Greetings! I suppose the "Boost Logo Contest Conversation" becames forming something philosophical :) I'm not a professional graphic artist any more, but have been worked as a graphic artist for some years. Although logo gives the face of the project, company, team etc., it does not determine the area of operation of the represented! I mean a logo doesn't need to reflect to all of the services a company provides and it's very hard to find a logo that looks great and tells everything about the company. Conclusion: sometimes that's good enough to have an impressive logo the emotional effect depends on the represented. However, I'm absolutely sure about the thing that the "user" will not spend any valuable minute on racking his brains about the very meaning of an abstract logo :).
Pepsi, Nike, Sun, Microsoft Windows, BMW, Toyota, Apple...
The logos of these companies are really impressive and stylish, aren't they? In my point of view Nike, Sun and perhaps Pepsi have those logos that are great just by being a logo the others mentioned need to have the background meaning to catch the attention. Iconify: I share the opinion of those who think about the recognizability of a logo as a basic feature, especially by extremely tiny size... but I don`t think that we would need a sparated icon logo as well. Sometimes the logo itself can work as an icon: http://people.inf.elte.hu/cad/etc/boost/famous-logos.png Although the logo of the Infiniti company is completely abstract, it`s incredible: http://people.inf.elte.hu/cad/etc/boost/infiniti.png As I attended the competition I don`t judge anyone`s work, since I`m affraid I couldn`t stay objective.:)
Then I examine it, my first thought is: "what is it supposed to be?" This is not good for a logo, IMO: when you look at a logo, it should be clear that a it represents something concrete or that it is a purely abstract design. (If a concrete representation is hidden in what first appears to be an abstract design, that's okay too.) The reason I find myself asking what this particular logo is meant to represent, I think, is that it's not sufficiently complex to hold its own as an abstract design. Once I ask myself what the logo represents, I can only conclude that it depicts a stack of paper. This is a big problem: aside from the fact that Boost has little to do with a stack of paper, stacks of paper are simply uninteresting.
I would like to protect my 75th application by some words: a logo doesn't need to illustrate anything tangible, since everyone will think and feel by seeing the logo the way he concieves of the represented. Jonathan saws papers, I saws component layers. that is subjectivity. Zoltan 'cad' Juhasz