Hi,
does any one know of any specific guidelines for designing your graphic novel's title logo...
like industry standards?

Only that it has to be a good logo, and I would guess it's better if it can stretch across the cover so spotting it is immediate. It's rather a broad question!

Hi Cedar,
thanks for the quick response.
Sorry if I was to broad.
what i'm asking is if there are any typography standards on how a comic/graphic novel title should/could be designed.
for example ...I could make a graphic novel title in a graffiti font, but everyone can't read graffiti (even though it looks cool). So in this, should things like x-height, typeface, serif vs san serif, stroke, base line, stem, mean line etc. be taken into consideration when design a graphic novel title?
hope I was more specific
Thanks for the help

God no, the comic world isn't a single corporate entity with a stye book! It just has to be a good logo, which makes even legibility optional as long as it's instantly recognizable and distinct.

Inlight,
Do you have Adobe Illustrator? It's a good program for making a logo and editing text. The advantage there is that since Illustrator works with vectors, you can print it any size. If you want to use a graffiti font, it's up to you. However, it will have more impact if it fits the overall vibe of the comic. One of my teachers always suggested having a friend or someone read the logo aloud based on how it looks, so that can help too.

Also this might help: http://blambot.com/successfullogo.shtml

Like the other's said, sky's the limit. This is your project and your logo, you can do whatever you think looks best.

Remember though that the logo isn't just another piece of art, so "what you think looks best" isn't the same as "what you think looks cool". Focus on readability, recognizably, uniqueness, and expressiveness.

Readability: Like you pointed out in your example, if they can't read the font, people don't know what your book is. Do your readers a favor and let them know your name. Of course, this is variable. If you're doing a graphic novel about graffiti artists, and your audience is primarily people versed in street art, a real thick graffiti font might be the way to go (which is why you have to go with what YOU think looks best).

Recognizably & Uniqueness: Your logo has to be you, and people need to be able to recognize your logo without even reading the words. When I was a kid and didn't read cursive, I still knew what Coca-cola's logo was, and what it meant. Strive for that. Also, don't let it be confused with other people's logos. You immediately understand all of these without reading the text:


But these might as well be soccer ball designs for all the recognition they muster:


Expressiveness: People should get some feel about your story from the logo. Over the years I've come to rue our logo for other reasons, but it certainly succeeds in being expressive:

Clearly, our comic is about outer space. Probably aliens and spaceships too. Our comic is clearly not about greek or roman myths (which someone might assume based on our name).

It's interesting that you have the Firefox logo in both the recognizable and unrecognizable groups.

In addition to what was mentioned earlier, here's a couple things you might think about when designing a logo...

1. You want it to be easily reproducible in a variety of situations/mediums. On the Web is the easiest since (for the most part) there are no color limitations, but you should try and design something that can be scaled back to a single color if necessary. Depending on the quality of the printing (digital/offset) gradients may or may not reproduce as well as they do on screen. I'd use them sparingly, or at least not use them as a critical element of the logo.

The other aspect of this is something that will work at a large scale, but will also appear clear and legible at a very small size (like 1in x 1in).

The batman logo is an excellent example of this, at it's core it's one color and very simple. But from there it can be build up, shaded, 3D modeled, textured, etc. based on the medium and the specific needs.

2. Often an identity are actually comprised of 2 different, yet harmonious (ideally), parts. The graphic aspect of the logo and the typographical aspect. This can allow for quite a bit of flexibility white still preserving the integrity of your brand.

Twitter is a good, current, example. Twitter has a very distinct typographical identity, but they also have the little blue bird. People now recognize the bird as Twitter without the need to even say Twitter, yet they can use them together for added impact. They also have multiple ways they can combine them based on the available real estate without diminishing the brand. I like this approach quite a bit.

3. It's also worth mentioning that if you do use a typographical aspect to your logo, don't use that same typeface for other elements of the design (website headings, title pages, etc.) this will take away from the uniqueness of the logo and it will start to blend into the rest of the page. What is best would be to find a complimentary font family (with a few different weights/styles) that you can use for stuff like that.

Anyway, hope that was helpful!

_matt