Choosing a typeface is obviously one of the most important parts of designing a logo. Although it might be fun trying to find a totally unique font to use, remember that a logo has to be clear and readable. It’s not just by coincidence that so many logos are set in fonts such as Helvetica or Garamond. You can always add little tweaks to the type afterward to give it a unique look, if necessary.

Press T to select the Type tool and type REACH. Try applying different fonts to the type to get the look you want (see Figure 12.2). I chose Gill Sans Light because I think it gives a clean, confident look. (If Gill Sans Light isn’t available on your system, Myriad Pro Regular is another good choice.)

Figure 12.2. I usually stack different type treatments and then eliminate the ones that don’t work, leaving me with a choice few to make a final decision.

In the Character panel, change the type size to 72 point. Set the tracking amount to –18 to pull the letters toward each other and turn on Optical Kerning (see Figure 12.3); letters aligned in this way will work well with the illustration you’re going to be adding.

Figure 12.3. Setting the tracking and the kerning so the characters look better as a unit.

Next, start a new line of text and type the tag line learn. grow. succeed. Change the tag line to a font size of 24 point, with tracking of 50 and leading of 25 point. Also, turn off Optical Kerning for the tag line text. This treatment makes the tag line a nice counterpoint to the larger, uppercase company name text.

Now you’ll want to convert the text to outlines. This is usually a good idea with a logo, making it easier to send the logo to others without worrying about fonts. The last thing you would want is to have your logo look completely different just because the person who opened it on another computer didn’t have your exact font. To convert the text to outlines, select the Type object and choose Type, Create Outlines. The typography part of the logo is now complete.

To add a graphic element to the logo, you can create an illustration that can quickly help identify what REACH does or represents. Because the company represents reaching for your dreams, here you’ll create the image of a hand reaching for the stars. Rather than attempt to actually draw a hand and stars, you’ll employ Illustrator’s Live Trace feature to help create a realistic illustration that will surely draw attention. Remember that because you’re creating this in Illustrator, it will be easy to repurpose this design element for other needs.

To create a hand and three stars to echo the three words in REACH’s tag line, you first place an image into Illustrator with which to work. Choose File, Place, and navigate to the folder of images and locate the file iStock_000001106412Large.jpg, which is a photograph that matches our concept (see Figure 12.4). The image, as it appears in your document, is too big for your needs here. With the image still selected, double-click the Scale tool, enter a value of 15% in the Uniform field, and click OK (see Figure 12.5). Position the scaled image to the left of the text.

Figure 12.4. The image of a hand and three stars.

Figure 12.5. Scaling the placed image.

Using raster images in a logo is usually not a great idea because if the logo needs to be scaled up in size, you will lose resolution and detail. The Live Trace feature in Illustrator enables you to convert this pixel-based image into a vector-based image and also enables you to customize the look of the image. Select the image, click the Tracing Presets and Options icon in the Control panel, and choose Comic Art.

The result of the Live Trace (see Figure 12.6) is a more stylized image because of the posterization that occurs as a result of a reduction to fewer colors.

Figure 12.6. Applying the Comic Art preset in Live Trace to the hand and stars image.

This is a very good trace of the hand, and lowest of the three stars, but there is some clean up to do to remove the smudge at the upper right and fix the other two stars. To do this, you’ll need to expand the paths so you can work with sections of the trace individually. Click Expand in the Control panel and watch the selection switch to paths with points (see Figure 12.7).

Figure 12.7. Expanding a traced object allows you to edit points along its paths.

To remove unwanted points, choose the Direct Selection tool, select the mess of points at the upper right, and press Delete on your keyboard. Do the same for the top two stars. Don’t worry—you’ll replace them with copies of the bottom star. Also delete the corner points at the upper left, lower left, and lower right.

As long as you’re cleaning up, now is a good time to point out that Live Trace makes both shaded and white shapes, which can be confusing when you start moving and changing the tracings. To remove them, switch to the Selection tool, select the traced objects, and choose Object, Ungroup. Select the shaded shapes and nudge them of the way, and then click areas where there might be white shapes and delete them.

Now that you have a clean area to work in, select the remaining star and double-click the Selection tool, which brings up the Move dialog box. Click the Copy button (see Figure 12.8). Using the Direct Selection tool, position the new star approximately where one of the originals was. Then press (Cmd-D) [Ctrl+D] to duplicate the last transformation, which gives you a total of three stars. Position the final star roughly where you want it.

Figure 12.8. Moving a copy of a star.

Let’s vary the angle of the stars, as they were in the original image. Select the top star and choose Object, Transform, Rotate from the menu and set the Angle property to 340. Select the other new star and set its angle to 15.

You will now change the appearance of the traced object by using different shades of gray instead of black. Choose Swatch Library from the Swatches panel (see Figure 12.9), and open the Metal library. Now that the library is open in your document, you can use these colors for your traced objects.

Figure 12.9. Opening a swatch library from the Swatches panel.

Select the star at the top and click a deep gray in the Swatches library. Set the star just below it to a medium gray and the bottom star to a light gray. For the reaching hand, echo the dark gray of the top star to bring visual coherence (see Figure 12.10).

Figure 12.10. The stars and hand are changed to shades of gray in the Metal swatches library.

Now, you’ll create a border by clicking once on the artboard with the Rectangle tool. Specify a width of 1.5 inches and a height of 2 inches, and press the D key to fill it white with a black stroke. Change the width of the stroke to 4 points and change the fill to a very soft gray. Send it to the back of the stacking order and position it behind the hand and stars (see Figure 12.11).

Figure 12.11. Positioning the border behind the hand and stars.

The hand is overlapping the box more than we’d like, so we’ll need a clipping mask to hide the part we don’t want. Fortunately, our rectangle is exactly what we need. Duplicate it and carefully position it on top of the original rectangle with the extra area of the hand shape sticking out; notice that the new rectangle is at the top of the stack. Then, hold down the Shift key and select both the new rectangle and the hand. Choose Object, Clipping Mask, Make from the menu bar. The hand now fits neatly in the box (see Figure 12.12).

Figure 12.12. Mask the vector hand shape with a clipping mask for neater edges.

To complete the logo, position the text you created earlier to the right of the rectangle (see Figure 12.13).

Figure 12.13. The completed logo.

Choose File, Save and click the Use Adobe Dialog button (if the button reads Use OS Dialog, you’re already using the Adobe dialog box). This dialog box gives you direct access to your Version Cue project. Navigate to the Reach Version Cue project (start by clicking on the Version Cue icon listed on the left side of the dialog box) and save the file as a native Illustrator document (.ai). Give it a comment describing what it is. If you have enough RAM, you can leave Illustrator running, but if your computer has less than 512MB of RAM, quit Illustrator so you won’t be slowed down when working in other applications.

Although the image looks pretty good, I’d like to convert it to true grayscale and make a few small adjustments. Choose Image, Adjustments, Desaturate to remove any hint of color.

Next, let’s lighten up the shadows to give a softer image. Choose Image, Adjustments, Shadow/Highlight. I think the default Shadows setting of 50% is too low, so drag the slider up to 100% (see Figure 12.14).

Figure 12.14. Applying the Shadow/Highlight filter to enhance the shadows and the highlights of the image.

The photo still seems a bit too harsh for the calm, confident mood you’re after. Blur the edges to give a more soothing feeling. Choose Filter, Blur, Smart Blur and use a threshold of 30 and a radius setting of 3 pixels (see Figure. 12.15).

Figure 12.15. Smart Blur softens edges.

Finally, convert the image to the CMYK color space by choosing Image, Mode, CMYK Color.

You’re done with the image for now, so you can save it to your Version Cue project. Choose File, Save As and navigate to your REACH project. Save the image as a native Photoshop file (.psd) and add a comment.

Create a new document, setting the Page Size to Custom, the Orientation to Landscape, and the Width to 3.5 inches and the Height to 2 inches. Set your margins to 0.125 inches all around and click the More Options button to set a Bleed of 0.125 inches all around as well (see Figure 12.16).

Figure 12.16. Setting up a new document in InDesign.

Place the Photoshop file from Version Cue (see Figure 12.17). You’ll have the image bleed off the card, so use the Scale tool to resize the image to fit within the card’s outside edges. Use the Selection tool to resize the picture frame to form neat edges.

Figure 12.17. Placing the image. Note that the placing preview is merely a thumbnail image of the original.

Now you can place the Illustrator logo from the Version Cue project. Scale the logo so it fits nicely within the card (see Figure 12.18).

Figure 12.18. Scaling and positioning the logo over the photo.

Enter the additional text information on the card. I used 8-point Gill Sans Light on 10-point leading to type 15-285 Learning Lane, Lake Success, NY 11020, 516.555.8000, www.reachforlearning.com. Bold the phone number and position the type under the logo (see Figure 12.19). Feel free to add your name and make yourself the CEO of the company, if you’d like. So you can see the outcome better, choose View, Display Performance, High Quality Display.

Figure 12.19. Adding the informational text to the card.

Although the card is shaping up nicely, the image in the background is demanding too much attention. Changing the opacity of the image will result in a more subtle background. Select the image with the Selection tool, and change the Opacity setting in the Control panel to a value of 25%.

Although the faded image looks good, it might be more effective to bring out the face along the left side with a gray overlay. Use the Rectangle tool to create a shape over the left one-third of the card. Change the fill color to black, and then change the Opacity setting in the Control panel to 25% (see Figure 12.20). The face is now nicely highlighted.

Figure 12.20. Change the Opacity to allow the image behind to show through.

To create additional emphasis, use the Rectangle tool to create an 80% black bar between the face and the logo on the card.

Finish the business card with a great quote. Create a new text frame and type The wisest mind has something yet to learn.. Then set it to 16-point Gill Sans Regular with leading of 16 and tracking of –10. Position the quote over the photo on the left side of the card as four rows of text, and make the text white so it shows over the gray background. Then, add the attribution line George Santayana on a separate line as 6-point type.

Press the W key on your keyboard to view the final business card in Preview mode (see Figure 12.21). Save the file into your Version Cue project and remember to add a comment.

Figure 12.21. The final business card.