Capitol Hill loves all you young designers. First, your neighborhood blog offers to feature your brilliant Obama ad banners. Now, your community council offers you an opportunity to stamp your look on its brand — the Capitol Hill Community Council is holding a logo contest. Here are the details:
Capitol Hill Community Council Logo Contest Help design a new logo for the Capitol Hill Community Council! This contest is open to anyone, members, non-members, students, professionals, amateurs – anyone with artistic creativity.
Requirements: Logo must include the name “Capitol Hill Community Council”. Immediately identifiable. Convey the spirit of the community. Adapt well to electronic media and printed media both in Black and White and full color form. Must be the original work of the submitter. Must be free of any copyright or other intellectual property claims. All entries must be submitted by the public meeting Thurs. Oct 16, 2008 Entries will be accepted day of meeting. Only one entry is accepted per person. Winner will be selected by a vote of meeting members Oct 16, 2008.
Award: Winner receives $100 and recognition on the CHCC Web site and press release proclaiming the designer’s name and/or firm’s name.
How to submit: Send entries as jpg to [email protected] with “CHCC Logo Submission” in title no later than midnight Oct 15th. Paper entries will be accepted day of meeting before voting.
For reference and inspiration, here’s what the Hill’s Chamber of Commerce (also CHCC!) uses for their logo.
Want some feedback on your design proposal before submitting it to the council? Post a link in the comments. Good luck!
Design contests are never the answer. They just going to get a lot of low quality logos designed by non-designers who don’t know the value of their time.
If they only have $100 I’m sure there are lots of young struggling designers who would be happy to design them a logo for that amount. There is even a college with a design department right on Capitol Hill they could be supporting.
http://www.no-spec.com/articles/design-contests/
I’m glad you posted but I think the linked essay fails to address a few important factors:
1) time
2) recruiting (related to 1) )
I get everything else about it (well, except the community council is not really a business) but the truth is the contest format is a simple, time-efficient (for the council) way to recruit designers.
Following your path, how does the key step work? Approach a school to contact a prof to suggest a student designer for the job? Ask the school to notify students about the opportunity and conduct a series of interviews? Without solving that, there’s no answer. Might as well have a contest.
Thank you for posting this. If you hadn’t I was going to.
J, yes, those suggestions you made are the way it’s done. It’s how I got my unpaid internship, and how I worked for a few months for pittance. It’s not a dog and pony show; while the work may be cheap, at least it’s HONEST, and the person working knows they are being valued. I understand that you disagree with minor points in the essay, but if you knew how relentlessly the graphics industry is being devalued, you would understand the firm stance on this. Designers shouldn’t waver, which is why I look at this and will not consider it. (Even though I have always hated CHCC’s old logo and would gladly redesign it for them. But not for a contest.)
Seriously, how should an organization like the community council proceed? Hire a graphic design intern? Now THAT would be a disappointing experience!
1) You guys need a “reply” button one more than just the first level of comments. Thread me!
2) I am being serious. CHCC can advertise at their office, in local community colleges, neighborhood papers, etc. They can contact instructors and community organizers and bloggers. They can post online in message boards and LiveJournal communities. They can advertise in Craigslist. They should be asking, “We’re looking for a graphic designer. We can’t pay much and may even need this to be pro bono. Know anybody?” It sucks when you don’t have money, but guess what: you don’t get services for free. That’s it. You wouldn’t ask a car mechanic to enter a contest to fix your car, and the best job wins $100. IT IS THE EXACT SAME THING. The difference between the ads that get responded to and the ads that get ignored is what is being offered, and speculation work is ignored. The people who don’t ignore it are devaluing themselves, or are talentless hacks.