Branding an Expert

Mordy Golding AKA "Expert"

An expert is someone with a high degree of skill in or knowledge of a certain subject. Every industry has them and communication arts is no different.

When it comes to Adobe Illustrator our industry has one expert that stands above all others. His name is Mordy Golding. One could easily argue that Mordy knows more about Illustrator than the Adobe people responsible for creating the software. Yes, I'm serious.

I first discovered Mordy's web site back in early 2006. I was looking for some help with Illustrator since I saw the hand writing on the wall with FreeHand approaching. His knowledge base was incredibly helpful to me transitioning from FreeHand to Illustrator.


Mordy Re-Branded!

Over the last several years both Mordy and I have become familiar with each others work so when he asked me to design a new logo to brand himself with I was honored to work on it.

The following is the exact design rationale I provided when I presented the logo to Mordy.

In general: You are your brand. I wanted to create a mark that would go hand in hand with your name and be modular so you could have your mark exist on it's own or with the type. The color treatment plays off your name.

Black: Strong, Informed, Solid, this plays to "Technology."
Gold: Valuable, Clever, Sophisticated, this plays to "Design."

This mark takes the letterform "M" and shows how you go beyond the surface, diving deep into your subject matter with informed knowledge. The point on the "M" descender pinpoints the answers and insight you bring to light. (Final logo was provided in both a vertical and horizontal format)

This new mark reflects better on Mordy than his old mark did. (Pardon the pun)


Business Card Design.

This card will serve as a touch point for Mordy's marketing efforts. The background motif reinforces the fact that Mordy is on top of the latest industry technologies.


Mordy's iPhone wallpaper.

Mordy is also a MAC geek and owns an iPhone so of course we had to created a nice branded design for that platform as well.


Unused logo concept 1.

Mordy's expertise doesn't stop with Illustrator and that was the one reason why this mark wasn't used. I like it's clever integration of a vector path to create the two letter forms but it pigeon holed his capabilities so it wasn't an appropriate direction to use.


Unused logo concept 2.

This direction was more an experiment. I wanted to create a logo mark that loosely read as an "m" and a "g" without being obvious. Knowledge is only valuable when shared and thus learned and that was my graphic intent with it being interconnected. At least that was my psycho-babble explanation.

Mordy likes his new identity and is working hard to get his new look applied to his web site. If you haven't had a chance to benefit from Mordy's expertise be sure to pick up a copy of his newest book due out soon called "Real World Adobe Illustrator CS4." I had the privilege of illustrating the books cover art which I'll post more about soon.