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Monday, August 4, 2014

Rocket City Nerdcon 2014

I'm so excited to be posting this! Today's post is about the Rocket City Nerdcon! It's a brand new convention that will be hosted in Huntsville, Alabama at the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library-Main Branch on October 24th and 25th! It's a celebration of all things nerdy! (i.e. videogames, science fiction and fantasy movies/TV shows/books, etc.) Notable events is a cosplay panel and cosplay contest. There's even a panel about the science behind the movie "Pacific Rim!" I will post a link to the details for the convention below and where you can buy tickets:


The cool thing is that my sister is head of the committee that's running it and she commissioned me to create a logo for the convention. Now, logos aren't really "my thing" per say. I can draw in Photoshop, but I've never actually done logo besides the lazy one I've made for my blog. So, this was an adventure! 

The specifications were that I create a logo for a poster/program/brochure AND a logo that could be used in a more general sense such as letterheads, memos, etc. I was encouraged to use the color scheme from the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library logo so the color choices you'll see in the following photos are from that.

First off, this is the poster/program logo:


You can click on it to enlarge so you can see all the juicy details! I was inspired by the LEGO Movie 3D logo and tried it out with this logo. I was actually extremely excited to find out that my version of Photoshop had a 3D rendering option and found a tutorial video to guide me through the process of creating this logo. The only things not rendered in 3D are the purple "jet stream" and the rocket ship. The rocket ship was hand drawn and the "jet stream" was just made with the Pen Tool. I was surprised at the smoothness of Photoshop's 3D rendering and the many options and "smart" tools it utilized. 

Next, here is the general logo:



I had actually made 3 options total for the Nerdcon committee to vote on and they ended up choosing this one. Actually, this one is my favorite too! My inspiration came from the fact that Huntsville's nickname is "Rocket City" since NASA is based there. When I think about cities, I usually think about intricate, unique skylines. Huntsville, AL doesn't really have much of a skyline like many southern cities since there isn't much need for tall buildings due to the immense amount of land to build. I googled some images and found one that looked the most skyline-like and traced it with the Pen Tool in Photoshop to make the silhouette. The rocket was actually taken from the library logo so that it would connect the two organizations. the "Nerdcon" font is the same font I used in the 3D logo above.

Here are the other two logos that didn't make the cut:




I actually think these two would be more appropriately for t-shirts, but the first choice for logo is most befitting. :) Well, that's it for today's post! I hope you enjoyed reading my thought process behind creating these logos and don't forget to check out the link to Rocket City Nerdcon and spread the word to those that may be interested in celebrating their nerdy interests with others! 

Have an awesome day!

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