Identity: Dina Avila Photography
When Dina Avila was ready to give her photography business a new look she contacted me to design a logo. We emailed back and forth to discuss her focus - her point-of-view. Dina specializes in shooting food and portraits - and she loves dark wood, distressed leather, old books and jazz. And she's kind of obsessed with very old, tarnished silverware. She sounds like my kind of gal.
I really latched onto and found inspiration in the idea of silverware + old books. I decided I wanted to design a logo that could be found on the back of a spoon, on the bottom of antique china or in the front cover of an old book.
But I also loved how the letters in Dina Avila seemed to mirror each other. So I played with a few ideas. 
I always start designing logos in black & greyscale - it keeps me focused on the form of the design. Then I start to bring in color to give it a little life.
My ultimate goal was to design a logo that reflects the aesthetic and personality of Dina while also positioning her as a professional photographer. Dina wants to come across as warm and open but also professional (but not in a corporate way).
I played around with a few different ideas and settled on a really simple type treatment - I loved the mirrored As. I thought it was really elegant with a little bit of quirk. But Dina was a little concerned that it might be confusing - so from there I flipped the A back around and started playing with incorporating flourishes. 
It's also important to see how a logo scales from large (imagine it on a billboard or large banner) to small (like on a business card or web banner).
Dina fell in love with this version of the logo and from there I finalized the colors and packaged it up for her. 
When I send over a final logo I include color versions for print (Pantone & CMYK) and web (RGB) in multiple file formats (vector, JPEG, Tiff, etc.) - that way the client will always have exactly what they need for various applications.
Dina was such a pleasure to work with and I love the final logo. You can see more of Dina's work here.
Other identity / logo projects:
• Clyde's Rebirth
• Pip & Estella
• Sweet B
Your branding for photographers is always so classy! I love flourish-- looks like growing green onions, perfect for a food photog :)
I love the doo-dad under the words - I am obviously lacking in the descriptive vocabulary to describe it!
So awesome!
I absolutely love my logo and and have been brewing ideas to work with you on ever since (blog design on the horizon!)!
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Cheers!
Dina
Oh, by the way, I've been fantasizing about having the logo stamped on tarnished silverware....hmmm, maybe I need to design spoons too :)
Ah! It's so cool to see your process like this! Thank you!
love, rudi
Oh, and, it's not really a new business, per se, more of an old business...reinvented...:)
Your openness (in all aspects of your life, but esp design) and willingness to share your process is one of the many reasons your blog is one of my favorites. Thanks so much for sharing this! It's always fascinating to see how other designers work.
Looks fantastic! I love the mirror reflection done just with the washed-out green.
Dina - I'm so glad you love the logo! And, oops! I wasn't very careful with my words - I fixed the post. :)
Rudi & DTDorrin - I'm glad you all are interested seeing some of my process. I always think it's fascinating to see how artists and designers get from Point A to Point B, myself. So I'm happy to share!
No worries, Kathleen!
And I can't wait to rebuild my website around my new logo...soon....:)
Yes! Just holler at me when you're ready to move forward with your site design.
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