26 replies to this topic

[Jess Ragan]

Hey Batari, I realized that Batari BASIC doesn't have its own official logo yet... something that could be put on the front of cartridges or box art to make it clear that the game was designed with your excellent programming tool.

I spent some time designing a few potential candidates for an official bB logo... there are two basic types, with three or four slight variations of each type. Check 'em out, and let me know if you'd like to use one of them.

JR

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[mojofltr]

Yeah, mine suck, but I had to get in on it.

Edited by mojofltr, Thu Nov 3, 2005 9:14 PM.

[batari]

Jess Ragan, on Thu Nov 3, 2005 9:03 PM, said:

Hey Batari, I realized that Batari BASIC doesn't have its own official logo yet... something that could be put on the front of cartridges or box art to make it clear that the game was designed with your excellent programming tool.

I spent some time designing a few potential candidates for an official bB logo... there are two basic types, with three or four slight variations of each type.  Check 'em out, and let me know if you'd like to use one of them.

JR

A good idea, and good suggestions.

I like the "built with batari Basic" and I tried to put it on a simulated metal plate but the results aren't great, since my artistic skills are limited, but it should at least be good enough to get an idea of what I was trying to do. If anyone wants to improve on it, go right ahead.

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[Random Terrain]

Maybe someone could make a bunch using the various Atari fonts:

http://www.atariage....l?SystemID=2600

It would be nice to have a really good one that makes people drool. Who's that guy who wins just about every box art contest? Maybe he could dream up a few logos for you to choose from?

[Atarius Maximus]

How about this?

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Attached Files

•  batari_highres.zip   123K   50 downloads

[SeaGtGruff]

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 4:27 PM, said:

How about this?

That looks fantastic! But what's the thing in front of "bB" that looks like a cross between an "S" and an "l"?

Michael Rideout

[batari]

SeaGtGruff, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 4:14 PM, said:

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 4:27 PM, said:

How about this?

That looks fantastic! But what's the thing in front of "bB" that looks like a cross between an "S" and an "l"?

Michael Rideout

Integral symbol?

I like it too, but I'd probably take out the thing before bB.

[Atarius Maximus]

I removed the symbol in front of the "bB". I don't know what it was supposed to be, I just thought it looked kind of cool.

Here's the revised version.

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Attached Files

•  batari_highres2.zip   116.04K   50 downloads

Edited by Atarius Maximus, Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:39 PM.

[ZylonBane]

What's with the lowercase/uppercase theme? The name of the language isn't batariBasic, is it?

[Random Terrain]

ZylonBane, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 5:34 PM, said:

What's with the lowercase/uppercase theme? The name of the language isn't batariBasic, is it?

batari likes his name to start with a lowercase b. So yeah, it's batari Basic (bB).

[SeaGtGruff]

Random Terrain, on Thu Jan 12, 2006 5:24 PM, said:

ZylonBane, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 5:34 PM, said:

What's with the lowercase/uppercase theme? The name of the language isn't batariBasic, is it?

batari likes his name to start with a lowercase b. So yeah, it's batari Basic (bB).

Or, if you want to be really picky, it's "batari BASIC"!

Michael Rideout

[Random Terrain]

SeaGtGruff, on Thu Jan 12, 2006 4:36 PM, said:

Random Terrain, on Thu Jan 12, 2006 5:24 PM, said:

ZylonBane, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 5:34 PM, said:

What's with the lowercase/uppercase theme? The name of the language isn't batariBasic, is it?

batari likes his name to start with a lowercase b. So yeah, it's batari Basic (bB).

Or, if you want to be really picky, it's "batari BASIC"!

batari told me when I wanted my page to have the correct name that he like BASIC with just the B capitalized. Reminds me of Blitz Basic. That also just has the B capitalized.

[SeaGtGruff]

Random Terrain, on Thu Jan 12, 2006 5:40 PM, said:

batari told me when I wanted my page to have the correct name that he like BASIC with just the B capitalized. Reminds me of Blitz Basic. That also just has the B capitalized.

Oh, I didn't realize that. "BASIC" is an acronym, or a word that's sort of like an abbreviation, made up of the first (or first few) letters in the (primary) individual words-- in this case, "Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code." Technically speaking, I believe acronyms are written with all letters capitalized-- like USA, NATO, TV, DNA, BASIC, COBOL, etc. However, I have been seeing BASIC spelled as "Basic" for many years now, as well as COBOL spelled as "Cobol." But I don't think that's proper, just as we don't write "Usa," or "Nato," or "Tv," etc. On the other hand, I see that "LASER" is also an acronym, yet I don't think I've ever seen it spelled that way; I always see it spelled "laser"! So I guess it's just a question of whichever is the most common form of usage.

Michael Rideout

[Jess Ragan]

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 9:38 PM, said:

I removed the symbol in front of the "bB".  I don't know what it was supposed to be, I just thought it looked kind of cool. 

Here's the revised version.

Ouch. I think my logo creation skills just got p'wned.

JR

[SeaGtGruff]

Jess Ragan, on Thu Jan 12, 2006 11:12 PM, said:

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 9:38 PM, said:

I removed the symbol in front of the "bB".  I don't know what it was supposed to be, I just thought it looked kind of cool. 

Here's the revised version.

Ouch. I think my logo creation skills just got p'wned.

JR

Don't worry, you didn't see how stinky mine were, because I didn't post them!

I was going to use the font that was originally used for Atari cartridges-- it was ITC Bauhaus-- but when I looked for somewhere I could download it from, I found out that it's a commercial font and must be purchased/licensed, so I didn't mess with it.

Michael Rideout

[supercat]

SeaGtGruff, on Fri Jan 13, 2006 1:04 AM, said:

I was going to use the font that was originally used for Atari cartridges-- it was ITC Bauhaus-- but when I looked for somewhere I could download it from, I found out that it's a commercial font and must be purchased/licensed, so I didn't mess with it.

There are plenty of Bauhaus knockoffs around. Font names can be trademarked, and the mathematical definitions of the letter shapes can be copyrighted, but the letterforms themselves cannot be copyrighted and generally are not trademarked (font trademarks would be applicable in cases where a font was used as part of the visual design for a product. If the London Underground were in the U.S., it could use a trademark on its signage lettering to prevent any other transit system from using similar lettering in its signage).

A lot of font knockoffs, especially the really cheap or free ones, are noticeably inferior to the "real" fonts they're copying. The biggest problem is often with letter spacing. Professionally-designed fonts are very carefully adjusted to assure that--to the extent possible--all likely combinations of adjacent letters will look good. Knockoffs are less carefully tweaked. A sentence or two may look fine in the knockoff, but setting a lot of text will often result in some parts that don't look quite right.

I suspect, though, that the glut of cheap quality knockoff fonts probably benefits the makers of real fonts. Sure, someone who just wants to use a font for some one-off thing that nobody's really going to look closely at may just grab some Paladin or Palatin or other knockoff from the net, but if a professional graphics designer is going to use a font for very much, spending a few bucks to buy a real font can be better than spending time searching for a decent knockoff and then having to inspect the output to ensure there aren't any anomolies.

[Nathan Strum]

Here's my first stab at the bB logo, based on what's been done to this point:

[Jess Ragan]

I'd keep the starburst and comet trail from the original logo, but other than that, the metal plate is lookin' good.

JR

[Nathan Strum]

I wanted to simplify the logo back down to the essentials, and see what it'd look like "clean". I tend not to add extras to logos unless they have a specific reason to be in there.

Part of that thinking, for this logo, is that it's probably going to be reproduced at a very small size, so readability is going to be very important. (And mine still needs work in that area, since it starts losing clarity pretty badly at small sizes.)

[Artlover]

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:38 PM, said:

I removed the symbol in front of the "bB".  I don't know what it was supposed to be, I just thought it looked kind of cool. 

Here's the revised version.

Gotta re-center the bB now tho.

[batari]

I like the two new logos. I'll have to print both out to see which one looks better, like as a postage-stamp deal on a cart label.

Oh, if anyone wants a bleeding-edge, buggy version of bB with some of the new features I've been talking about, see my blog.

[Random Terrain]

When you guys are done hammering out the best logo, can you also make one that can be put on people's bB web pages without the "built-with" part on it?

[Atarius Maximus]

Artlover, on Fri Jan 13, 2006 2:24 PM, said:

Atarius Maximus, on Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:38 PM, said:

I removed the symbol in front of the "bB".  I don't know what it was supposed to be, I just thought it looked kind of cool. 

Here's the revised version.

Gotta re-center the bB now tho.

You're right. If Nathan's going to work on the logo for batari, I'll concede to his superior artistic skills. Nathan, the artwork you've done on cart labels is simply amazing.

Steve

[Nathan Strum]

Thanks for the compliments Steve, but please don't stop working on yours on my account. Batari should get to choose whatever he wants.

That said, here's a revision that should print a bit clearer:



Here's the full-size version (192 k).

And a possible web page version:



Probably should move the logo and text up a bit on that one...

Edited by Nathan Strum, Sun Jan 15, 2006 5:16 PM.

[Random Terrain]

Thanks. So would this be OK?



Or has too much been chopped off?

Edited by Random Terrain, Sun Jan 15, 2006 5:31 PM.