We recently held a logo design contest at LogoTournament.com. There were almost 500 entries in the contest. It was a challenge to judge this contest because there were so many great designs.

We again want to publicly thank all of the designers who participated in the contest.

Congratulations to aremmai for taking first place in the contest. Aremmai’s winning design will soon grace the pages of this site.

Here’s the design:

Please tell us what you think…comment below.

Best,

GraphicDesignerGallery.com

Please look at the site design images below and then design a logo for our site.

We’ve intentionally left the design requirements pretty open so you can let your creativity flow.  Please create a logo that matches the site design (images below) and that inspires you as a graphic designer. Design the logo as if you wanted it to represent your work as a graphic designer…after all, this site is for you and all other graphic designers to display your work and to get recognized.

Here are some words from our ‘about us’ page:

What is the GraphicDesignerGallery.com you ask? Well, we’re in the process of developing a site where designers can post examples of their graphic design work and help each other improve their skills. Not to mention the exposure designers will get by having their best works on display.

Website Design

Here are some screen shots of what this site will look like. Disregard the existing logo…your logo will replace it.

Homepage:

Graphic Designer Profile Page:

Monthly Contest Gallery:

Thanks for joining our contest. We look forward to your submissions.

By the way, please support our sponsor and go check out the $5000 logo design contest currently going on at ThePerfectDesign.com.

Man, the web design contest at 99designs.com was awesome! It was so intense!!! There were a lot of talented graphic designers involved with the contest that made it work so well.

The Design Contest

We started out with a couple scattered designs and we were wondering how many we would have by the end, but all of a sudden there was a flood of entries coming in at once! We were overwhelmed because all of them were so awesome that it was hard to sort through them and give the feedback necessary to get exactly what we wanted.

The Designers

ProvenMill, sheeze, d.whizzle, nitagale, h2orius, Carvingdezine, netbluez, KMDesigns, Alitimate, madebynoodle, Mabuhay, GDT Designs, bearbrick, Soul Designer, SouM, and so many other great designers were involved. They all helped to make this contest the best contest ever!

The Struggle

It was a very difficult decision because not only were the designs great, but we were also able to see the different personalities of the designers, not just from their designs, but from the messages sent and how they interacted with us. They are all very professional individuals and we know they are successful at what they do. They are passionate about graphic design and we see it!

The hardest part, for all of us and the graphic designers involved, was that we couldn’t give all of the details of this project. Though this made it a little difficult we were able to get exactly what we wanted. In fact, the designs were so great that we felt we needed to award at least a second place prize.

The Contest Winners

Zan Lete (zanlete) stole first place in the contest, giving him $1,400 to “Go out to dinner” and have a day off! Lee Carpenter (ClaX) came in at second and received a prize of $1,000!

We want to congratulate Zan Lete as our first place winner and graphic designer for our website. It is going to be awesome!

Screenshots

Here are some screenshots of our new design, so you can get a small idea of what’s to come. Please leave comments and tell us what you think.

New Member Section:

Graphic Designer Profile:

Monthly Contest/Gallery Page:

*Note: Edits are listed in red.

1. Homepage

The homepage shall have a  fresh, uncluttered, easy to use format. We’re leaning toward Web 2.0. Big, bold fonts, simple clean layout…but, if you have some suggestions, we’re willing to listen. We want the page to be resizable when viewed in different sized windows.  Please design the page/site to a minimum of 960px wide.

The homepage shall include:

1.1 Header section

1.1.1        Logo – We’ll take care of the logo. Please provide a placeholder logo for now.

1.1.2        Login and Registration (Register) links

1.1.3        Search Box

1.2 Horizontal Navbar with links to the following:

1.2.1        Home

1.2.2        Categories

1.2.3        Designers

1.2.4        Designer News

1.2.5        Gallery

1.2.6        My Account

1.3 Content

1.3.1        HomePage Splash Content

1.3.1.1        Start Your Portfolio – 3 Easy Steps on the left-hand side of the page. We want the text to be large and easy to read. Also we’d like to have a specific call to action for them to sign up using the webform, mentioned next.

1.3.1.2        Start Your Portfolio Webform – Allows entry of basic information to start. Place this to the right of the 3 Easy Steps. The basic information should be listed as follows:

1.3.1.2.1        Name

1.3.1.2.2        E-mail

1.3.1.2.3        Password

1.3.1.2.4        Re-type password

1.3.1.2.5        Country

1.3.2        Weekly and Monthly Spotlight – We will have a weekly and monthly spotlight of graphic designers and their designs, one in each category. This section will be found directly under the 3 Steps to starting the portfolio and the Webform for signup. This section needs to include:

1.3.2.1              Title = Monthly Spotlight

1.3.2.2              Designer’s name

1.3.2.3              Designer’s design we are spotlighting

1.3.2.4              Description next to the design

1.3.3        Newest Member Listing – We want to have a list, below the Weekly Spotlight, of all the newest members of the site. Each listing needs to have the following information:

1.3.3.1              Member Name

1.3.3.2              Short Bio

1.3.3.3              Date & Time Joined

1.3.3.4              Last Entry Date – Last image uploaded into their portfolio

1.3.3.5              Number of Entries – Number of entries in their portfolio

1.3.3.6              Points – we’ll have a point system where graphic designers and their peers have a chance to rate each other.

1.3.4       View All Designers Link – Just below the New Members list, we need a link that allows them to “View All Designers” if they choose to do so.

1.4 Footer – Footer needs to include links and copyright information:

1.4.1       About Us

1.4.2       Contact Us

1.4.3       Forum

1.4.4       Blog

1.4.5       Privacy Policy

1.4.6       Terms & Conditions

1.4.7       Copyright 2009 GraphicDesignerGallery (no link)

By the way, we recommend that you visit our sponsor and sign up for the $5000 logo contest (click banner below).

The gallery page shall inherit the homepage elements that will be common to all pages on the site (including header, navigation, etc). The page shall be resizable when viewed in different sized windows, without any borders. The page shall include:

1.1 Content

1.1.1        Most Recent Monthly Contest Winner

Our community will be rating designs displayed in designers’ portfolios.

The top section of the gallery page shall display the most recent monthly contest winner. The elements displayed shall include:

• A section title (i.e. Last Month’s Contest Winner)
• The winner’s username (links to their profile page)
• Image of the winning design – this is image could be of a logo, web page, t-shirt or other design, so this image should be big enough to give the viewer an idea of the design. This image will link to a larger version of the image for full-size view.
• A description of the winning design – this is text that will give a summary of why this design was the winner.
• A trophy image shall be displayed next to the description – this trophy/award logo will be inserted into the design by us later. Just create a placeholder trophy/award image here.
• A monetary prize shall be displayed (i.e. $200) – the monthly contest winner will get a prize. This prize amount shall be displayed somewhere near the trophy/award logo.

1.1.2        Monthly Contest Description Section

Below the monthly contest winner section shall be a section that describes how the Monthly Design Contest works. The description shall include:

• A section title (i.e. Our Monthly Design Contest)
• A few descriptive paragraphs explaining how the contest works.
• A button that says ‘view previous winners’ – this button will link to previous monthly contest winners.

1.1.3        This Month’s Contest Candidates

Below the monthly contest verbiage section shall be a section that displays the current month’s contest candidates. This section shall include:

• A section title (i.e. This Month’s Contest Candidates)
• Up to 5 thumbnail images (i.e. 1 per week of the month) of this month’s contest winner candidates – these images will link to a page with more details about the entry. The thumbnails shall be big enough to fill the width of the page in 1 row.
• The designer’s username shall be displayed below each thumbnail image.
• The design rating (i.e. 1 – 5 stars) shall be displayed below each image.

1.1.4        Design Pool

Below the monthly contest candidates section shall be a section that displays the top rated designs for the month. The display shall include rows of design thumbnail images the same size as those listed in this month’s contest candidates section (1.1.3). At least 5 rows of entries shall be displayed. Each entry shall have the following elements:

• A thumbnail image of the design – similar in size to those in section 1.1.3
• The designer’s username shall be displayed below each thumbnail image.
• The design rating (i.e. 1 – 5 stars) shall be displayed below each image.

1.1.4.1  Sorting and Filtering

The Design Pool section shall have sorting and filtering elements that allow the user to sort and filter the designs by rating, upload date, etc.

1.1.4.2  View All

A ‘view all’ link shall be displayed at the bottom of the design pool area. This link will take the user to a page that displays all designs for the month.

1.2 Footer – Footer needs to include links and copyright information:

1.2.1       About Us

1.2.2       Contact Us

1.2.3       Forum

1.2.4       Blog

1.2.5       Privacy Policy

1.2.6       Terms & Conditions

1.2.7       Copyright 2009 GraphicDesignerGallery (no link)

By the way, we recommend that you visit our sponsor and sign up for the $5000 logo contest (click banner below).

1.1 Header Section – same as Homepage requirements

1.2 Horizontal Navbar – same as Homepage requirements

1.3 Content – There are three main sections within the content section: Designer Profile, Ratings/Feedback, and Portfolio. Though the three sections will be included in the design below, please create tabs for each section at the top (under the navbar and above the Designer Profile). Feel free to ask questions if further explanation is required.

1.3.1        Designer Profile – If this was your own personal profile page, how would you want it to look? The requirements for this page are below, but if there’s anything that is missing, feel free to give us your ideas. We’ll make sure to give a lot of feedback. Thank you in advance for your creativity!

1.3.1.1        Logo / Picture

1.3.1.2        Bio – format the page in a way that if the bio is a little lengthy the resize won’t ruin the rest of the format on the page

1.3.1.3        Link to Website

1.3.1.4        Overall Rating – Starred rating

1.3.1.5        Average Rating by Category – Starred ratings by these categories:

1.3.1.5.1        Creativity

1.3.1.5.2        Composition

1.3.1.5.3        Balance

1.3.1.6        Most Recent Submissions – Most recent submissions to their portfolio

1.3.1.7        Highest Rated Submissions – Portfolio entries they’ve entered that are the highest rated by their peers

1.3.2        Ratings/Feedback – The graphic designer ratings/feedback section shall display the ratings/feedback provided by fellow graphic designers. The display shall list the same elements as the following, only formatted much better:

1.3.3        Portfolio Section – The Portfolio section includes tabs in it. These tabs will represent the categories in which the designers have submitted artwork and will display the artwork in the categories listed below:

1.3.3.1        Tabbed Categories

1.3.3.1.1        Favorites

1.3.3.1.2        Logos

1.3.3.1.3        Print

1.3.3.1.4        Clothing

1.3.3.1.5        Web Pages

1.3.3.1.6        Stationery

1.3.3.1.7        Banner Ads

1.3.3.1.8        Buttons & Icons

1.3.3.1.9        Twitter Backgrounds

1.3.3.1.10    All

1.3.3.2        Image Display Format – This is the way we’d like the images to display. If there are any better ideas out there, please let us know. We’d love to see what you’ve got. We included a picture below of how it potentially could look, but don’t want this to limit you:

1.3.3.2.1        Images in each category need to display at 162 x 126

1.3.3.2.2        There needs to be arrows on the left and right, or some sort of graphic, letting the user know that there are more images that can be seen by clicking.

1.4 Footer – Same as footer in the Homepage requirements

By the way, we recommend that you visit our sponsor and sign up for the $5000 logo contest (click banner below).

There are a lot of galleries out there, but they just don’t seem to get it. We have ideas as to how we want things done, but we also know that we don’t know everything and want as much feedback as possible on what you like out there and what you don’t like.

We don’t want to be your mother’s next graphic design gallery… We thank you for taking the time to post your comments. Your feedback is invaluable!!

GraphicDesignerGallery.com