Looking for someone to improve this image

[curt_grymala]

I'm working on doing a possible re-design of the DC Evo site, and I'd like someone to take a look at the banner image I'm planning to use, and improve upon it, please.



Obviously the quality of this image isn't as good as I'd like it to be (the only copy I had was half the size I needed it to be, so I had to upsample it). Unfortunately, I suck at adding textures and stuff to text in PhotoShop, so I didn't even bother trying to re-do the text myself.

If you have any ideas on how to make a better banner, please give it a shot. Otherwise, if you can simply improve upon the one I've posted, I would appreciate that as well.

If you need a new copy of the background image (which seems to have originally been an ad for Apple), you can find it as the first entry in these search results. That's a full-color, textured version of the image, so you'll probably want to flatten it and convert it to grayscale/halftone or something.

You can play with the size of the current banner a little bit, but I don't really want it to be any bigger than the current incarnation. Slightly smaller would be ok.

[melancholy]

Actually, you could mess around with it all day or you could do one small edit that would fix it immensely.

-First off, get rid of all of the fancy stuff added to the text. Just make it plain black for the moment.
-Now, take the background image and move it above the text.
-Next, put a thin line between the text and the image to create a ground plain for which the characters to walk on. Make the line start halfway between the 'D' and end halfway between the 'N' to create a nice triangle hierarchy.

This should instantly fix the problem you are having regarding readability and conflict of type/image. Plus, if you add a nice embossing to the whole thing and make it a grayish color, you could create this nice Romanesque stone carving look that would really hit home the 'evolution' part. If I had a working computer, I would whip it up really quick for you, but I'm currently posting from school until my computer parts come in.

[curt_grymala]

Do you mean something like this?

[stagg]

Actually, you could mess around with it all day or you could do one small edit that would fix it immensely.

-First off, get rid of all of the fancy stuff added to the text. Just make it plain black for the moment.
-Now, take the background image and move it above the text.
-Next, put a thin line between the text and the image to create a ground plain for which the characters to walk on. Make the line start halfway between the 'D' and end halfway between the 'N' to create a nice triangle hierarchy.

This should instantly fix the problem you are having regarding readability and conflict of type/image. Plus, if you add a nice embossing to the whole thing and make it a grayish color, you could create this nice Romanesque stone carving look that would really hit home the 'evolution' part. If I had a working computer, I would whip it up really quick for you, but I'm currently posting from school until my computer parts come in.

???

[Thomas]

Actually, you could mess around with it all day or you could do one small edit that would fix it immensely.

-First off, get rid of all of the fancy stuff added to the text. Just make it plain black for the moment.
-Now, take the background image and move it above the text.
-Next, put a thin line between the text and the image to create a ground plain for which the characters to walk on. Make the line start halfway between the 'D' and end halfway between the 'N' to create a nice triangle hierarchy.

This should instantly fix the problem you are having regarding readability and conflict of type/image. Plus, if you add a nice embossing to the whole thing and make it a grayish color, you could create this nice Romanesque stone carving look that would really hit home the 'evolution' part. If I had a working computer, I would whip it up really quick for you, but I'm currently posting from school until my computer parts come in.

???

You didn't quite follow the directions right.



that is pretty good,nice and plain, but rather large for a banner.

[curt_grymala]

that is pretty good,nice and plain, but rather large for a banner.

Indeed it is. Unfortunately, it's way too tall for my banner area. I'm working on trying to downsize it in order to get it to fit in my layout. I've changed it (made it slightly smaller than the first time I posted the image), but it's still too tall. It pushes my layout all together. Really, the original image is as tall as the banner can get, so I'm working on trying to make a compromise between the two, keeping the size of the original banner, but keeping the integrity of the design of the new banner.

[melancholy]

Yeah, I meant something like that. But I didn't read the part where it said it couldn't get taller. Anyway, that makes things harder. You have an extremely big image and a really long word that must occupy the same space.

...hmm...okay, how about this; first off, see how the 'DC E' is in caps while 'volution' is in lower case? Well, make the 'DC E' part slightly taller. Not much at all, just a little taller. Then take the picture (henceforth, when I say 'picture', I'm referring to the monkey/man image), and place it in front of the E, then shrink it so that the picture ends about halfway between the 'n' at the end. You should probably ditch the line idea to conserve space. See if that shrinks the height of the image enough to suit your needs. If not, you might have to rethink your idea, since the picture will never look good sitting behind the text.

Oh, and one other thing; make the embossing softer and don't make it black, but instead just a darker gray.

[Christuserloeser]

...someone interested in making a custom badge out of this for Curt, DCDayDreamer, Skyhawk and me ? I am thinking of something along the lines of "DCEvolutionary"...

[Christuserloeser]

...oh, and fackue (whom I forgot to mention )