The Style of Elements: Inflexible

Why do I always seem to do battle with myself every time I start to work on a post? (you shut up. no, you shut up) I find myself ready to make a pronouncement then realize I haven’t thought things through thoroughly. Soooooo here we go again…

This post is about logos and originally I was going to come out (swinging) and saying: FLEXIBLE LOGOS ARE THE BEST LOGOS. ALL OTHERS ARE BAD.

There may have been flexible logos before, but MTV definitely made the flexible logo part of their identity. Their ever-changing mark signified forward thinking, playfulness, and a reflection of the culture of their audience. The logos were often wonderful expressions of graphic design, possibly crossing the line into art.

Go to 10steps.SG for a nice compilation of the MTV logo:

Be sure to check out the MTV logo story on Frank Olinsky (the logo's designer) where you will find:

"The next, and probably most revolutionary part of the story came when they were asked to come up with the "corporate colors" for the logo. The decision was made that there weren’t any, and that the logo should always change. Knowing that many animators, designers, ad agencies, etc. were going to be working with the logo made them think how, just like rock music always changes, the logo should also. This was a concept that had never been used on a logo before. The "M" and the "TV" could be made of any colors and/or materials."

There were obvious rules. The big “M” always stayed in the same font family (ish), the font of the “TV” never changed and the size relationship to one another didn’t change nor did their placement. After that, let the fun begin. What we were given was a character unto itself. It had a personality and an attitude. While there were many animated logos, you never saw the NBC Peacock spit tar into the CBS eye.

When I was running The Movie Channel, we always had fun with the logo. When promoting a specific movie, we often animated it into the actual footage for the promo’s end page. When we shot original footage for the network, we would place the logo on any and all spherical and disc-like surfaces (dog toy, cocktail napkin with drink ring). Both the MTV and the TMC logos were for entertainment networks and I think the logos had the obligation to entertain. (NOTE: as soon as i find copies of the TMC logos. I will re-post)

But I think we are meant to take comfort in certain logos that don’t change very much or if they do, they evolve. The fact that they remain the same signifies (falsely or not) stability. Banks tend not to change their logos drastically. Government offices don’t try to hip up their logos. These institutions mean to convey a solid presence. Again, falsely or not.