Creating a brand…

Logo for Ink

They say designing for yourself is the hardest task of all. They were right!

The name Ink was the result of a discussion with my PR guru associate Dave, at the time he was hatching plans for his own solo project and had come up with the name ‘Digital Links,’ which I felt was too unwieldy and just didn’t sound right to me. So off I went looking for a suitable name for that, firstly, as his primary clients are games companies I went looking for some Far Eastern inspiration (something I did a lot at University, but thats another story for another time!) but this failed to produce anything of merit. Eventually I suggested simply ‘Link’ on it’s own and this formed the basis of the early brand.

However at this stage we decided to aim to bring our two developing businesses together, I reasoned operating with different names to then suddenly switch to a third name would cause confusion amongst clients, affect google rankings, email etc. I quiet liked the simplicity of ‘Link’ but it didn’t really say much to me about design. So I set about coming up with a name with some common ground.

It then occurred to me to drop the ‘L.’ and there we have it, ‘Ink.’ To me it has common ground with both design and pr, as well as future areas of interest like marketing, advertising etc. It’s simple, but memorable and, I think, allows for a strong graphic identity.

Back to designing for yourself, the problem with it I see is that it’s a never ending process, there’s nobody to say ‘great I love it, leave it be,’ a never ending cycle of adjustments, modifications and restarts! But for now I am happy with what I have, I’m not quite set on the colouring yet, but I don’t need to be until the proper site goes live and I get business cards etc. It’s been kept deliberately simple as a) I’m not really into the whole web 2.0 drop shadow type stuff and b) I intend to be used across a wide range of mediums and sizes, simple logos fit this role best!

What do you think?

So… It begins!

Eventually this will find itself a custom home on my website, but since that doesnt exist yet this will do for now!

So I’m Scott, I’m a graphic designer from Edinburgh, Scotland and this is my blog. Basically it will revolve around two things; the business I am in the process of setting up (Ink) and design in general. I’d always wanted to set up a design blog and I figured incorporating my experiences of starting out in my own business etc would be a good thing to add in, maybe even inspiring people along the way!

I guess a general scene setting update is in order! I left my previous job with a creative agency just before Christmas and returned to Edinburgh (I’m from here) to set up on my own. I have some fairly big plans for this, firstly will hopefully be merging with a friends PR business under the Ink banner.

So here we are at the very beginning, the logo has been designed, the sites being worked on and discussions with what will hopefully be my first clients are underway! Exciting stuff!

Thanks for reading!