After reading through the helpful comments and critiques from my peers I definitely had a good idea of what I needed to do in order to make my logo a much better design. Executing these changes was another story altogether and was the tough part as I am not completely confident in my Illustrator abilities unless I have step-by-step instructions.
I added a shadow to the bottom of the stereo, much like the shadows under the little pink bunny in the tutorials but deleted it after decided that it did not look good with the gradient design. Instead, I incorporated the fist logo design from the tutorials so it looked like somebody holding the boombox. I rounded the edges of the boombox so it does not look as 2-D and box-like as it did before. I added my original gradient background back to the design for aesthetic appeal as well. I also added two attenaes which were simply designed with the line and eclipse tools. I’d like to thank my peers for their thoughful and helpful constructive criticism on my design process.
I initially started with the rectangle tool and made a rectangle of unknown dimensions. I then gave it an 8 p.t. black stroke after experimenting with different colors and stroke lines. After that I wrote “ZMM DESIGNS” in big bold letters. Because my project is about me, I went with my initials “ZMM” and “DESIGNS” as a fake company name for the purpose of my logo. I also added “Est. 1990″ as that is my birth year and I thought it gave it a little more flair.
Following those details I made two circle shapes with the elipse tool. I thought my design was starting to look like a boombox stereo so I continued to use that thinking to influence my design. I hope everyone was able to see that as my intention. I added various shapes to serve as buttons and the cosmetic look of the speakers but didn’t want to go too detailed with the buttons and whatnot because I wanted to keep the design crisp, yet simple and an overall lack of experienced Illustrator skills. I used the colors red and black because they look really slick together and are my favorite combination besides dark blue and green, my first choice. I added a grey background for aesthetic effect even though it would not be present if my logo were to appear on a letterhead or something.
The design pertains to me and my life because I love listening to music and do so every day to get myself amped for the gym and also when I’m doing homework or studying for tests. Without music in my life, homework would be nearly impossible. It helps me to focus and use and attribute my energy wisely. I look forward to the critiques on my design and hope people can provide good insight and feedback on how I can perfect it for visual appeal. The feedback was overall quite helpful on my Photoshop collage so I hope for more of the same this time around.