Eden Pictures- Production Logo

The Production-logo task:

Firstly, we were told that a production logo and company name was needed so that it could both represent us (Me, Iain and Lizzie) as group and to be presented before our final film opening. At first we discussed the techniques we could use to create our logo properly and professionally, and we talked about the use of stop-frame-animation, either technologically (using computer software such as Serif draw plus) or practically (drawing out the logo bit by bit, using a camera to capture the logo as it forms). We then agreed on using either, depending which is easiest for whatever logo design we decided upon. We also discussed how we all have experience in Serif draw plus, so that would probably be the best method for us, in the creation of the logo itself. This here, is the development of ideas for our production company logo and name, how we created it and the finished piece. 

Early planning- My ideas:
As a group, we decided to individually come up with some names for our production company, over the next weekend. Ready to discuss our ideas and build upon after hearing each others.
Here are some ideas I came up with initially:

1. Native Pictures
2. Regal Pictures
3. Royal Productions
4. Imperial Pictures
5. Woodland Pictures
6. Bottled-dream Productions
7. Lighthouse Studios

These ideas all vary in meaning, and I mainly wanted something that suited us most as a group, representing us well and not too harsh sounding. As well as arty, meaningful and clever.

• I liked "bottled-dream productions" as it sounded like we make dreams into films, though it sounds nice and hopeful, it also sound quite child-like and not serious enough, which didn't reflect us well- No disrespect to "Dream works" my inspiration for this title. I especially like their logo of a boy sitting on the moon fishing- this helped spark meaning to my next idea.
•  I really liked "Lighthouse Studios" For the deep meaning that we are looking out into the sea, a place that hides the undiscovered and mysterious ideas we want to catch for a film. A lighthouse could guide us like it guides ships, and a lighthouse is strongly standing against the treacherous waves- I mainly wanted a symbol that represented us as a group as strong, powerful, and has a chance in the world of film-making. Although, these meanings aren't so obvious, so I decided to disregard this idea, but a more simpler one with good meaning and beauty. My inspiration for this title was "Summit Entertainment"  due to their simple and effect logo of a mountain outline (including the possibly symbolism behind it). This made me think of something British- the seaside, which led onto the traditional and easily recognisable lighthouse.
• The quick idea of "Woodland Pictures" could help put across the nature and beauty of our film ideas, as well as being strong like the trunk of a tall tree among others. A woodland is a large area of trees, and it takes time and nurture for a woodland to occur- a woodland could have represented us as forever growing and naturally beautiful. This bring me onto my next thought "Imperial Pictures" as imperialism is the idea of gaining more power and respect, growing over many countries, we would be well known and supported. Yet these ideas still aren't what I was originally hoping for. Neither was "Native Pictures" though my other group member liked it because it showed the relevance of our films and our natural British roots. 
• I decided to put forward my idea(s) "Regal/ Royal Pictures" as not only is it a continuation of my "Native Pictures" idea (that Lizzie and Iain liked), that Britain has grew to be royal, wealthy and knowledgeable,  but it also brings about the idea that we as a production company will be all those things, too- putting us up high with the other very successful companies because we have the knowledge and expertise in film-making (that's how we would appear of course). It is also fairly simple, with perceptable meanings, compared to my previous ideas. This name begin to spark imagery in my mind for the logo, such as a golden crown, yet i didn't expand much further into my ideas, because my group members shared their ideas with me. I became focused on theirs as I really liked them, and I didn't value my own very much, despite their strong meanings. "MGM" inspired me for this idea, as their logo includes a strong and beastly lion, the king of the jungle, which led a train of thought the ruler of Britain- the queen and her associations. 

Group-members ideas:
We came together to then share our ideas with each, hoping to influence and inspire each other, therefore improving our initial ones to something better, and something we all agreed on and loved.
These are the ideas my two group members (Lizzie and Iain) contributed-
Lizzie:

1. Hummingbird Productions
2. Mockingbird Productions
3. Red Breast Productions
4. Hornbill Productions
5. Sunbird Productions
6. Pintail Productions

Iain:

1. Iridescent Films
2. Indigenous Pictures
3. Crimson Pictures
4. Peacock Pictures
5. Raven Productions
6. Forbidden-fruit Productions

I liked most of the ideas they both put forward. Lizzie's use of animal was influential in the way that we have an animal figure to represent us. I think the different types of birds were nice as they could strongly symbolise both beauty and freedom- I couldn't really decide which of Lizzie's ideas I preferred as they were all quite similar, though I liked "Sun-bird Productions" because it sounds short and snappy to the ear, and obviously its a pretty bird that could help reflect us well. Whereas I also really liked Iain's "Raven Productions" as it was different from lizzies in the way that they may not be so beautiful, but more realistic in a way that represents us starting out in a gritty world and could grow to be liked and understood. This bird would be different from commercialised symbols such as the roaring lion from MGM's logo, standing out in a way, like an individual production company should. Though these ideas weren't what we were looking for just yet.
Our ideas were then narrowed down to three main ones that we could use a base to expand on:

1. Hummingbird Productions (Lizzie)
2. Royal Productions ( Me)
3. Iridescent Pictures (Iain)

Development of ideas:
After talking about which ideas we liked, it become clear to us that we wanted an animal to represent us in our logo. Iain then suggested that we look at mythical creatures like a mermaid, for example; it sounded like a good idea though I also explained we shouldn't delve too deep into mythology and keep some realism in it. After this, Iain talked about a stag being the animal figure as a one off comment. Lizzie and I really liked this idea for a number of reasons, although, Iain wasn't quite hooked yet, he preferred Lizzie's Hummingbird idea. Lizzie suggested a nice compromise that we could instead have a White-Stag, as this could be perceived as quite mythical and unique as well as strong and beautiful. I then liked this idea even more, yet Iain explained still why he did not feel this was right for us. This led to a long disagreement based on what each idea represented for us, until eventually Lizzie and I thought of a good idea which included both animals, therefore solving this problem we needed to overcome.
The ideas were shortened to these final two (as they had animal figures, unlike "Royal")

1. White stag Productions
2. Hummingbird Productions

Because Me and Lizzie preferred White stag, we tried to change it so that we were all pleased with this idea. So we suggested that our moving logo could be a stop-frame-animation of us drawing the stag, bit by bit, where it would lift its head up from the grass, and i hummingbird would fly over onto the antlers and sit there. We all thought this idea was perfect for us...

We then decided to look for a name that was synonymous to the moving image. We looked closely at the symbolic meanings behind our  idea- the stag represented strength, and the humming bird represented beauty. This thought triggered us to think something is missing... we then realised, knowledge was missing.  These three ideas work so well together and effectively presents us professionally. As the stag and hummingbird worked in the moving image harmoniously and coexisted peacefully, we thought of words that meant exactly that: Iain initially suggested 'Eden Pictures' and we all really liked it for how original and sophisticated it sounded, and for what it could represent. It had all three key aspects of power, beauty and knowledge hidden within, but not too deep. Although we still searched for other names just in case, like 'harmony pictures' but we definitely liked Eden more. So we went with that. Eden made us think of the garden on Eden from the book of Genesis, therefore we continued to think of all the life and how beautiful and natural it is (beauty ticked off) then the tree of knowledge (knowledge ticked off) and finally God, himself (power ticked off)- he is omnipotent ( all powerful), omniscient (all knowing) and benevolent (all good). Now all representations were covered in this name idea, it became out production company name.

New idea:
We planned to make it But there was just one problem seemed to occur to us after we decided we wanted this- it was considerably too ambitious, too time consuming and maybe too hard to draw how we want it. It was a real shame that we couldn't use this ideas as much as we wanted to, creating it at the standard we all imagined, was just too much for us this stage- maybe if we had more time we could have tried. However, it wasn't all bad,as the moving logo idea help really inspire us for new and better ideas that could cover all the representations that this idea brings to the audience. We started sketching out our company name Eden to inspire us even more, then we eventually realised what we could do to create an effective and simple moving logo.
Here are some of the sketches:

                    

After sketching out a few ideas, we then though of what we associated with the name; one thing we all had in common was an apple, and we started incorporating this apple into out ideas. We all quite liked the flowers and vines, seen in the fourth sketch, so we came up with the idea that there's an apple blossom flower in the centre, with vines slowly growing out, then an apple growing and dropping from the vine, like it would from a tree when it's ready. We sketched this idea down too, and began comparing it with the other ideas, to see which we liked best and if our developed idea could work well and moving image. I especially liked our original wonky font.
Here is the final idea sketch:

We really liked this idea because it looked good, represented us well, the name worked with the moving image as a logo and we were much more capable of creating this one in shorter time. We could now begin to animate this on Serif draw plus.

Making the Production Logo:
We knew it would be best to use the computer software- serif draw plus, because of how much easier and quicker it could be, as we have some experience in using it to create stop-frame-animations. We took a picture of the final design, then uploaded it to the computer, and opening it in serif. We then used the pen tool to draw around the lettering, and the apple blossom. This was considerably an easier process then creating the moving vines (the animation part) due to how much simpler it was. Next we animated the growing vines and the falling apple. Here is an image of the logo halfway through the making of it:

 We aslso took a video of us during our first attempts of creating the logo in class, discussing some things and what we are doing, here it is:

Refining our idea:
When we were deciding what colours to use, we decided to use the colour gold for the lettering, as it reincorporates my 'royal' idea that we as a company will appear wealthy, successful and knowledgeable  Gold represents beauty, wealth and power, gold is also strongly desired. We then edited the font to look more 3D in order to stand out and look more professional. And we coloured the apple blossom a pale pink, as its the actual colour of the flower, this colour is light and delicate which we all liked. We had to then decide what colour the background should be, after looking at other production logos, we thought black was a good choice as it looked very professional, complimenting the gold font (this was widely used by other companies such as MGM for the black and gold colours). Here's an image of the logo with the colours finished:

Now we had coloured all the logo, we began to animate the vines and falling apple- it included a total of 25 frames. This was the most difficult part of the task as we had to try and make the vines run smoothly and slither along. The completion of the animation meant we could then convert the piece into a video file, then simply add the complimenting music that lain found. We used Windows Movie maker to add the sound. The section of the music piece we used was 7 seconds long and it went so well with the vines. Here is what we thought, was our finished piece:

I really liked this finished piece, although it look amateurish, it still included some professional aspects.  After watching this finished piece a number of times, Iain pointed out that the vines hadn't run along as smoothly as we intended them too, that in fact they were very jolty. I, however liked the jerkiness of the vines, i thought that they matched the wonky looking font quite well. Though, this seemed to be a problem, we decided to re-animate the vines, and hopefully improve the overall picture quality, as that also looked not so good... As lizzie had the software at her home computer, she kindly volunteered to get the job done and fix it,  one night. She started the vines and apple again from the beginning, hoping to improve both the picture quality, and the smoothness of the growing vines, the apple falling was fine though. 

Final Logo piece: 
After Lizzie improved and refined the original logo piece, this was the outcome:

The group liked the improved piece and we were thankful that Lizzie nicely volunteered to do so. Looking at what we liked most, was the glow of the apple as it grew and eventually fell slowly from the vine, ending the the animation well. The vines ran much smoother on this piece- they slithered along rather than jumped which was pleasing to see. I also really liked the music used as it complimented the moving image really well. Overall, I think the entire production of the logo was a great success. We tackled all the problems that were raised, with maturity and professionalism- shown in our development of ideas.