:52 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Comments [60] | Tracked by:
"RSS Bandit [Nightcrawler Edition] Alpha Progress Report" (Dare Obasanjo aka Car... [Trackback]
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"RSS Bandit [Nightcrawler Edition] Update: Amazon OpenSearch, the Newsgator API ... [Trackback]
"RE: RSS Bandit [Nightcrawler Edition] Alpha Progress Report" (Blue Fenix) [Trackback]
"RE: RSS Bandit [Nightcrawler Edition] Alpha Progress Report" (Blue Fenix) [Trackback]
"RE: RSS Bandit [Nightcrawler Edition] Alpha Progress Report" (Christopher) [Trackback]
Bandit-Logo.32x32.png (30.12 KB)

Friday, August 12, 2005 1:11:46 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant 2 by far... it looks smooth and sleek. V3 looks too busy and V1 looks a little retro.

Simon Moon

Friday, August 12, 2005 2:10:45 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Completely agreed with Simon. Variant 2.

Lion

Friday, August 12, 2005 2:46:00 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

+1 on variant 2

Thomas Freudenberg

Friday, August 12, 2005 8:50:55 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I think I like number 2 the best, but it might be better if the bluish parts weren't so dark. Or maybe the black text was 'punched out' white. Just seems a little over stylized.

isaacg

Saturday, August 13, 2005 1:36:14 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

1 is ok.
Maybe my monitor but the 2nd reads as "SS Bandit" at first glance. The R blends into the blue/black.
3 is too busy.

Prefer the current smiley to all of them! Any chance you can leave for those who don't want the boring professional look :-)

Robin Capper

Saturday, August 13, 2005 8:32:00 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Robin: I added variants.

TorstenR

Sunday, August 14, 2005 8:48:10 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I vote for 2a.

Vasanth

Sunday, August 14, 2005 11:06:04 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I hate to "follow the crowd" but I agree with everyone else in saying #2 is my favourite.

Len

Sunday, August 14, 2005 11:43:57 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

2a is my current favourite (may change as more variants are added I guess).

However, when users are complaining about the smiley, do they complain because it 's in the logo (which I had never seen before, I think) or because it's the application icon?

Also: what do you want to achieve exactly with the new icon? This may have a big impact on the choice you'll make. As said by others, 1 looks a bit retro, 1a looks very basic, 2 hides the R in RSS, 2a looks rather playful, both 2 and 2a pull RSS towards the 'news' category (for user that don't know it) with the newspaper. 3 is probably the most in fashion right now. I don't feel it's busy, but it is very, well, nerdy: few people will understand any of 'rss/', 'xml:', 'opml:' etc. (And is there an opml: protocol? ;-) If nerds/geeks/techies are the audience you want, that's good (it may keep the dumb support questions away!), but if you want a wider audience, that's not so good. In the same way 2a almost implies that children are your target audience.

legolas

Monday, August 15, 2005 7:39:09 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I vote for variant 2, or a hybrid between 2 and 2a:

As a previous poster suggested, the R in RSS is a bit hard to see b/c of the black foreground on blue background. Perhaps lighten the RSS to a grey. Also, I'm not a fan of the hands on the logo, remove them and move the pirate smiley to the foreground.

Jake

Wednesday, August 17, 2005 4:12:58 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Most complaints are about the app icon (also used in the system notification area). My idea was to just the colored standing square as the new app icon...

TorstenR

Wednesday, August 17, 2005 7:06:39 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

TorstenR: I think the decision on icon is more complicated to make than on logo. But the standing on it's angle square like on logo's Variant 1 seems suitable and easy to read on screen.

Lion

Thursday, August 18, 2005 9:51:06 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

2a - don't take all the fun out of it. I like the bandit...

Derek

Friday, August 19, 2005 4:22:00 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant 2 looks quite professional (with the newspaper on the bottom). Like that...

taffit

Monday, August 22, 2005 1:55:21 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I have both a Mac at home, and at work I naturally have a PC. It's not a huge deal breaker for me to have an app that works well but isn't very pretty looking. But to attract the general populous I'd say that improving the logo should be a high priority. Not in general, but I'd have to say that since you're attempting it, it is a big deal.

All of the options don't really improve on the concept. I do agree that the diamond shape would improve the app icon in the system tray, but I'd say with WinXP out there you should push the level of detail.

I'll see what I can whip up, but I don't know how busy I'll be at work in the near future. Oh yeah, I'm a graphic designer, though logos aren't my strong point. Keep us updated. :)

jake

Thursday, August 25, 2005 11:17:09 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Ditch the smiley face, go with the professional look. Variant 2! I noticed there are some new icons used throughout in Dare's post. That's nice to see as well. The app is great but the UI could stand a good polishing.

Jim Mathies

Friday, August 26, 2005 12:23:50 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I vote for 2a

Prathiraj

Friday, August 26, 2005 2:23:56 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

+1 for 2b

Ayende Rahien

Friday, August 26, 2005 6:52:48 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Sorry, I don't really care for any of them. I'm just not feeling any of them.

BTW, does this mean the icon would change also?

I guess my vote would be anything that does *not* have the smiley-face icon on it.

-Ryan

Ryan Farley

Friday, August 26, 2005 9:33:29 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant2++

If I *had* to pick one of the three variants of variant 2...

Variant2b++

Yex

Monday, August 29, 2005 2:08:07 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I vote for 2a ...

Petr Reichl

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 6:27:36 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I like variant 4 the best; although none of them strike me "exceptionally compelling".

Michael Griffiths

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 10:57:11 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I vote for Variant 4. I like the grin look :)

Kevin

Wednesday, August 31, 2005 10:21:38 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Groovy... ok, I change my vote to number 4: the bandit still there, but looking much more professional than the actual logo...

taffit

Wednesday, August 31, 2005 11:48:45 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Friday, September 02, 2005 6:46:01 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant 1!

It's the only one which looks like it's been designed by a *designer* (except v4). The others looks like cheap logos straight out of Publisher 98 clipart. Very dated.

Variant 1 has the smooth, XP feel to it. Very, very good.

Look at what the nice Firefox icon did for Firefox's popularity.

Nick Dunn

Sunday, September 04, 2005 3:00:45 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I don't particularly like any of them. I'd go with something that centers around the folded newspaper (the only part of any of the things that looks good. Perhaps simply the folded newspaper with the orange RSS logo on the bottom right. That way it's naturally associated with RSS and news. I don't think there's any need to include the product name.

Something like this (not a great example...)

http://brh.numbera.com/rssbanditicon1.png

Ben Hollis

Monday, September 05, 2005 11:41:25 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

the newspaper one is probably the nicest looking one. an important thing as well would be to tie in the application's splash screen (and possibly even elements of the actual GUI). at the moment, it's all a bit unfocussed with the smiley as a logo and the splash screen as a space picture...

patrick h. lauke

Monday, September 05, 2005 11:42:19 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

duh...by "the newspaper one" i meant variant 4

patrick h. lauke

Wednesday, September 07, 2005 9:53:56 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant 2a is my favourite (maybe 2b is a good idea for some animation in the splash screen) ... Variant 4 would be my second choice.

Matthias

Thursday, September 08, 2005 9:02:25 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant 2, but w/ the "RSS" letters from 2a.

Jayson Knight

Thursday, September 08, 2005 7:47:06 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

It's all about branding... RSS Bandit has a following -- a familiarity associated with it.

The imagery needs to remain true to the brand. The splash screen, the favicon.ico on the sight, the tray icon, the web page, about screen, footer of support emails... everything needs to convey the brand through images. The eye patch is an icon of the product; lose it at your peril... In fact, make embroidered eyepatches with the smiley face...

I believe that the face might be turn slightly (rendered rotated to it's left) with shading to make it look less cartoonish/old school. Look at msn messenger... the icon of the green shaded torso is everywhere!

Regarding the corporate user's thinking that it is something to be played with... does the paperclip or wizard in office seem "more professional".

Dave Thomas

Friday, September 09, 2005 7:59:26 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Dave: good points. The majority of feedback states to keep the smiley with the eye patch and we tend to follow them. Just waiting for the most "professional" eye patched smiley image... ;-)

torsten.rendelmann@gmx.net (Torsten Rendelmann)

Friday, September 09, 2005 6:50:00 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

How did the name 'Rss Bandit' come about?

Dave Thomas

Friday, September 16, 2005 12:33:41 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Darn, I come back to find that Mr. Smiley is staying. The mock ups I had down on paper were total deviations. I had a racoon, a bandana, a robin hood cap, and one of those generic looking pirate captain hats.

I guess I'll drop all of them and look into a "professional smiley." Outside of the logo itself being cleaned up a bit I'd say using a different font would help a LOT. What style are we going for here? Fontleech just had a free pirate font on display. But I didn't think it quite fit. I just think something stronger is needed. I forgot the power cable to my laptop at work, but I'll try and do a little "professional" work over the weekend.

Jake

Saturday, September 17, 2005 10:52:09 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Jake: that sounds cool. You can send it directly to me and I will add them to be displayed for voting, thanks!

TorstenR

Thursday, September 22, 2005 3:11:19 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I didn't care for any of the options presented here very much (either too bland or too "IM"-look), so I spent an hour playing around this evening with some ideas and posted them on my web site here:
http://www.wiredprairie.us/journal/2005/09/rss_bandit_logo_idea.html

Aaron

Wednesday, September 28, 2005 1:17:01 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I like the one with the smiley and the newspaper that Eric Winchester did. It is high quality and fun!

Richard

Wednesday, September 28, 2005 12:09:00 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant Eric (Thanks to Eric Winchester)

manuti

Wednesday, September 28, 2005 10:52:40 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I emailed my quick mock ups to the rssbandit email address, I wasn't sure what you're was Torsten.

jake

Thursday, September 29, 2005 7:21:47 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant Eric gets my vote!

Chris Slatt

Thursday, September 29, 2005 7:59:32 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant Eric++

it wouldn't be the same w/o the smiley...

gerrard

Thursday, September 29, 2005 10:35:41 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

VariantEric with Variant2 a distant second.

Jack Richins

Thursday, September 29, 2005 10:57:40 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant Eric

Mitch Denny

Friday, September 30, 2005 12:00:00 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Variant ERIC, but with Aaron's bandito-mask instead the eye-patch (I always thought the eye-patch was for RSS Pirate).

Marc Brooks

Friday, September 30, 2005 4:25:03 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Eric 2 gets my vote, followed by Eric 1.

Troy Goode

Saturday, October 01, 2005 5:54:18 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Argh.... Or should I sat Arrrr... (PIrate Voice).

I was more going for a "professional look" as best I could. I'm just surprised the #5 version which wasn't a 'smiley' at all, outside of being yellow, wasn't a good enough variation. I'm not really sure what you guys are looking for. I'll keep trying to plug away at it a bit and throw in some stuff that's totally off the map. But I have other projects cropping up so I might only get a day or two of free time. Hmm....

*Walks back to the drawing board...*

jake

Saturday, October 01, 2005 11:25:09 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Eric 1!

Mine sucks compared to the rest, haha! thats what happens when a developer tries to do graphics.

Mark Allanson

Tuesday, October 04, 2005 8:05:21 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

eric 1

zyxil

Wednesday, October 05, 2005 12:18:23 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Eric 1

Westy

Wednesday, October 05, 2005 2:44:05 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I tried in a completely different direction:

http://www.wiredprairie.us/journal/2005/10/another_attempt_at_the_rss_ban.html

Aaron

Wednesday, October 05, 2005 8:07:21 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Eric 1

Frank

Sunday, October 09, 2005 2:25:13 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Eric! Both!

ining

Monday, October 17, 2005 6:24:24 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Hi,

it would be better if you can update RSS Bandit to upcoming .NET2.0 (it wont work with .NET2 rcX).

Meran Herbal

Monday, October 24, 2005 1:24:43 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Meran: don't forget it is a spare time project and requires spare time to get any progress. So there is some time to just have fun and with that we have motivation to go on programming... ;-)
Or: just provide a patch, or donate to get it done with a higher priority.

TorstenR

Tuesday, April 17, 2007 8:02:32 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Hi,

it would be better if you can update RSS Bandit to upcoming .NET2.0 (it wont work with .NET2 rcX).

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Monday, April 23, 2007 5:02:35 AM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

I like variant 4 the best; although none of them strike me "exceptionally compelling".

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Tuesday, August 21, 2007 5:12:33 PM (W. Europe Daylight Time, UTC+02:00)

Well... I don't know if this calls for honesty (or, if honesty is appreciated) and I don't know if you've gone ahead and made a decision? But I don't like any of them. Ash, I think, was onto something there (As far as making a professional, more corporate like logo...) but I still think it wasn't quite there. The truth is, that you're not really wanting to go for 'corporate' as much as you're wanting to go for 'simple' or 'slick.' Actually, what you're wanting is web 2.0 and I don't think any of these fit the design. Just my opinion, anyway, but one I thought you might want to consider. You need simple, and I don't think these are simple enough.

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