Thread

I am looking to redesign/brand my website to be more professional looking but wanted some advice from everyone here on how to go about it.  I have been working freelance on websites for awhile now but have never been much of a “graphic designer”.  I can tell you what looks good and what doesn’t and make good layouts but vector graphics for instance aren’t exactly in my skill set.  Soo…..

- What would the avg. logo price be?
- Where would be the best place to look for a graphic designer?

Would also appreciate some feedback on what I already have created @ http://www.baywatermedia.com/new/

Cheers.

my initial advice - learn!
What better way than learning something new than on a project you are in complete control over - your own.
At design university the hardest project brief i was give was one word “idea” - basically we could do what the hell we wanted in the realms of graphic design, all sparked by our own idea. Personally i did not get it at first, and only got an average grade, since then and hitting the real business world i realised how wonderful that project was, and i follow that principle for many personal side projects (which typically don’t see the light of day, but make me smile) - idea -> then learn how.

I personally would advise you to plan what you want you site to do (structure too) and your brand to represent. (You will need this for a graphic designers brief anyway)
Once you have this, research, take influence - find what ids working for others, what you look, what reflects you as a web guy…
*** NOTE *** I do mean take influence… and NOT copy, that is just a backwards step!

If you then find you know what you want, but somehow you just cannot get there, or convert that idea and brief into your logo and site, then hire a designer… from where… i cannot help on that! But i can provide inspiration resources (logo and typography books from the library is your best bet), but online i quite like:

http://piepmatzel.de/
http://creattica.com/

And i did come across this - which be of help…
http://99designs.com
Istock is selling logos soon too - but not just yet.

Hi Jeff,

I see you’re from Germany, so prices should line up with Holland I think. Of course there are all kinds of levels of logo designs. There are companies that do this on the run and there are logo’s which have been developed by a complete marketing team simultaneously with new stationary rules and a communication strategy.

But it’s not just the logo I think. If you just want a good looking website, you can make one without any logo at all (I’ve done this several times). There are enough designers who think that logos are overrated.

Still most people tend to start with the logo then do the stationary and end up with the website. It’s hard to name prices, but a decent, well developed logodesign should take a designer a day or so, depending on the complexity. But then again, I’ve done some in 30 minutes (as part of a webdesign), and others in a week. It really depends on the level of thoroughness you expect.

Thank you both for the advice and @nevsie thank you for those links with logos and such for inspiration.  I’ve spent most of the day today working on my new design and trying to come up with a new logo.  After playing around with some ideas, I was actually able to come up with a simple yet decent logo which reflects my water theme.

Now to hammer out the design 😛

Any one help me plz i want to design a logo for my new website…..