[policy, no patch] Revise the Druplicon logo

And to avoid people stepping all over each others, keep in mind that the DA is working on something related: https://association.drupal.org/node/18263 I know it's about a logo and not the druplicon but consistency helps. So let's just keep that in mind and reach out whenever possible/required/beneficial.

@chx: the current Druplicon is a result of several revisions of original Druplicons:

Saying the current one is *the* one is as valid as to say any of the older ones were the ones. We should have stayed with the smiley blue 3d drop from the O in drop all along? Where we fools to adapt?

(Aside: see also interesting and wildly changing font choices for the "Drupal" word through the years in http://www.slideshare.net/fgm-osinet/les-blocs-drupal-de-droporg-drupal-8)

LOL, the status change was due to @chx's comment that he deleted.

@sphism: I'm not sure there even was a documented conversation about the logo directions back then, certainly less people felt they belonged to the logo, so it was definitely easier to experiment and adapt. If you click through Frederic's slides I linked, you'll see several font choices and color variants of the Druplicon even (eg. yellow) appearing in different stages of Drupal.

I think you summarised the reasons above pretty well in the issue summary. Many people believe the Druplicon is a good community mascot but not very professional or friendly for an "enterprise software" (also many people disagree). So it was made less important on the d.o front page in favor of the wordmark. The goals of the wordmark I believe were to have a Drupal logo that is "enterprise friendly" and "not freely modifiable" (compared to the Druplicon that is licensed under the GPL and is therefore free to change/adapt as people wish).

Here it is in Mark Boulton's words from http://web.archive.org/web/20100119002709/http://www.markboultondesign.c... (the URL itself is not accessible anymore):

Why do we need a new logo anyway?

Following the latest post, it was clear that there has not been enough explanation, or discussion around why Drupal needs a new logo.

We need the fish

A few of weeks ago in Szeged, I sat down with Larry, to discuss some of the finer points of the ‘branding’ deliverables that were indicated in the RFP process. He explained that Drupal needed a new logo that could be trademarked, in order to protect itself legally. Druplicon can’t be trademarked because of it is licensed under GPL. Those are the business reasons for doing so. Larry’s latest blog post goes a long way in explaining why this item appeared on RFP, and why my firm was briefed to undertake the work as part of the d.o redesign.

But Druplicon can’t be that playful community spirit as an official logo. Official logos more rules they have to follow, both marketing-wise and legally. If Druplicon were the Official Logo Of Drupal(tm), it would have to be trademarked. Random fish would be harder to do, as we’d run the risk of it hurting the trademark’s standing. We couldn’t use it as the default “logo” graphic on new Drupal installs.

Larry goes on to say:

No, Druplicon is not a logo. It is a mascot that we’ve been using as a logo. Think Tux the Linux Penguin. Or think the elePHPant, which is distinct from the actual PHP logo. As a mascot, we can have cookies.

These are sound business reasons on why Drupal needs a logo, separate from the Druplicon. But, aside from that, why do I personally think it’s time the Drupal logo had some attention?

What’s wrong with FF Max?

This question has cropped up a lot. Not only with the community, but with the DA as well. Why am I suggesting we change it? Without Druplicon tied to the logo (as it can’t be for the reasons Larry stated), then we’re left with FF Max.

Personally, I’ve got the following reasons for suggesting the change:

• What makes FF Max interesting are the small details in the letters. However, at small size, those details degrade. At about 12pt and below, FF Max doesn’t look all that distinctive.
• Most display typefaces are designed to solve a specific purpose (a lot of text faces too, like FF Meta, Frutiger, or Johnston). I’m not sure of the intended usage of FF Max, but I don’t feel it works particularly well for a logotype.
• I don’t feel there is enough character, or the brand ‘voice’, of Drupal (the software), or Drupal (The community) using FF Max.

I understand that changing a logo is a big deal. I hope that giving some of my rationale, together with Larry’s thoughts, and the DA’s business reasons, we’ll collectively go some way in explaining ourselves.

Thanks for all your feedback so far. It’s been invaluable in assessing the changes that need to be made, and we’ll continue to work as openly as possible.

• Posted on: September 18, 2008 by Mark Boulton
• In: planetdrupal

You can dig through the web archive for Mark's other posts on the wordmark and drupal.org redesign, eg. http://www.markboultondesign.com/news/detail/initial_wordmark_designs/ and http://www.markboultondesign.com/news/detail/whats_in_a_wordmark/ with the Web Archive too.

Oh man, thank you for initiating this! I've been saying Druplicon needs an overhaul for years, but no time, blah blah… Here are a few thoughts on this topic.

- First, and probably most important: Druplicon is no longer Drupal's logo. It's been replaced by the wordmark (https://drupal.org/drupal-media-kit). It's not "sort of been pushed out of central drupal branding", it's officially out. It's now a mascot. It has also become a kind of symbol for the community and the people within it. And this is good news, first because as you explained with great detail it's outdated, and secondly it means we have a lot more freedom.

- There is still a lot of confusion between the logo (wordmark) and the mascot (Druplicon). Even in the official media kit some pages are a outdated and still show Druplicon as the logo. And hell! The favicon for Drupal.org is still Druplicon… No wonder that for many people Druplicon is still the logo. This could be a good opportunity to explain the difference clearly once and for all.

- As it's now a mascot, I don't think we need to limit its representation to just one image. It's a character, it should live it's life, it's not an untouchable historic piece of art in a museum.
For years people have adapted/transformed/butchered it for the better or the worse. Drupal Camp designers have shown great creativity, and should be able to keep doing this. I think my favorite is the reversed Druplicon / bee from Drupal Camp Manchester (https://camp2012.nwdrupal.org.uk/) :)

- I've always found the general shape awkward. A big circle with a tiny spike, it feels disproportionate to me, it's a difficult shape to work with, and quite frankly, I don't think the shape alone really looks like a drop.
I think we should drop (ha!) the old graphic entirely and create a modern looking character based on the same basic elements: drop shape, eyes, smile (we can skip the nose) with a different overall style. Not sure we should keep the infinite loop in the eyes because first it's in large part responsible for the nasty/malicious look, and secondly I think few people notice it.

* The general shape could look more like a drop
* It should be easier to draw and modify than today's Druplicon. Infinite loops are hard to nail!
* Not sure we need an official color
* Simple shapes FTW!
* Can we make it a kind of smiley, with different expressions?

- For what it's worth, here's a drop shape I created that has been used for several French Drupal Camps (like http://paris2013.drupalcamp.fr/ and http://paris2011.drupalcamp.fr/) and also for Drupal Design Camp / Frontend United graphics and t-shirts (http://www.flickr.com/photos/elv/9441041093/)
SVG file here: http://elv.free.fr/pub/drupal/drop.svg

IMHO the infinity eyes is what makes it readily recognisable in any variation, no wonder @sphism kept that in all options in the OP.

When the logo issue came up again, Kristjan Jansen (Kika) came up with the idea of putting two sideways drops together to form an infinity symbol. When placed inside a filled circle, it resembled a face. After more work by Steven Wittens, the Druplicon was created: a stylised drop with the "infinity" eyes, a round nose and a mischievous smile.

From https://drupal.org/druplicon

Yeah well, I refrained from any statement as to whether I agree with the need for the wordmark or not, because I cannot tell really :D As for how other open source software deals with trademarking things, see a very public dispute documented at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation_software_rebranded_by_t...

Okay, now I have a better understanding of what you're trying to achieve. Basically you want to keep the good ol' Druplicon people love but with a modern style, while I came here for the kill with the idea of creating something different :)
These approaches are not necessarily mutually exclusive though, so I'll follow the topic anyway and bring my ideas and sketches, as they will be a lot more useful here than in a corner of my brain. Whatever we end up with is good for the community.

Re/ the logo/wordmark distinction, well the Drupal Association and Mark Boulton decided the logo would be the wordmark, and so it is. I don't think our role is to fight this decision. On Drupal.org, on Drupalcon websites, on marketing material, t-shirts, stickers, you will only see the wordmark. Druplicon on the other hand is used a lot on the community side of things

Well, in fact DrupalCons follow the good old logo variant model, although they did move more away from the actual Druplicon (no humanoid nature for the drop). But if you look at https://prague2013.drupal.org/ or https://portland2013.drupal.org/ the logo is derived from a drop shape. http://munich2012.drupal.org/ is actually truest to Druplicon from the recent examples, it includes it almost verbatim. There is no major use of the wordmark around Drupalcon sites that I can see.

@gabor: True that, I typed a bit too fast! The wordmark is notably absent from Druplacon websites. It's for Drupal only. Drupalcons are apart.

Munich is a bit of an exception though, Drupalcons usually use a logo with a drop, but not the good'ol Druplicon. Copenhagen had more cartoony Druplicon variants that were in the same spirit, and I think before that one we have to go back in time to Szeged in 2008 for something as close to the original Druplicon.

@sphism: Yeah it's silly. And soon we will also have a Drupal 8 logo that will confuse people even more.

@elv: the Drupal 7 logo was a slight variation of the Drupal wordmark with a big 7. Mogdesign did this: http://mogdesign.eu/portfolio/drupal-7-branding it was used eg. to produce a special version of drupal.org's design to celebrate the occasion: https://drupal.org/drupal-7.0 - not sure if the Drupal 8 logo will be any far from the wordmark and/or the mascot :)

Well, the installer issue after close to 200 comments have managed to get a solution which is the least recognizable Druplicon possible (at least the droplets had a recognizable shape). This issue will make sure that nowhere in Drupal 8 will have the Druplicon left. And that's good 'cos the code is not Drupal anymore either so why would be the looks?

Hi all, first of all great discussion! I would love to help however I can.

I wanted to address the Drupal 8 branding. From a brand identity standpoint, it makes sense to use the existing Drupal wordmark similar to the Drupal 7 treatment. As elv points out, departing from the Drupal wordmark would cause confusion. I also wanted to make sure to communicate that the Druplicon is not within the scope of the launch work we're doing with Drupal 8, so any update to the Druplicon can happen separately at a different pace, and as the group here sees fit.

As this discussion highlights, there is probably a broader discussion and subsequent documentation that should happen at some point that clearly and officially defines the role of the Druplicon (mascot vs. official logo, etc.) and the Drupal wordmark.

I'm looking forward to following the discussion here and, again, helping however I can. Cheers.

Joe Saylor
Membership and Marcomm Manager
Drupal Association
jsaylor@association.drupal.org

FWIW, I'm totally supportive of this kind of design exploration. 2004 was a mighty long time ago.

DrupalCamp Leuven is a great example where they took the infinity eyes at heart :)

Also references to the drop on the site, but never both at the same time :D http://leuven2013.drupalcamp.be/

Rotate Druplicon by 90° (any way) and you have a nice logo for Drupal 8 :D

Nice! comment #25... that logo just has to be it!

You may want to explore that and submit at https://association.drupal.org/node/18263 ? :)

Good concept sphishm, definately worth exploring further.

yup +1000 for this :)

what i would like to was going 2 ways in the future:

0. kill the old druplicon - its out vintage version & we can all love it going retro like the apple logos with the colored stripes in it.

1. Make our mascot a real mascot.
- if the Drop is alive n well, well lets give it. hats n mustards, wands, lip, wigs whatever on - so it can turn into a fun character we can use for whatever - think TUX with a cowboy hat. We tried to do that around DrupalCon cph 3 years ago. It worked out pretty good as a gimmick thing.
We have had a ton of request of reuse of em later on.

2. Make a more simplyfied version of a drop.
aka Something that will work in a 16 x 16 px version (yes the favicon) - i think that elv's simplyfied drop is pretty much spot on. Its clean its reusable can be done in many versions & keeps the feel of a Drop alive.

Should we call a BOF for next week in Prague ? ;)

...you are kidding. Right?

Renegade Druplicon is spectacular!

I've never seen the Druplicon for 7 in #37. Is it new, or has it been around for a while?

Is it possible to render these 3D Druplicons as SVG?

Have to say, am loving the approach Sphism is taking - whilst the specific logo rendering might not be to everyones' taste, the fact that it has been generated as part of a blender model - render workflow gives it a ton of flexibility, a bit like how most modern cartoons/anime use 3D modelling with cell shading etc to produce cartoons that still work in 3D (Simpsons/Futurama/South Park/Family Guy etc)

If you don't like the particular rendering, you could change the angle somewhat, and it is still the same mascot.

Not only that, but if the mascot model were made public domain, along with Blender being Open Source, it means that any individual, public organisation or company could hire a 3D animator to produce their own logos incorporating the Druplicon without distorting it or breaking character, further solidifying it.

Just think - the Brits colonised lots of things through the identity of the British Flag, incorporating it into the corners of many other flags. This was quite a successful strategy in building image and lasts to this day.

That's the first time I've seen the "Drupal 7 3D" version from #37. I love it. :-)

I like #42, but for the rest versions as a logo ...you gotta be kidding. I mean, I like the story behind how the Renegade version came to be with the complex framework etc. It is really cool and all and the 3d version, but they are not "proper" for a logo IMO. We need something that resembles a favicon/desktop icon and more style-wise like for example the icons of google chrome, google earth, skype or viber etc.

#42 is closer to what I imagine for a Drupal logo.

Agree with with #46, I prefer something like #10, clean, pure, and cleaner in small resolutions (favicon for example). Still the #37 is an awesome piece of work, congrats!

@sphism I like your work, you are obviously very talented. I want to add my input that the only design element that I do *not* like at all is the thick light outline as shown in #42 and a few times previously. Thanks for all the time you put into this. I felt I needed to add this feedback if time were to be spent in a direction that might have this detail.

I don't know why it strikes me differently than others. It looks less classy and course to me. The only outlined one I like is the dark outline that blends into the bottom blue, so it looks only partially outlined.

I unpublished a previously entered comment for violation of our Drupal Code of Conduct.

#10 seems to be going in the right direction to me.

Anything we do that tries to be overly illustrative or "rendered" will date almost instantly.

I don't see what "needs review" here.

@Bojhan - Apologies. Wasn't intended to offend. @sphism and I are friends - perhaps that wasn't clear.

I'm not a designer, I don't have the skills required to produce a professional druplicon. I'm not even going to pretend that I do.

The reason why I'm saying that #10 and Gabor's suggestions are going in the right direction is because the suggestions fit better into the way this task is framed by the issue summary.

@sphism, you may like your renegade Druplicon imagery, but objectively they address very little of the weaknesses outlined in the issue summary for the current Drupalicon, and IMO introduce new weaknesses the current icon does not have - such as having such intensely stylised colouring and textures that they would be incompatible with almost every design you could think of.

I'm loving all your crazy designs @sphism!

I think #10 lacks the personality required for a community mascot.

It seems to evolve all by itself. There used to be competitions before DrupalCons to come up with the logo, resulting in some gems:

I really love the 3D Drupal 7 Druplicon in #37. Any chance it could be rendered as SVG?

The 2004 Druplicon looks dated because it is flat / Web 2.0. 3D will come back - we should be ahead of the curve.

Google image search for mascot comes up with some interesting results, including boy / girl Druplicons here: http://idleidol.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/police5.jpg

Did anyone ever make a fat Buddha / Druplicon mashup?

I think we should stick with the floating head idea.

Anyway - just some random thoughts.

...just to be clear:

I'm sure no-one would object to these sorts of designs for DrupalCons and Camps and their respective websites and/or advertising gear (t-shirts, cups, badges, stickers etc). The reason why I personally (and my guess is that all others that feel the same) oppose the 3D ideas is that because we have in mind the logo that will be in the installer, the front page after each installation in the Seven theme as well as here in d.o. It's just that we need something more "plain" as the product "official" logo. Something in the spirit of #10 or #42 or what is in the issue summary at the time of writing this (personal favorite is the "E" series with the "fading" border instead of the "A" and "G" series with the white one that makes it look like a sticker).

Just my 0.02$

PS: Logo competitions for DrupalCons is a great idea to establish like voting for the next place that will be considered for DrupalCons.

@klonos I think the Drupal Wordmark is supposed to be used instead of the Druplicon when we need to satisfy the plain / official requirement.

There is a Druplicon BoF at Drupalcon: https://prague2013.drupal.org/bof/druplicon-rip-long-live-druplicon

I think when people say that the Druplicon is a mascot they mean he is a character: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Character_%28arts%29

He is someone we can pretend is a real person, like Homer Simpson.

a droplet at terminal velocity is basically a sphere that ripples as it falls, the stylised "pointy" droplet is just that, stylised. Any "perfect" droplet shape would therefore be contrived, but I'm sure you could come up with something pleasing to the eye by playing around with ratios that are generally considered "good".

Regarding #10, great work! I really like the idea of a simple design.

Would this be the simplest method?

Beautiful!

I like the subtle changes to the nose and mouth.

Note that the DA/Dries picked a Drupal 8 marketing logo at https://association.drupal.org/node/18568, that is NOT a Druplicon replacement, so this issue is about different things. Just wanted to state that :)

@sphism, the curve can be decreased by applying a margin. The thicker the margin, the lesser the curve.

@sphism on #73, I like the druplicon's expression so much more. He/she looks more confident and clever :-)

@sphism Interesting, there could be many variations on this. For example, the outline now ocassionaly "clashes" with the gradient (e.g. its only matches in the top of the Druplicon). The mouth is a little uneven, probally because its difficult to have it "turned" and smiling. The eyes on the right, have a line - I understand this is to avoid connectiveness - but it might be worth playing with white space like the WWF logo.

Make the next SVG Inkscape compatible. I made the previous on compatible with just one change. From:

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.0//EN"    "http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-SVG-20010904/DTD/svg10.dtd" [
	<!ENTITY ns_flows "http://ns.adobe.com/Flows/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_extend "http://ns.adobe.com/Extensibility/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_ai "http://ns.adobe.com/AdobeIllustrator/10.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_graphs "http://ns.adobe.com/Graphs/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_vars "http://ns.adobe.com/Variables/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_imrep "http://ns.adobe.com/ImageReplacement/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_sfw "http://ns.adobe.com/SaveForWeb/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_custom "http://ns.adobe.com/GenericCustomNamespace/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_adobe_xpath "http://ns.adobe.com/XPath/1.0/">
	<!ENTITY ns_svg "http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
	<!ENTITY ns_xlink "http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
]>

to:
<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.0//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-SVG-20010904/DTD/svg10.dtd">

A Druplicon emphasing 8, as used on http://d8the.me/

@peterx that thing is staring into my soul with its dead infinite-loop infinity eyes.

Agreed, but it's perfectly spoooooky for Halloween. :)

My favourite is still #43, but I love the creativity in this thread! :)

If the goal is to produce a new Druplicon render to be used in the default install and such, it needs to be simple; simple enough that it can scale down to a favicon. Many of the examples here fail that requirement.

If the goal is to produce cool looking Druplicons that we can collect and offer to people to use in unofficial capacities, we should setup a place to host such imagery and let people start filling up the collection. In that case, "simple enough for a favicon" is not really relevant.

What do you think about a simplified version, and a construction with
base shapes?
I designed it from simple circles, and subdivision of the shapes

From my perspective, that's not a drop anymore, that's a circle with a shark fin.

This might be controversial but... it's 2014 so I'm updating the title.

What do we see overwhelmingly in "good" design for commercial, not for profit and government projects alike in 2014?

- Flat design
- Less reliance on skeuomorphism to present an idea
- Refinement of responsive design patterns, including SVGs
- Inclusive/accessible design

Can I suggest that a blue little man's head with sunglasses (or are they eyeballs fused together?) rendered in 3D is none of these things, and so is not looking to the future and is not even on-trend for the present.

Looking to the future or at least being on-trend for now, a logo would:

- Use "flat" design aesthetic, definitely NOT be a 3D render or attempt a "psuedo-3D designy thing"
- Not put eyeballs or a face on a water drop, because nobody knows why it has eyeballs and it just looks goofy and alien to outsiders (I have literally had clients ask me why there is a blue alien on their website and were concerned that I had done something to put the "alien" there).
- Be SVG friendly, so that we could include it in a design at all sizes from favicons to billboards on buildings, and so automatically also be zoom friendly for people using assistive technologies

The Druplicon is part of Drupal's marketing and public image and we have to remember that many people in the world who make decisions about what software organisations use are still skeptical/dismissive/uninformed about Drupal and so we all have a vested interest in improving anything that makes it easier for people to not take Drupal seriously.

..we all have a vested interest in improving anything that makes it easier for people to not take Drupal seriously

Umm... no. Just because there may be a few "clients" out there that may not understand the logo/design doesn't justify completely abandoning the iconic "logo" of Drupal. People accept what is presented, especially if you simply explain the fact that "it's their logo". Also, it isn't like one can't white label a site and remove all traces of this logo/[fav]icon for this to be considered a justifiable reason.

- Not put eyeballs or a face on a water drop, because nobody knows why it has eyeballs and it just looks goofy and alien to outsiders (I have literally had clients ask me why there is a blue alien on their website and were concerned that I had done something to put the "alien" there).

I do not agree with this at all. GitHub has the Octocat and I assure you, that looks more "alien" than our Druplicon. The Druplicon is our "brand". It is what is/has identified something as "Drupal" for many, many years.

I do not like the idea of scrapping the key components of the Druplicon: drop outline, infinity eyes, nose, mouth. That is what make it the Druplicon. How those elements are presented is certainly up for design, but removing them is not an option IMO.

#91 did not include the nose or mouth which is what makes it look odd to me, I'm still up in the air about the "shark fin" though and kind of agree it doesn't quite look like a drop anymore.

A friendly reminder that there are constructive and less constructive ways to share feedback with people who are donating both their volunteer time and artistic skills (neither of which we as a community have in abundance). I also think there's no reason to box in creativity based on tradition. This should be a fun exercise in exploration. Some ideas will work, some ideas won't, but IMO we should allow anything to be on the table.

Basing a long-lasting logo/mascot on what is "trendy" in design currently is a very short-sighted idea. What's trendy this year won't be what's trendy next year, or the year after. Flat design will pass. Drupal will not.

Also? This little guy hasn't changed in almost 20 years, and it hasn't hurt anyone: http://www.isc.tamu.edu/~lewing/linux/

webchick: Good design thrives with constraints. A constraint of "consistent with the history of the brand" rather than "what's trendy now" is an entirely reasonable constraint. Even with that there have been a lot of ideas tossed about in this thread so I don't think we're at risk of suppressing creativity.

I do not believe I was being "less constructive", I was simply trying to point out:

I do not like the idea of scrapping the key components of the Druplicon: drop outline, infinity eyes, nose, mouth. That is what make it the Druplicon. How those elements are presented is certainly up for design, but removing them is not an option IMO.

Which is what @Crell said, just better than I did :D

A constraint of "consistent with the history of the brand" rather than "what's trendy now" is an entirely reasonable constraint.

I'm the italian designer of the "FLAT" logo

@marcvangend
yep, it seems to be a shark instead of a drop
but if the idea of the sketch is ok, (it's a 30 minutes try, every circle i used can be an ellipse) i can adjust the shark pin, and it will be a drop

@thedavidmeister
I do not agree with you about the eyes of the drop

and i agree with
@Mark Carver
i can try to insert the nose and the mouth

But i want to specify for the reader of this thread why i used the term "FLAT"
I wrote "FLAT" beacause i have to "sell" my design to other, i have to use new terms that are modern and attractive, but NOT to imitate only the trend of this year

i'll explain it responding to
@Crell
https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRwJrKNxh8mfxeX7yeb...
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FojM8qm25EU/TWIxWCWrk1I/AAAAAAAAALk/sIYMvxUPtO...
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-h7xqwWVE-BM/UrH9cD3Fy_I/AAAAAAAAIis/qdeKNn0RTr...
and more...

Now you can tell me that all the modern logos are FLAT?
Or it's simply a natural evolution?

You all work on the web i hope, if you use Drupal ;)
So we can be more constructive and rational with comments

Good design thrives with constraints. A constraint of "consistent with the history of the brand" rather than "what's trendy now" is an entirely reasonable constraint. Even with that there have been a lot of ideas tossed about in this thread so I don't think we're at risk of suppressing creativity.

If we're being serious about this, then we should add these requirements to the issue summary instead of posting them in comments after the fact. Especially if there are requirements that are so subjective, we're running the risk of being “clients from hell”.

There's also a lot of solutioning in the issue summary that should be moved into comments.

I think Flat design will be over by the time Drupal 8 is in common use. I think that a new logo for the new approach of Drupal 8 is consistent. As a comparison with the leader in another field, Rolls Royce changed their distinctive radiator.

One of the things I like about https://www.drupal.org/node/2057767#comment-7995835 is the direction, the face is looking up instead of down. The current logo could use a slight tilt up and a drift from fierce to happy.

.(:)

I agree with #96 and #100, I'd like to focus on updating the requirements/constraints that we can agree are important so that suggestions can be reviewed more objectively against rather than limiting creativity by proposing "solutions" based on current trends.

I do still think it's important that we can represent the logo in a scalable format, such as SVG - this is *harder* but not impossible with 3D renders on small scales (like a favicon). This is already stated in the issue summary as an important consideration.

I do still think that it's important that the logo is comprehensible and approachable to as many people as possible, not just people who have worked with it for years and not just developers - this is *harder* but not impossible when you start putting eyeballs on things as you start wandering into "uncanny valley" type considerations (Github's Octocat has other body parts beyond eyeballs - I'd say the usual reaction to the Github mascot is "that's cute!" not "oh, ok... a blue spaceman"). I think it's sort of funny that we're apparently OK with human eye balls that are horrifically mutated to the point of being fused across the middle into a single, giant mono-eye but not something that looks vaguely like a shark fin. "The Drupal icon is weird looking and dated" is a *common* criticism of Drupal's branding that I have seen in Drupal's own IRC channels, have heard time and time again at meetups (not just Drupal meetups), from clients, friends, etc... Again, this is already stated as a primary weakness of the current logo in this issue's summary, in fact the weirdness and unapproachableness of the logo make up 5 of the 8 stated main weaknesses in the summary.

I also think it's a rather masculine looking logo, which isn't great for fostering an encouraging feeling of inclusiveness. The female renders in #52 and #53 are a bit extreme for my taste, but they do highlight that whether consciously or subconsciously, there are people out there who identify with the current Drupal logo as "a male thing". I feel this probably could be added as a weakness in the issue summary, but I'm curious to see whether others agree.

The issue summary itself *opens* with the premise that the Druplicon has been steadily becoming less relevant and marginalised over the last *9 years*, providing clear evidence/examples.

The main arguments I have heard (feel free to provide other arguments, I'm actually quite open to discussing this) in defence of the idea of the blue-drop-space-man as an immutable part of Drupal's branding are:

- That's just how it has always been and so how it must always continue to be
- Other successful products have logos that people find weird too (which is not the same argument as other successful branding has weird logos, arguably linux suffers from terrible branding/marketing/public perception issues compared to both Mac and Windows, which I think a lot of linux advocates tend to forget easily simply because linux itself is a great product, and this is a great example of what NOT to do if you're looking for mainstream acceptance)
- I don't personally find it off-putting/I don't accept or am suspicious of other people's claims that it is off-putting, there must be some ulterior motive there
- Anyone who doesn't "get it" is wrong somehow and if they just got to know Drupal more they'd love it exactly as much as I do
- People who do identify with the current logo would be incapable of accepting a change and will almost certainly like any and every other possible logo idea less, so we shouldn't even try to consider alternatives because they're guaranteed to be worse
- "It's subjective" and so any logo can be justified, even if "some minority of people" are pointing out issues in how it presents and what it represents

Arguments I have NOT yet heard from anybody defending the blue-drop-space-man:

- A blue-drop-space-man is clearly aligned with the community's goals, ideals and achievements because it represents X (I can see how the droplet metaphor works, but why the spaceman face? I could see other non-droplet metaphors working but that would be a much larger departure from tradition)
- There are clear statistics showing that other products/brands with stylised/mutated blue human heads perform well in the market
- If I were to invent a logo/mascot for Drupal today, in a world where it did not already have one, I'd probably choose a blue-drop-space-man after carefully considering all other options

I totally agree that "because tradition" is a valid argument when talking about logos and branding because you obviously don't want to throw away all your existing brand juice, but it's not the only consideration either and the graphics in #99 show that things can change and evolve over time too. If we did have a clear long-term branding goal (like, "less anthropomorphic" or "less masculine") we could always plan to iterate the branding towards that goal over multiple years in a way that allowed people to adjust their expectations gradually.

We absolutely do have a vested interest in being taken seriously and being viewed positively by people who are outside our existing community, and not "because of clients" (although clients are important too, the community owes a huge amount to the buy-in from clients). One of the main things I keep hearing from the D8 spruikers about is that this release represents a global scale attempt from our community to try to become more inviting and approachable to people outside our existing members - "getting off the island" as they say. I don't see much difference philosophically between wanting to embrace technologies that other PHP developers see as valuable, like Symfony, and wanting to embrace the aesthetics and branding ideals that other major open source PHP (and non-PHP) communities have decided to adopt.

The "flat design" thing was more about me suggesting a solution to the above, but forget I said anything about it as it's only tangental to the main points I wanted to raise.

Interesting comment about male/inclusive and #52. In many other discussions, outside of IT, women are seeking strong images/role models. #52 would have to be a strong fierce cat.

@lussoluca

love the geometric approach you have taken as well as the fresher color. I have a version I have been using in all of Dries's keynotes that has a similar coloring and more flat approach.

I do feel that the mouth and nose are essential though, or at least the mouth. The smiling face has been documented to have a positive impact on users psychologically and it is not an accident that brands like survey monkey use smiling mascots.

References
http://blog.usabilla.com/effect-human-faces-web-design/
http://3.7designs.co/blog/2012/08/10-psychological-principles-to-design-... (#6)

@marcvangend

+1 to #92. It does look a little like a shark fin.

Setting aside facetious comments and tangents about the d8 logo wordmark, history, the nature of brand etc. I'm going to make an attempt to summarize the consensus view so far:

• The druplicon is important to the Drupal brand
• The current druplicon is dated
• It's important to evolve with time, while maintaining connection to our history
• The colors of the current druplicon are web safe but rather dull
• The druplicon's eyes can be interpreted as mean or "alien" but...
• The eyes are also part of the brand history and represent two drops forming infinity
• Faces have a powerful psychological impact in usability
• The druplicon is a drop and should look like a drop
• Light sources in icons are an outdated artifact of "skeumorphic" design but...
• "flat" design may just be the current trend
• in either case an overly rendered druplicon would certainly look dated and would not age well
• A more geometric approach can yield a simpler, cleaner icon but...
• Anthropomorphism is also an important "humanizing" force in design
• The druplicon's a little weird but...
• It's also kind of cute and quirkily endearing in it's own way and many of us love it
• It's important for Drupal that visual representations of our community brand give the impression to the commercial ecosystem we are part of that Drupal is contemporary and relevant

Based on the consensus summary I've put together a solution that balances all the competing objectives as well as I can.

Other problems with the current design that are not covered above:

• The drop is not a perfect circle below the tip
• The spacing between the features is not in correct perspective mapped to the sphere
• The spacing between the eyes and the right edge is too close to scale well
• The mouth is too small to even appear at the scale of an ICO
• The eyes look like glasses or racing goggles adding to the "fierce" appearance (it's also worthy of note that solutions above that remove nose and mouth amplify the "fierce" impression)
• The nose has been referred to as "piglike"
• The lines of the nose and mouth are angular and "mechanical" not fluid and gestural making the impression more robotic and less human
• The tip of the drop and the highlight has a "pinched off" appearance rather than a fluid shape that suggests weight
• The subtle infinity shape composed of two drops that was the original intent of the icon's eyes does not succeed in conveying that idea because the "bridge" detracts from the "droppiness" of the eyes and your eye cannot form a continuous infinity shape by following the outlines across the divide from one shape to the next
• The combination of this "bridge" and the shadow line immediately above it also suggest a "knit brow" again emphasising "fierce", "mean", "angry"

Below is also a description of how I arrived at a color that combines the median of colors in the proposed solutions in this issue and more accurately reflects the current state of colors across the Drupal brand which right now are similar but not exactly the same (the darker one is for the background color).

The original and the proposed solution:

Attributes that relate to topics in that arose in the issue

Images from the issue that were sampled for color

Derivation of the colors

How the icon might appear in Bartik with the revised colors

The nose and mouth are much better/friendlier but the eyes are either a tad too big or to close(low) over the nose. Seems a little out of proportion. Some attempt at multiple tones might add a little more pop. It wouldn't have to be as complex as the current icon and you could still get the flat look. My 2 cents.

The drupal.org site and bartik both have top-darker to bottom-lighter gradient for the header regions. Perhaps the icon could just go in the opposite direction?

@dcrocks

If others feel the same way about the eyes I'll try some variations on it.

I'd urge you to live with this one for a bit though. I think it will grow on you. The closer features are actually intentional. Children's features are closer together than those of adults and a younger face is more approachable and endearing which is helpful in countering the "scary alien" vibe.

As for the gradient. Flat is most definitely in. In fact for pure graphic designers (think Paul Rand or Massimo Vignelli), flat has always been in. I'd argue flat is just design for the web finally coming of age. If I'm wrong and the pendulum swings back we can always update it again with a gradient, but right now it makes us seem out-of-touch (personaly i'd remove the gradients from the headers of bartik and Drupal.org as well).

Even IOS 8 isn't there yet, since many older icons still have gradients. But you're right, the dupal.org/bartik background probably doesn't serve flat icons well.

This is great work tkoleary. I'm curious to see what other folks think but I just wanted to thank you for your comprehensive work synthesizing what's been offered above, and specifically addressing those issues in your proposal. I'm going to let it sit with me for a few days, but this is looking really good.

Nice synthesis but I worry that you've found an average that might work as a whole has a bland appearance. Not sure Druplicon should become more cute. Less freaky/aggressive sure, but not necessarily younger.

- I wonder if this blue provides enough contrast, even against white. I don't think it's necessary to find some middle value between all variations. Is there a strong reason to move away from the "official" colors?
- The forehead seems quite large
- There's friction between the 3/4 direction of eyes, nose & mouth and the drops point being exactly in the middle

The original druplicon has a certain dynamic and speed to it: squinted eyes, the assymetric drop shape. The proposed variation seems more static.

@tkoleary: Great effort and fantastic insight into your workings especially.

That said, I still feel that we need to be bolder/braver and that the best progression would be to lose "face" entirely - even in your revised version it's still the trickiest part to get right in terms of the emotion that it does or doesn't convey (let alone agreeing on what emotion, if any, should be present). I also feel that it's the part of the current logo that's the least timeless with too many clear connections to early-naughties logo design. The face is the point of most contention throughout this entire thread.

Losing the face entirely neutralises the logo, addresses the largest concerns surrounding it looking "dated" and makes it many times more flexible in terms of possible application. To me, this is an easy decision where the pros far outweigh the cons.

the proposal from #107 looks too static to me. the symmetry makes it appear less dynamic than the old one. at one hand side the druplicon now appears younger (nose and mouth) and maybe less mature. at the other, the eyes look a bit like grandma-glasses. color looks ok, but the contrast doesn't work well for the revised bartik example. i think the shapes need a more professional and dynamic touch.

sorry if i'm sounding very negative here. i very much appreciate the effort being put in and like the academic approach. thanks for your work and hope my comments can be seen helpful rather than turning ideas down :)

@rootwork

Thank you.

@danbohea

Did you read #104? Those are only two of many references you will find to the positive psychological impact of faces on usability. Like you I was initially for a solid drop but the research in this area has brought me back to the keeping the face both for historical and brand consistency as well as the positive UX impact.

@Yoroy

Very thoughtful analysis

Nice synthesis but I worry that you've found an average that might work as a whole has a bland appearance. Not sure Druplicon should become more cute. Less freaky/aggressive sure, but not necessarily younger.

I see your point here but I do still lean towards the cuter for the reasons already stated but also because it tends to counter the kind of aggressive masculinity noted by others in this issue.

- I wonder if this blue provides enough contrast, even against white. I don't think it's necessary to find some middle value between all variations. Is there a strong reason to move away from the "official" colors?

Given that you're the second person to note this I'm ok shifting the lightness down within the same hue.

- The forehead seems quite large

It's actually smaller than the original but I think I can mitigate that by bringing the point down slightly.

- There's friction between the 3/4 direction of eyes, nose & mouth and the drops point being exactly in the middle
The original druplicon has a certain dynamic and speed to it: squinted eyes, the assymetric drop shape. The proposed variation seems more static.

I think you may be right that this compromise between the symmetry crowd and the traditionalists has resulted in a weaker icon. See my revision below. I think this captures more of the "speed" and dynamism of the original without losing the friendliness.

Here's the two color variations on the bartik header. Gradient or not I think we will need some kind of subtle accent outline as shown here.

C is really getting close, imo, more so than any other attempt in this thread. It preserves the best features of the old, yet feels more fresh and vibrant... Less potentially-super villian like the current druplicon; something about those eyes.

Great work bringing some momentum to this thread Kevin!

I agree with the comments about the eyes and like the direction C is heading.

It feels like a outline would be a good way to add contrast, have you tried a very thin white(ish) outline instead of the thicker dark blue one?

I'm not sure the outline the way it is done fits the flat design philosophy. A wider white might be better. The color of (a) above is 'flatter' looking and would be better against the various backgrounds I've seen the logo against.

Really liking B and C. I don't feel strongly about the color or the outline (other than the fact that I agree there needs to be something) but I like the modification of the peak.

Bikeshed alert ... I'm a graphic designer with 25 years experience, and a site builder working for small to medium businesses that operate in the real world (ie they are not primarily web-focused). The general reaction I get when clients see the Drupal icon (if I show it to them) is that it is cute, but not very professional-looking. When pressed, this is because it's a round smiley face, which they associate with emoticons and see as childish. I tend to agree with them. It's not about colour or fine tuning of detail or flat-vs-rendered or mathematically-correct shapes (WTF??), it's the basic concept. My advice on the Druplicon (not the logo) would probably be "lose it".

That said - B is too saturated, looks garish. C is the best of the color options so far, if it's on a white background. On other backgrounds, it's always going to suck to some degree. Both the Bartik examples are very problematic to my eye, blue-on-blue seriously reduces the integrity and impact of the shape, and you wind up just slapping band-aids on it. For this sort of logo, my usage rules to the client would begin with "it always has a white background".

Nowhere in this conversation is the "Drupal" type being given much consideration. Why not? Considering the typeface at the same time is an essential part of the design process, and may help to suggest some complementary subtleties for the druplicon.

@John Pitcairn

While I appreciate a view from off the island, and your experience (though I have you beat on both breadth and longevity), icons from the mail chimp to the Zurb Foundation Abominable snowman paint a different picture. There's nothing inherently unprofessional about a lighthearted illustrated mascot. It's all in the execution.

John Pitcairn: The type/wordmark of "Drupal" as seen in the header of this page, which is what I assume you're referring to, is out of scope here for legal reasons. Druplicon is the "community mascot/logo", and has been licensed under the GPL for a decade. The wordmark is held by the Drupal Association separately and is used as a trademark, thus by nature must be more closely controlled. A closer linkage between the two could be problematic.

I agree that #117 C is one of the better options that's been put forth so far. It's more smiley, less creepy-grin. :-)

@John Pitcairn I don't really see this as a client issue. Most clients should never see this. To me it's more of a community issue. And this is the community, right here, discussing it.

In terms of the wordmark (the "Drupal type") that's a whole separate thing, and is copyrighted. See #605710: Decide on if and if so, how to implement the Drupal wordmark in core for recent discussion on using that. While the wordmark is Drupal's logo, the Druplicon is more like a logo of the community (thus the importance of it being remixable). Though I agree with tkoleary that plenty of "professional" projects -- that are not open-source and are not community supported, for that matter -- have cutesy logos. Most of the discussion above has sustained the overall look of the Druplicon, if anything defending it against what are seen as attacks (for instance removing the face) from its identity. The community consensus seems to be mostly in favor of the general cute- or cool-ness of the Druplicon.

Still liking both B and C, but agree there needs to be some accounting for being on blue or clashing backgrounds with a white outline or a shadow.

#117 b
Bright. Happy. Intelligent. Pretty. Just like me.
The asymmetric top bit makes the logo "forward looking".
The blue is dark enough for white backgrounds and bright enough to survive dull corporate blue backgrounds.

Fair enough. I did mean some consideration of the recommended typeface to be used in close association with the druplicon, not the typeface of the wordmark. Or is there no recommendation, and that choice would that generally be up to whoever was using it?

The introduction of an "outline/drop-shadow" etc. just to deal with Bartik's conflicting color scheme is out of scope of this issue. It also severely limits the colors available. Once a new Druplicon has been adopted, we should open a new issue to figure out the best implementation for Bartik.

So far, I do like C the best and this does appear to be the general consensus of what I have read from others as well.

That being said, I think we will continue to run the risk of bikeshedding this issue if we don't limit ourselves in what should be accomplished here. Considering that we already have a lengthy discussion just about "how" we should update the Druplicon logo, I think this issue should needs rescoping from any sort of implementation to just being a new "policy" (so to speak) for the Druplicon.

Once a decision has been made, the appropriate nodes on d.o (https://www.drupal.org/node/9068, https://www.drupal.org/druplicon) should be updated and new issues to change files in core should be created. I would mark this NR, but we still need an issue summary update (I do not have time to overhaul this at the moment).

@John Pitcairn

The Drupal wordmark is tied to the "Drupal" name trademarked by Dries and can't be used without permission AFAIK. The druplicon is fully open source and can be used anywhere.

@Mark Carver

Good point. There will need to be an issue for Bartik.

That said I'm working up some guidelines for color and outline standards which I'll post here soon.

Here's my first pass at a standard for use in core. I went back to the Seven blue (#0074bd) since it was so close to "c" and necessitates fewer changes in CSS.

In order to balance the seven blue to Bartik I have changed the gradient to: Top #005EA4, Bottom #007CD8, which would need to be added to that issue.

The outline proportion is 3px at 100px height or 3% of icon height and should scale proportionately.

The "don'ts" would only apply to where it's used in core (Bartik and seven themes), since it's GPL others can change it at will in their own themes.

Still to come is a style for "ghosting" needed for the installer.

Annotated version revised based on iterations since #107

I really like these clear "do"s and "don't"s :)

However, I strongly feel that there should not be an outline by default. I think there should only be one exception to this and that should be if the background is too close to the Druplicon "blue" (ie: seven blue). If that is the case (as in Bartik) then an outline of the same color as the eyes/nose/mouth (white) should be added and the background should be changed to transparent for an "outline" version of the Druplicon.

This would be the only variation for the Druplicon logo (in core anyway).

@mark carver, @lewis Nyman

However, I strongly feel that there should not be an outline by default.

My personal view is that the outline as used in the examples above goes beyond simply performing the function of creating sufficient contrast to the background. It acts as a stylistic focus to set the icon apart from any background it sits on (even white) and give it a kind of prominence not afforded other elements on the page.

That said, I think that Lewis should have the last word on this as the maintainer of seven style guide.

@mark carver

If your concern is around having too many variations of the druplicon file i'm sure we can get around that by producing the variations of outline color using CSS before and after elements with some radius cornered boxes like this:

Then we can have just two files: blue and transparent for bartik.

That is partially my concern, but for I suspect perhaps for different reasons. In core, there often needs to be an explicit direction on what should be done in cases like this (i.e.: why we are finally getting a style guide for seven :)). This isn't so people cannot create their own variations (which they can and will do since this the Druplicon is GLP). This aspect of the Druplicon is to just help provide explicit instructions in how to implement it in core:

Being used on top of a background that is not or does not conflict with the shade of the Druplicon blue?
Use the normal Druplicon logo.

Otherwise:
Use the "white outlined" version which will be transparent and match any background.

It's more about providing (in my eyes anyway) a clearer "do" and "don't" scenario by limiting to option "A" or option "B". Introducing the various different shades of an outline, IMO, will just complicate matters and allow further bikeshedding down the road when it comes time for implementation.

I'm certainly not going to be up in arms if we do, this is after all just an opinion. I just thought I would share how I can see this being a potential issue and yes, I would like to hear @LewisNyman's thoughts on this.

So, I like this a lot. FWIW, I don't really dig the eyes. I wish that we rounded out their meeting point a bit (never disliked the "visor" look) or if we want eyes, let's actually separate them. Other than that, I thin this is great.

Eclipse

Thank you tkoleary for the amount of work you have punt into this. I really like the direction this is going.

My only concern is with the outline. The light gray outline on the white background looks strange to me. While the outline is about enhancing contrast and drawing a crisp shape, a gray outline on a white background does the opposite and seems to blur the druplicon like a drop shadow.

I agree with Mark in #137. Even though we cannot force anyone to obey the style guide, we should do our future selves a favor and define very clear instructions that leave no (or very little) room for interpretation. If the style guide would say "the outline can be a shade of gray in the range of #ffffff to #aaaaaa, optionally up to 40% transparent", we aren't helping anyone.

Uuuhh really really like the direction.
The outline discussion I leave to the Themers and Designers.
But Version C looks super nice.

Why not just make the outline always white, always the same transparency? Then it will be invisible on white, visible and matching on any color.

This looks awesome. Really liking C too - like the friendlier face and the modification of the peak from the previously suggested symmetric one.

Why is the style guide limited to CSS changes? Something like the shadow can be an element in SVG we can change and the style guide can say something about the range of changes. The options might be limited to delete or change to a different colour.

I am tempted to add a speed trail out to the left. Make the druplicon a brilliant comet in a universe full of cold dead rocks.

@tkoleary - kevin, wow. Thanks for this work. Likewise thanks to @lussoluca for picking up this thread again.

I really love the rationale outlined in #133 and the synthesis of consensus in the thread.

I'm, taking a deep breath, and tentatively marking RTBC. We could tweak it more, but I think it works beautifully as it is.

- Donna.

echoing #137. I think that there should be a basic "this is the druplicon" type of icon for licensing / promotional reasons (people will always fork anyway). If there is an additional repository / location that has all this justification, usage, style guide, etc then I think that's the way to go because the variations (especially via css transformations if svg editions are supplied) would be the way to go.

From a design perspective it seems everyone loves the direction of iOS / Drupalicon, which is not my personal taste but I like the overlay w/ visual justifications / proportions. The only thing I'd critique in the current design iteration:
-- makes mention of dropping "skeuomorphism" yet the Druplicon is still looking down and to the right
-- it's a flat look w/ nice sharp edges with the exception of the smile which is still cartoony and the nose (also a bit cartoony)
-- is the druplicon intended to look more or less approachable? Right now it's like the D8 "logo". Flat, corporate, but still a little silly too. Which direction are we going?

What meaning are we trying to convey w/ Drupal via it's icon? To me the eyes have always been dangerously close to the infinitely sign without outright being one (kind of a lopsided infinity); suggesting that it is a framework with unlimited uses. The current design the eyes appear to follow the skeuomorphism w/ them seemingly wrapping around the outside of what you'd project to be a spherical surface, yet the added design cue's suggest that this is a flat item.

Also, as drupal has had an influx of corporate interest, the logo is starting to reflect this with a redesign taking a page from iOS 7+. Sanitizing the community component of Drupal visually, and reducing community to the smile. I also don't love the outline idea unless it had some color depth to allow the druplicon to appear to be sitting on the interface like a coin (slight sharp black edge to the bottom of the white outline would give it a raised feel).

I like the attention to detail in describing it in its current state, just providing feedback.

To piggy back on #143, I assume we will make an "official" version available as an SVG? That's the only version I use because... SVG. :-) (And it does allow for easy CSS-based customization as noted, although I rarely do that myself.)

Re #143 & #146:

Of course, even the current one has SVG. We should add an "outline" element to the SVG, but it is transparent by default. Then, when we need to achieve the "outline" look as I said in #137, it should be the same color and opacity as the face elements.

However, the point I am trying to make is about keeping future implementations in core from bikeshedding over when it's appropriate to use the outline and what color it should be. That is all.

No one is limiting what you want to do on your own time. I'm just saying that there should be clearer "do"s and "don't"s regarding how we implement it in core.

Any reasoning to justify altering the Druplicon to "deal with X implementation" is an entirely separate issue. For instance, Bartik (or whatever future theme we come up with) will have it's own color palette that may or may not conflict with the "official" Druplicon. That is when we discuss targeting, for instance, specific SVG elements and altering them there. We should not be discussing that here.

@Mark Carver, @crell, @John Pitcairn

If the style guide would say "the outline can be a shade of gray in the range of #ffffff to #aaaaaa, optionally up to 40% transparent", we aren't helping anyone.

The variations in #132 were intended to be the specific (proposed) appropriate uses, not a fuzzy range.

Why not just make the outline always white, always the same transparency? Then it will be invisible on white, visible and matching on any color.

I think that could work. Trying it out.

I assume we will make an "official" version available as an SVG?

We should add an "outline" element to the SVG, but it is transparent by default.

Good idea. I will do that.

The variations in #132 were intended to be the specific (proposed) appropriate uses, not a fuzzy range.

I understood that, however not everyone will. #139 just simply proved my point. Some people will just interpret it as a multiple choice. This is why I was saying that it should read more like option "A" or option "B" is all.

@Mark Carver

I understood that, however not everyone will. #139 just simply proved my point. Some people will just interpret it as a multiple choice.

I'll revise to make that more clear.

@tkoleary when you revise.. .can you also update the issue summary with the current proposed solution and the do's and dont's?
This feels like it is getting close to me and an issue summary update would really help.

I suggest moving the eyes *a bit* to the right. Once that you see them in the right angle, it's impossible to un-see it.

I've been helping to get the current Druplicon SVG fitting every possible background color in Bartik #2142653: Change default logo filetype to .svg and add an SVG version of Druplicon, and it's hard. *Good* that you postpone that for later, it can multiply the bikeshedding in this issue.

@corbacho, We can use javascript to connect your version of the logo to the video camera so the eyes follow the user around the room. :-)

@YesCT

Sure. The issue summary is getting a bit long is it appropriate to remove content that's no longer relevant or should I just add to it at the end?

@corbacho

suggest moving the eyes *a bit* to the right.

Independent of your comment I just noticed the exact same thing this morning.

@tkoleary: yes, the purpose of the issue summary is it contains an up to date summary without earlier history (which one should get from comments). The goal of the summary is to be an as concise and yet as complete summary as possible.

:) thanks!

removing the needs issue summary update tag, and marking that done in the remaining task in the summary

adding a before to the summary

I think this needs work, for the move the eyes to the right as mentioned in #152 and #154.
But also needs review in general.

Feels like are getting really close here. How do we make the change "official"?

I really like the current iteration, and even more I like the direction it has gone since the early versions.

I think the only remaining part I dislike (and this has been mentioned above) is that the eyes come to a point in the middle. It doesn't have to be as wide as it was before, but can it be smoothed out a bit?

@YesCT I think the shift to the right in #152 and #154 has been applied in the new revised version.

I pulled the proposed and revised side by side pngs into inkscape and compared with the animated gif. Without getting out a ruler, I can see it's definitely shifted. perhaps not quite as much as in the animation, but then I would guess @tkoleary was trying to preserve clarity at smaller sizes as spec'd in the annotated version.

@tkoleary can you confirm? And great work on the issue summary. It's really clear now.

@tim.plunkett - Personally I don't mind the point in the middle of the eyes. For me, it makes it even more like the infinity symbol which is nice.

As for deciding... I see two paths forward.

1. We call this done, and put out a general call through all channels and get a raw vote from as many people as we can. Simply asking "Is it time to update Druplicon?" Yes? or No? We shouldn't ask for extra feedback and revision at this point, just a yes or no to adopt this revision. Perhaps a post on groups, or perhaps even a news post on the front of d.o? Do we still have the ability to do a poll module on D.O?

or

2. Ask Dries to issue a Drupal Decree.

:-)

RTBC

Oops, that should really be needs review.

We call this done, and put out a general call through all channels and get a raw vote from as many people as we can. Simply asking "Is it time to update Druplicon?" Yes? or No? We shouldn't ask for extra feedback and revision at this point, just a yes or no to adopt this revision. Perhaps a post on groups, or perhaps even a news post on the front of d.o? Do we still have the ability to do a poll module on D.O?

We have done this in the past and it just ends up further bikeshedding an issue because regardless if you state you just want a "Yes/No" answer, people are inclined to be opinionated. We're already at 168 comments. I say we go ahead and go up the latter on this one now that it's been flushed out. Personally, I think that's the only real "Yes/No" we need.

Was gonna assign to @xjm, but since @webchick has been on this issue I'll assign to her. Should this be escalated to Dries or should we do a community "poll" on this.

I'd still very much like to see the eyes fixed first.

I agree with @kattekrab in #163:

For me, it makes it even more like the infinity symbol which is nice.

Also from #107:

• The subtle infinity shape composed of two drops that was the original intent of the icon's eyes does not succeed in conveying that idea because the "bridge" detracts from the "droppiness" of the eyes and your eye cannot form a continuous infinity shape by following the outlines across the divide from one shape to the next
• The combination of this "bridge" and the shadow line immediately above it also suggest a "knit brow" again emphasising "fierce", "mean", "angry"

I don't think there is anything that needs to be "fixed".

I'm not sure why this is assigned to me. Branding of Drupal is a project lead-level decision.

Ok - I tweeted.

https://twitter.com/LittleMsDrupal/status/530666541772046336

Catching up after a long time. I still stand by what I wrote a year ago: I think a redesign would be better than a refresh.

It goes in the right direction though, and the intentions in the "What is changing and why" section are good.
That said I think the execution feels too engineered. Some curves are weird, like where the "hairline" flattens, and generally it could be more organic. Perception beats geometrical precision in this case imho. To me the proposed Druplicon feels more current but not better. Which is not that bad really.
Oh well, I should shut up, get my acts together, and pull some vectors.

Added comment reference (#96) to "Proposed Solution" in the issue summary as to why this is a revision of the current look and not a complete redesign.

I've always found the drupalicon scary because it has blank eyes.

A couple of other people also expressed they have an issue with the eyes.

I wonder if making the border outline of the eyes slightly thicker would help? so that the drops making the eyes are more joined together.

I'll experiment. But I imagine @tkoleary will have a better idea.

@Mark Carver thanks for digging out that rationale about refresh over redesign.

This will always be a challenge to some extent. People love Druplicon, as a mascot, it's much like a family pet, we're going to have strong feelings.

What do you think? https://t.co/umPI38RhuO pic.twitter.com/oCme20Q89J

— Donna Benjamin (@LittleMsDrupal) November 7, 2014

There were a few replies

I know this is blasphemous, but look how Druplicon looks more friendly with eyes.

@sphism, your work has not been deleted (it's still available at https://www.drupal.org/node/2057767/revisions/6584145/view, and I must say: you did a lot of work there!) but as you probably know, the role of the first post has changed over time. The first post now reflects (or at least: should reflect) the current state of the entire issue, with all its comments and files. This is not meant as disrespect for the original first post.

Thanks for your work sphism. I think it has a lot of sense to make a 3D Model, and then flat it out, to get right the face perspective.
* I like more the clean simple strokes of the mouth/nose of B though. It has the right spirit IMHO.
* I have some doubts about the 50's sunglasses look of A's eyes. We want it to look contemporary. But B's eyes don't "click" neither. Maybe it's the perspective.

IMHO a mathematically correct perspective is merely a design tool, not a criterion to judge the result by.

If you look at the architecture of ancient Greek temples like the Parthenon, there are no straight perpendicular lines; they're all slightly curved and concave. This would not have happened if they had favored mathematical correctness over visual effect.

I think it would be great to have a 3D model and see some flat renders from different angles. But let's not assume that the result will by definition be perferable. The human perception does not strictly follow mathematical rules.

I think this discussion is getting a bit derailed. We spent a lot of time building consensus and revising design based on consensus up until #165 when it looked like we were ready to RTBC this.

Commentary from that point on has largely reopened questions over which there was already discussion and compromise.

To paraphrase comments above, mathematical precision does not equal visual harmony and 3D rendering is not graphic design. Yes it is important that the icon not look visually "wrong" in it's perspective and I have already adjusted the consensus version per #163 to correct those problems.

As to the issue about how the eyes meet, a significant number of people have commented on this so I have taken another look at it and revised slightly to "soften" it without detracting from the "infinity" effect.

At this point it's up to Dries.

I agree.

I'd like to make the final decision. Thanks for all the work but to be honest, this does not seem like a high priority. In fact, I'm not entirely sure why we're even considering to change the Druplicon. The issue summary states that "concern has been expressed by many that the icon is dated". I personally don't believe this is a widespread concern. Even if it is a concern for some, I'm not sure it is a problem. Changing the Druplicon has certain impact on the project as many websites, books, t-shirts, training materials, marketing materials will look 'outdated'. I'll certainly give this serious consideration, but I did want to set the expectation that this is not top of mind.

I'm glad to see this final iteration with the revised eyes. It was the last thing that nagged me a bit as well.

This is a solid & professional looking update to Druplicon, kudos to Kevin for navigating this discussion so well. I think we should go for it.

I think this (#188) is great. I support moving forward with it.

The logo is dated, but Dries is right, that alone isn't enough to be concerned about.

The real issue IMHO is that the current logo just isn't very good. That's much more of a concern as it misrepresents Drupal. This has led to "many websites, books, t-shirts, training materials, marketing materials" choosing to sidestep the current icon altogether. A conceptual "drop" has naturally surpassed Drupal's official branding - because it's had to. I don't see the Drupal icon in its current, un-messed-with incarnation featured on the homepage of any of these high profile Drupal websites.

Most recent DrupalCons:

• https://amsterdam2014.drupal.org
• https://austin2014.drupal.org

One of each con's Diamond sponsors:

• https://www.acquia.com

More sponsors:

• https://commerceguys.com
• http://www.amazeelabs.com/en
• http://www.exove.com
• http://i-kos.com

etc etc... you know this list is long, you get the point.

Widespread evidence that high profile sites with a direct interest in promoting Drupal for some reason choose to shy away from its official logo? Maybe. Either way, I'd certainly consider it a widespread concern and one that needs addressing.

I'd like to be as proud of Drupal's official branding as I am of everything else that it represents. I'm not.

Oops, forgot one:

• http://www.drupal.com

(yes there's one in the inmotion ad but that doesn't count, it's a hosting ad)

Really good work tkoleary, now it really has the right perspective :) Thanks for working that out
It's gorgeous, I can't wait to have a sticker in my laptop.

Re #193: Every time we move toward consensus on a logo someone comes in and says we should do something else entirely.

The overwhelming community consensus is to stick with the Druplicon and simply update it. Reading back through the hundreds of comments here makes that apparent. Talking about this with long-time Drupal developers makes this apparent. Asking for feedback (and looking at what feedback was given) on Twitter makes this apparent.

I am really tired of seeing this conversation derailed after 98% of the work is done with "wait but maybe we should do something else completely."

That discussion is done. This discussion is about updating the Druplicon. If you want to propose killing off the Druplicon and adopting a new mascot (aside: Druplicon is a mascot, not a logo), then open your own issue.

@rootwork - I'm not trying to derail anything. I was simply trying to illustrate how important this issue is - particularly to Dries who seems to think otherwise.

I already added my opinion to the design process further up this thread - since then I've stayed quiet and just followed how the design has developed. @tkoleary has done a very thorough job.

I vote for #188 then make any future discussion D9.

I'm not sure that other websites not using the logo as-is is evidence of a problem. Websites/groups/people want to be unique, and will modify the logo regardless of what it is.

I don't think we're voting anymore. We're waiting on Dries to give his feedback.

@tkoleary, Re #188:
I love the detail where the eyes meet, well done. But why did the light gray border (#f5f5f2, may not even be visible on every screen) make a come back? It wasn't there in #160 and #161.

Dries already commented in #190. This is really not a good use of everyone's time, and I think it is a bad idea. I propose: "won't fix"

You are free to make any variant on the Druplicon you like, but we should not change the official mascot image.

@pwolanin, the phrase "I'll certainly give this serious consideration" does not sound like "won't fix" to me.

@pwolanin

I don't think Dries comment was definitive or final.

I'll certainly give this serious consideration, but I did want to set the expectation that this is not top of mind.

I clarified with him and he made some design comments on the eyes and the smile "too kidlike", revising.

We could do a poll to the community.

Please provide any evidence for: "Concern has been expressed by many that the icon is dated and needs a refresh"

I think the entire issue is based on a false premise.

If you want to provide other variants that people can use, go ahead. If they become more popular, then an update is achieved, but doing it via issue seems problematic.

@pwolanin

If you read the issue in it's entirety you will see that this is expressed many times both as personal opinion and as quotes from customers, prospects, etc. I personally have not spoken to a single designer or front-end developer who does not agree that the icon needs a refresh.

As has been said before in the issue, the question is not should we do something about the Druplicon, but what should we do about it.

@tkoleary - respectfully, I like the icon the way it is. So, I disagree. I don't think there is any consensus for change in the broader Drupal community. Just among a majority of the people that happen to have been drawn to this issue.

...quotes from customers, prospects

I'm having a hard time believing major business decisions are being made based on the logo. But if that is a problem, and clients complain about seeing a little "alien" on their website, the only place they probably see it is the favicon. None of these changes will have a big impact there. The changes proposed are too similar to the original to make the favicon look less "alien".

This entire thread is about the personal opinions of the few people commenting here. I don't think we should claim to have a consensus of the community. That would require a much larger discussion, with a lot more people. If we really wanted to do this, why not announce it to more people? Why not have a design contest? Maybe that would be fun. If it is a community issue, why is it limited to the few that stumbled upon this post in the core issue queue?

I also agree with Peter that if people want to publish a variant, go right ahead. There is nothing stopping anyone. It is done all the time, and I'm sure lots of people, including me, will use it.

@pwolanin, @davidhernandez

Why not have a design contest?

Just among a majority of the people that happen to have been drawn to this issue.

Do we have a "code contest" to determine how to proceed with Drupal core?

The "people drawn to this issue" are primarily designers, themers, and front-end developers. These are professions that take many years of hard work to master and suggestions that we could just have a "contest" or that the quality of a design is just a matter of opinion are at best uninformed and at worst disrespectful.

A large number of highly skilled individuals have contributed over 200 comments to this issue and we are close to a strong consensus. That's how the process works with development, it should be no different for design.

In any event the issue is still RTBC and in Dries' hands.

Even if you don't agree the icon needs a refresh, it was originally designed by someone who no longer associates with Drupal (to put it gently), and from talking to him a few years back, I think he would be extremely glad to no longer see his work plastered all over the Internet in support of Drupal. I will back up the customer/prospect perspective on the current Druplicon as well. It's been almost 10 years since the original incarnation. It's fully fine to explore this.

Design contests are viewed in the design world as extremely disrespectful and harmful (to put it gently). And while it's definitely true that the opinions here among ~50 people do not express the consensus of the community, the Drupal mascot would never be chosen via community consensus, in any case. It's a branding issue, so it's a project lead decision.

Design is by its nature subjective, but I think everything Kevin's done here is totally in the spirit of open collaboration. He has not only synthesized and responded to the feedback expressed, but also very clearly laid out his design choices and the reasoning for them. I think "thank you" is in order, moreso than "won't fix," even if this isn't ultimately committed to the repository. Once again, it's Dries's call.

Do we have a "code contest" to determine how to proceed with Drupal core?

No, we don't, but we also don't say individual code changes are a community matter, as some people have stated with this. If the logo is a community matter, I have concerns about it being changed without larger community awareness. People working on the logo are experienced designers, but I'm betting most of the people "voting" in here are not. They were drawn to comment on this issue because they knew about it, which is probably excluding a rather large portion of the community, including many other design professionals. If Dries wants to treat it as purely a core/code issue, that is his prerogative, and it will be decided here, but if the logo is considered hugely important to the entire community, I think it's a mistake to not try for broader input.

I think "thank you" is in order...

To be clear, I agree completely. I don't ever want to leave people with the impression that efforts and expertise are unappreciated, even if I might raise concerns about the process.

@davidhernandez

I think it's a mistake to not try for broader input

Don't assume that the input is only as broad as the commenters. Few issues I have seen have been been tweeted and retweeted as many times, often by people who read without commenting.

I wholeheartedly agree with @webchick here. Kevin, Mark Carver and many others have done a great job iterating on it!

It takes some time to get used to it, just like any change - to the mascot/logo/design that you love. Although its indeed not the current focus for getting Drupal 8 out of the door, its also the type of contribution designers can really do well at this stage in the development cycle (improve our marketing material). Let's make sure that we welcome it appropriately.

It feels like Dries is looking for more argumentation, that the feelings that are shared here are more widespread. Which is something we can look into and summarise better? Why is it outdated? What makes it fresh and not fresh? Why do we need this now?