The Story Behind Our Unique Logo Design
Image of the main character, “Princess Melanie,” illustrated by Irish concept artist Leanna Hillen for Daddy, Where Do the Animals on the Train Go?
Conceptualizing logos are a unique challenge. The graphic has to be memorable but fresh in appearance. It must get its message across quickly. Logos require simplicity unencumbered by visual complexity or it will risk losing the intended audience’s attention. Additionally, the final design must translate well across mediums (social media profile, business letterheads, television, company t-shirts, books, etc.), and it must scale well in various formats (small, medium, large, etc.). These are just a few of the things that come to mind. Personally, I believe a logo that excels is one that embodies the “soul” of an idea or represents the values of a brand distilled down to its purest essence and presented as a single piece. And that’s the conundrum for this fundamental truth which constantly eludes me as a designer. I would much rather contract another professional who specializes on the matter. It is a rarity that I “hit the nail on the head.” However, when I do, I leap for joy. Several years ago, I came upon one which I still think to be a stroke of genius. On the other hand, It was not because of me alone. I had much help. In fact, as I recall, it was not my intention to develop a logo.
The Original Assignment
During November 2018, I contracted several artists to help develop Daddy, Where Do the Animals on the Train Go? when I envisioned it as a complete narrative versus the mini-series it is today. Each of them were given the task of demonstrating the interaction and relationship between the characters. Images laying out the appearances of “Daddy” and “Daughter” were shared with them. I knew what I wanted to see in general concerning each character; yet I struggled with an aspect of the daughter “Princess Melanie.” It was important to me to show the little girl as having a fondness and a great appreciation for her heritage. So, I instructed the artists to include “I Love Africa” as graphic symbols versus written words on the character’s white t-shirt. This would give a subtle hint to our intended audience that someone in the child’s family was a well-educated adult. Additionally, it fell right in line with Places We Go with Media, LLC’s company purpose. There was just one problem. In her final form, Princess Melanie wore a jacket over her t-shirt. It was opened, but some of the graphics might be covered. “How was this going to look?”
Where There is a Problem, There is a…
The creative process takes time. It is imperative to give illustrators their space to think and execute. I never like “hanging over the shoulder” of a creative person or any professional I contract for that matter. Your end result is what concerns me. I do not care to see how you get there. Otherwise, why did I hire you if I don’t trust your expertise? That said, one artist resided in Ohio while the other two were in Italy and Ireland making for a several-hours difference. Regardless, my heart was filled with a child-like anticipation. “What would each professional conjure up?”
As each draft rolled in overtime throughout the week, I noticed that my lack of specific input had manifested in their character designs. Two illustrators had good visuals for storytelling, but Princess Melanie’s t-shirt looked rather bland. One design for “I Love Africa” used 2 lines where the first 2 graphics were on the first line and the last symbol was relegated to the second. The first word was the letter “I,” the second was an image of a heart, and the third one was a graphic representation of the continent of Africa. Visually, the whole message was an upside-down triangle if you squinted your eyes (an artist’s visual test). That was cool, but not what I was looking for. Another artist ran the graphic imagery horizontally across the t-shirt, which meant some of the message was covered by the character’s jacket. How were we going to solve this problem?
Image created by Italian character illustrator Armando Tozzi for Daddy, Where Do the Animals on the Train Go? His t-shirt design would serve as the building block for the final iteration.
Among the 3 book illustrators was a young and gifted Italian named Armando Tozzi. Armando’s interpretation of Princess Melanie’s t-shirt was so obvious, and yet, I had never considered it. He took the message and ran it vertically. I was shocked. A person could see the positive pictorial language in its entirety unencumbered by the child’s jacket, and it was uniformed as a single line. And that was not all.
A few months ago, I had been studying ancient Egypt which brought me back to that old world’s form of transmitting ideas. In my art history class, we discovered that an educated group known as scribes used a certain symbol later named by the unlearned French as a “cartouche” to help usher their noble dead into the afterlife. Years later, I became aware that the ancient Egyptians called it a “shen” or an elongated “shen ring.” It was a stylized rope looped with a line tangent to it. The word shen meant encircle and represented eternal protection. With an elongated shen ring, the graphics inside represented the name of a royal person.
Final graphic logo design and character illustration of Princess Melanie created by Solomon Johnson, author of Daddy, Where Do the Animals on the Train Go? Book One.
And so, it made sense to me that Princess Melanie’s shirt would use the shen to protect the positive sentiment of “I Love Africa” on her t-shirt. Immediately, I redesigned the message, this time trading in the letter “I” for the graphic closest to the “all seeing eye,” normally found throughout ancient Egyptian “medu neter” or “hieroglyphics,” and representing the pineal gland found in human brains. (It has been suggested that the pineal gland gives humans “sight” beyond the material world but could be a devastating experience to an unskilled novice seeking enlightenment via this “organ’s” path. However, there is no scientific consensus among academic scholars to back up the entirety of these claims).
Vinyl pressing of “I Love Africa/I Love Myself” t-shirt hand crafted by Kenya Johnson. Photo by Heart of Solomon, LLC.
Later on, my wife hand-crafted the positive symbol onto actual t-shirts as merchandise for our customers to wear. Jokingly, but also very seriously, I view it as a person’s “superhero” emblem. So, if you are feeling down or anxious for any reason, you could look at your “I Love Africa/I Love Myself” t-shirt and gain the strength you need to carry on with your day.
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