Alternative version of the logo

[CristianCantoro]

I have a few issues with the current logo:

• it is a little small
• the fact that the C in "MathCAT" is the cat's tail is lovely, but not very readable
• the transparent background does not work very well with dark background.

Here's how I see the logo on a browser with a dark background (left) and with a light background (right):

So, I've created an alternate version of the logo. Full-disclosure, I have used ChatGPT starting from the original logo and arriving to what you see below after a few prompts. I cannot draw that well.

Here's the modifications:

• I have simplified the style to make it cleaner and so that it works better in small size
• I have moved the cat to the left and have the tail go around the writing "MathCAT" to make it more readable.

I have created two version with different colors, one with a black cat and brown outlines and the other with a brown cat with a black outline. The images are in PNG format.

[NSoiffer]

I've long known the quality of the logo is horrible. You can see why it was a good choice not to become an artist :-)

I tried playing with AI, but never found anything close to good. Your version are better than what I came up with, but they miss the "cute"/clever idea that the cat's tail forms the letter "C". Several people sort of volunteered to do a better logo, but they fizzled. My son's Christmas gift was to get an artist friend of his to do a logo for MathCAT. But after a bunch of back and forth with sketches that I didn't like, it has fizzled out and nothing has happened in four months. I should bug my son again to bug his friend. Here's the last iteration:

I felt that the cat was too flat in color and needed some kind of shading. The tail is kind of weird and whiskers standout too much. Maybe you can feed that into whatever AI you are using. It's been almost a year since I last tried and it keeps getting better.

[CristianCantoro]

@NSoiffer wrote:

I've long known the quality of the logo is horrible. You can see why it was a good choice not to become an artist :-)

Same here, same here.

I tried playing with AI, but never found anything close to good. Your version are better than what I came up with, but they miss the "cute"/clever idea that the cat's tail forms the letter "C". Several people sort of volunteered to do a better logo, but they fizzled. My son's Christmas gift was to get an artist friend of his to do a logo for MathCAT. But after a bunch of back and forth with sketches that I didn't like, it has fizzled out and nothing has happened in four months. I should bug my son again to bug his friend. Here's the last iteration:

[...]

I felt that the cat was too flat in color and needed some kind of shading. The tail is kind of weird and whiskers standout too much. Maybe you can feed that into whatever AI you are using. It's been almost a year since I last tried and it keeps getting better.

I also find the idea of the cat's tail becoming the "C" cute, but it was making the original logo unreadable and I couldn't come up with a way to make it work, so I decided to move the cat all the way to the left. I have to say that the new version that you posted does it in a clever way that looks nice.

Some unrequested comments:

1. I think that a logo should be simple, so it should have few details and colors. This would allow it also to scale well for all sizes. For example, I would go for a simpler version of the cat (no whiskers?)
2. Maybe with a simpler font that matching the style of the cat's tail works better?

I don't want to use AI to take a way an artist's commission, so if you are working with an artist please continue doing so.

[ways2read]

I edited Cristian's brown cat with MS Paint so that the cat's tail forms the letter "C".

[NSoiffer]

@ways2read: that's the best yet! I'll see if the artist wants to improve on that.

@CristianCantoro wrote:

I think that a logo should be simple, so it should have few details and colors. This would allow it also to scale well for all sizes. For example, I would go for a simpler version of the cat (no whiskers?)

That's what my son said, but I thought it was boring. With you joining in, I'm getting out-voted...

[CristianCantoro]

Sorry, I couldn't resist and take another shot at this. So, first of all, one problem I had with the original logo (and in part with @ways2read's version) is that the C is not very clear. The tail should clearly look like a C.

So, I tried to improve it, here's a version where the cat still has a thick tail:

Then, I took inspiration from the artist's version above, that version has a couple of interesting features that make the C even clearer:

• the cat needs to be a bit more to the right with respect to the word
• the tail is long and thin

Here's two versions, I liked the idea to have stripes on the tail, but I am not sure it's the best idea (again, simpler is better)

The distance between the cat and the top of the letters needs to be adjusted.

All in all, I think a human hand could make the necessary adjustments and redo the image in a vectorial format, so it scales at any size.

[NSoiffer]

This one is growing on me:

I'll get my son and his artist friend to take a look at it. He's currently writing his PhD applications on top of his regular class work/research and is pretty stressed at the moment, so I'll wait for the Christmas break to push on him to offer up any changes.

Thanks for working on this. It is definitely better than what I came up with!

[ways2read]

I too think this is the best yet. The tail fits well with the text and also looks right on the cat. Good job!

I also like this version of the cat. I will to experiment with placing this into the NVDA dialog to see how this scales down.

Back in September I played with some different colorways, and also with text directions/placement. I don't think they worked so well, but I could add them for completeness.