Dec
19
2009
The poster has arrived! It’s really cool to see it in print. Available directly through the Mt. Airy Learning Tree (MALT), you can drop by their office on Greene Street in Mt. Airy and pick one up immediately. They’re also being sold at the Weavers Way Coop and through my website.
They are $20 each, and half of that goes directly to MALT’s Make This Our Home building fund. They are looking to raise about $230,000 to buy the building where their offices have been for the last 10 years. This is a great community organization so if you have any ties to Mt. Airy, or know somebody who does, get them this poster as a gift.
Dec
19
2009
Maple leaf logo
I’ve been working on a new logo which will then lead to a new web and blog design. I thought about having a graphic element to go with the name: Toizer Photo. What kind of element makes sense? I could choose something that just looks pretty such as a swirl or paisley-type of design. Or perhaps I should use something more closely associated with photography.
Examining my philosophy and what I have done already in my life, I wanted something that represented being outdoors as that has been the type of photography I most enjoy. Since this will be a logo, it also has to reproduce well in a variety of sizes and media so it can’t be too complicated. I started thinking about using a leaf.
Some time ago I worked at an arboretum so I’m familiar with quite a few different trees. I wanted a very specific leaf, a sugar maple. This is probably my favorite tree – I love the shape of the leaf, the seeds, the multi-colored bark and the way it starts to peel away a bit from the trunk as it grows. And I thought the shape of the leaf would work well for a logo. But in southeastern Pennsylvania, we’re close to the southern limit of the sugar maple’s range and people tend to think about more northern regions when they see a sugar maple leaf. So the first design received some jokes about possibly being Canadian.
Since I have no real connection to our northern neighbor, I thought the logo needed a redesign. I was also increasingly bothered by all of the black area in the upper part of the leaf. I’ve gone with something much simpler in line and concept. The leaf became more generic and is made up of only two lines. Now the funny thing is, as I look at it, the leaf becomes an eye. How interesting. People often talk about a photographer’s “eye” or their “vision” in creating images. This logo works as two different symbols, one of which is very closely associated with photography, and art is all about the interpretation.
So what do you see? An eye, a leaf, or something else entirely?
Leaf/eye logo
Dec
05
2009
The “Signs You’re In Mt. Airy” poster is almost ready to be printed! I had to make a few revisions to the initial design. It seems I had confused a boundary and included several businesses that weren’t in the city, let alone in Mt. Airy. Those had to be removed and replaced with others. I had some help along the way from the staff at the Mt. Airy Learning Tree, providing suggestions and even securing a large “Mt. Airy Philadelphia” sign in their office. I had, in fact, found a similar sign still attached to a telephone pole near my childhood home and that is the one on the poster. Another friend of mine reminded me of the license plate with a smiley face and “I like Mt. Airy” written on it. So I went in search of a car with one of those plates. Wouldn’t you know there were 3 cars on my old block with that plate!
The poster will be proofed and approved in the next week or so. Then on to the printer and shipped back to Mt. Airy Learning Tree and available for sale.
Thank you to all who have provided support and suggestions throughout this project!
