The good folk at Baker Piano and Music wanted to keep the founder, Gerald Baker. Though I do a good bit of cartoon illustration work, I wanted Baker's presence to be simple and light but not cartoon-like. Rendering a satisfactory image for the late Mr. Baker was the most challenging aspect. I rendered version after version until I came up with the one I knew would work. Much of the logo was rendered in CorelDraw and then imported into Adobe PhotoShop. The portrait was in pen and ink, scanned and imported into PhotoShop.
During my initial work I had submitted two versions, a version with Baker text against the grand piano lid backdrop and another using Baker's illustration without the piano lid. The keyboard rendering was present in both submissions. The folks at Baker Piano wanted both ideas combined. I was a little hesitant. It was too easy for the head illustration to distract from the piano lid. There is a lot of text in this logo...a lot going on. I usually push for simpler imagery, but this really came together nicely, very strong. Jay Holland (of Jay Holland Communications) and I worked together to merge the two concepts and make it all work. I'm very proud of this logo and confident it will serve Baker Piano and Music Company well.
