When you start a new business, or just a new site, one of the first issues to establish is a decent logo. These days you can do in so many different ways: automatic design logo sites, freelancers, special software, big design companies. So far I have designed on my own, for my different sites and businesses, about 20 logos. The last design was made for this site and for the brand – ChessAdrenaline. It took me about one month to find an appropriate expression. What I was looking for was a connecting link between two words and concepts: chess and adrenaline. Chess is regarded as boring and slow (only for non-experts!), whereas adrenaline has more dynamic connotations. As it was rather a long endeavour, I thought it would be a great opportunity to show you the whole process.
Stage 1: Choice of the Name for the Brand – ChessAdrenaline
In January 2020 I started writing my first chess book (it is now only available in Polish, but will be available also in English this year). As I dived into the first chapters, I started to consider different ideas for the perfect title. The book is geared towards the beginners, and the main idea is to introduce the reader with main concepts of chess: the general rules of the game, opening, middlegame and endgame strategies, basic chess tactics, as well as tournament and FIDE ranking guidelines. The inspiration came from the truck passing by in one of the streets of Bielsko, Poland, where I used to live and where I often go to visit my favourite places. The truck had a brand name on it, with the word “adrenaline” combined with something else. It was this kind of a-ha moment when everything becomes clear and simple. Thus the name Chess Adrenaline came to my mind, as the ideal mixture of two opposing concepts: slow and quick, safe and dangerous, soft and hard.
Stage 2: Instagram Account and the First Logo
My first logo consisted of merely two words, designed with a nice font. I set up my Instagram account and I needed something simple. I was experimenting with some fonts in my first posts and my choice was Realist, with a vintage feel. The main content in my first Instagram post touched upon chess facts and stories, and the Realist Font seemed at that time perfect. As a consequence, the font was used for the logo purposes.
Stage 3: The second logo.
As I moved forward, and my Instagram account had about 500 followers after 3 weeks of posting, I decided to improve an existing logo. The aim was to use graphics to make it better on Instagram. In the end, I used a Chess Cases font, with a slight modification.
Stage 4: YouTube Lessons & Advice from the Best.
As I am a beginner to Instagram and social media in general, my main source of sensible advice is YouTube. Yeah, I know that some of you will point out it can be a dubious source of information, yet when we take into consideration the social media world, it will soon turn out that there is no better place to start with than YouTube videos from the best experts in the field. One day I found an intriguing video made by Chris Do, completely unknown to me. I watched his Instagram advice, then I watched his documentary about the process of designing a logo for a local brewery Hamilton which turned out to be a turning point to me. Delighted with the outcome, and motivated by other Chris Do and theFutur videos, I spent two days designing and redesigning a new logo which was to combine two opposing concepts of chess and adrenaline.
Stage 5: The final version.
The final version mixed the letter A with the newly designed chess piece of the Queen. I decided to stick to only two colours – white and red – to make it more dynamic and consistent.
