I was just digging through some old backups and look what I found!
Back in November 2004 when I first started freelancing I had decided that the company I was starting, Dreamfoundry Design, little more than a twinkle in my eye at that stage, needed a logo. I asked Jeanine, a great designer I know, to help me come up with an identity for Dreamfoundry. She did a few sketches, and poked about on a computer with some fonts.
The font pokings eventually became what is now my logo, a simple use of type – a slightly modified Avenir typeface for those who know about such arcane matters. The sketches on the other hand evolved into what you see above.
The idea was to build a machine, a dream foundry. I took Jeanine’s sketches and I went to town in Maya, a superb 3D package. The model took me a day or two to build and tweak until I was satisfied, and then another day or so to texture, light and render. I quite liked the end product then, and I guess I still like it now (despite it being a bit chunky by today’s standards), even though I eventually, after using it for a year or two, decided against it’s use as a logo.
The main reason for that is pretty obvious now, but back then I was younger and dumber, and tried my best to ignore the fact that the machine above looks more like a gramophone player, while a “foundry” should probably look a lot more like a factory.
The moral of the story? Sometimes we’re blinded by beauty, and especially beauty of our own making, when practicality or functionality should have been our main focus.
Below you can see the final rendered image.
Tags: 3d, Jeanine, lesson, model
