Well, in the begining I used simple text as logo and banner for my site. Then, I went to some banner generator and got the banner for my site. I never was satisfied with it.

So, I sat down and designed the logo-banner for my website, WiseTome.

It is a vector art done in Microsoft Word. I know, that is the unlikliest tool, but I chose that because the driving aim during the design was simplicity. The logo was desigined as follows:
- only 4 basic shapes: earlier I had gone for more colors, but then I setelled for monochromatic]
- the font for "WiseTome", which is 'Trebuchet MS'

I was always aiming at branding. I did not want something in my Logo and Banner that was too complicated to be replicated.

Hope my website grows and I can start selling merchandize based on that.

Ok. I think now I am dreaming too big.

I actually really like the design. (Perhaps this is because I'm a fan of simplicity?) I especially like that door (?) like thing next to "WiseTome". The colors of the logo also mesh in nicely with the website--I think it instills in visitors a nice, calm and quiet feeling. Anyways, it is kind of surprising that it was made in Microsoft Word.

I never really thought of Word as a good image editing program that could be used to make banners. Although I do occasionally use Word to insert weird symbols into Photoshop that Photoshop doesn't have. And btw, is it even possible to create a high resolution image with Microsoft Word?

This post has been edited by Arbitrary: Jul 7 2006, 06:04 PM

I don't have much to say, since it is simple, so there is nothing to talk about J/k, as Arbitary already said, it fits the web site perfectly. The only thing I mind is the size, or the height, to be more specific. If it were wider, it would make sense, but this way I think it takes too much space. Even a smaller one would do it

Ya man - the height is a bit too much. Squish it down a bit and think of spreading out the design widthwise to fill up the top.. It'd really fit in nicely then.

Well, it is actually a book ><. OK. I am a bit crappy on the vizualization.
Now that I think about it, both things open on a hinge like thingy - so I am pretty close, eh?

I am not sure if Word is a good image editing program, but it worked for the present senario because all I wanted was a bunch of basic shapes in vector so that I can easily change its shape and size and skew, and mix and match the all the properties and the colours. Then, I combined it with the WiseTome text, and after some long brainstorming with some of my friends, I settled down on the Trebuchet. You should have seen the first few of those logos littered around the workspace. All the fonts like Verdana, Curlz, to Jokerman (yes, Jokerman!) were used. Then we had to choose between Gills Sans and Trebuchet. In the end it was my call, and I went for Trebuchet, because I wanted something that was a bit more common and easily found, so that in the future, if I had to reproduce the same logo under some other software I would be able to do it. So, in the end, it came out to be four round edged rectagles to form the 'Tome' or the book (common word ) and the text 'WiseTome' in Trebuchet MS.

Now about the height. I think I may reduce it, but when we were mixing and mashing it on the MS paint... ok.

Now before I tell anything else, I should say that I used MS Paint too. We grabbed a screen print of the site, and then laided it on the Paint program. After getting the finalized logo and banner text, we would copy it to the paint program and see how it looked at various positions. If something did not fit in many of the locations, it was back to the drawing board (or MS Word), and then redesign, and the process again. We went through some five of six cycles like this.

Now, continuing what i was saying before this paragraph: ... we were moving it to the center or the right edge and trying out different things. We found that we should leave the space alone and keep the Logo + Banner small in terms of width. About the space that remains in the header, I have not thought about it, but that I think should hold something else. Not the logo + banner. Another purpose of keeping it that dimensions is to have a handy set of logo and banner that can be placed at various places. Hey guys, do you have any ideas on how I can use that space to the right of the logo+banner on the header? Adspace? Would it sell? Obviously not now, but I might think about it in the future.

Anyway, may be I should reduce the size of the logo+banner. That way, I get more space for the other things.

I like your logo. It does not seem nice on the forum, but it's look and feel is really adapted to the rest of your site page.
So, I woud tell you "don't change anything". Or, at least, test the modifications the other forummers suggest you, but be ready to go back to your original layout.

You know, I like the layout. It's neat and orderly and the colors also look good. Of course, it's a little hard to believe that the logo is a book , no offense, but it resembles a welding mask.

But although there are ads all over the site, it doesn't look cluttered and is rather neatly arranged.

I don't think you need to change the size nor font as far as the logo is concerned, it looks good.

A book. A door. A welding mask. Man! Do I really conceptualize that bad!

Anyway, thanks for your review abhiram. I think I will keep things as they are for the time being. When I do future revisions, I will try to keep the things you all have stated in mind, and redesign it. I will definetly try to make a more book like logo. But for now, I think I will start building the 'brand-image' of WiseTome.

I am off to start work on Frequently Asked Questions. I think I will add a "What is that logo?" to it. That way, I will brainwash everyone to think of it as a book, and I need not redesign.

Yeah, that's really good! It's very appealing because it's so simple. There's only one color, and the lines aren't too harsh... no sharp corners...

I love it!

I'm sure that'll help you get lots of business.

Thank you austinkoge for your reviews.

And business? Well, I do not have any at the moment. The website is intended to serve quality articles and information on various topics. May be later if I get enough articles on one particular topic, I might put a HTML based book out there under the banner of WiseTome. (OK. I start day dreaming again )