Milestones and Moments

There has been a long silence on our blog. Not because there was nothing to share about, but because there were too many things happening that required more attention. New enquiries and new customers etc. to be looked into, new plans and proposals for ‘Blue N Blaze‘, etc. There are still a couple of things in the pipeline which we will talk about and share after some time, when they have a more concrete shape.

When it comes to export market, a matter of concern has been the inflation of Rupee as compared to US Dollar. As this graph shows the dollar value has been constantly going down in the past few months and the Indian exporters have been suffering loss because of this.

However, this is all a part of the trade. It is not the same everyday. Some days are good and some days are not so good.

Overall we have been busy working on some new and interesting projects, looking up with hope, getting returns for hard-work and creativity as we constantly strive to make things better always, moving towards new milestones and enjoying our journey with its ups as well as downs. As they say, “Life is not a matter of milestones, but of moments.” We try to not only create milestones, but also to make the moments memorable for our customers as well as ourselves

Website of Blue N Blaze with a new look

We recently updated the website of ‘Blue N Blaze‘ with a new look. Many thanks to Dr. R.C. Mishra and Ravi Kamdar for their valuable support and technical help regarding the website. 

Do visit our website and let us know if about your comments and views. Look forward to hear from you.

Why a circle in the logo design of ‘Blue N Blaze’

Siddharth’s comment on my last post motivated me to write this post, mainly to answer his question ‘..why not something other than the circle’ for the logo of ‘Blue N Blaze’.

While designing the logo for ‘Blue N Blaze’, I basically wanted the following :
1) To keep the logo simple, not complex, and not too difficult to remember and recognise.
2) To make a logo that could REPRESENT ‘Blue N Blaze’ – so the colors were also very important in representing it as the name itself involves colours.

The logo was designed as a reprentative of flame and the shape of something like flame. The colors orange and red were used to represent Blaze and Blue was used for the background. The background colour needed to in contrast with the motif colours so that the motifs and the motif colors stand out.

As I mentioned in my last post that one of the meanings of the proprietor’s name ‘Rashmiman’ (Hindi name ‘रश्मिमान’) is rays of the sun. It also means full of light. His nick name or pet name at home also has a meaning that relates to light. This is also one reason why the name ‘Blue N Blaze’ has been selected as it relates to light, apart from other wonderful connotations of light. The same thing inspired the logo to be designed in the shape of a flame.

I took opinions and feedback from some people after the design was ready and asked different people,
“What does the logo represent to u ?”

The answers were something like these :
“growing flame”,
“cool and hot”
“it represents partnership”

While describing and disussing about the logo design with someone, I said I chose circle as circle is more striking… than squares or rectangles. Squares and rectangles are more rigid. Although I had the psychological effects of circle in mind while designing, but it was not in the form of words, so I did some research for this post and have tried to explain here about the circle, specially in the context of logo design.

LOGO : A logo is an iconic symbol designed to represent a company,organization, product, service, and sometimes certain places.

Read about the use of shapes in logo design here which says – everything has a shape but the basic shapes of circles, squares, and triangles can be very effective in logo design, in part because of their simplicity. These shapes have certain sub-conscious meanings as well. The circle is protective or infinite. The square denotes stability, equality, and honesty. The triangle suggests tension or conflict or action.

As this link says, Circles suggest infinity, completion, softness, and security. Many ancient cultures considered the circle to be a perfect and even a sacred form. Circles are useful for focusing attention because of the closure of the shape, and because they are less common in man-made objects than shapes with straight lines. Ellipses share the psychology of circles,but to a lesser extent depending on the how close they are to a true circle. Shapes like circles and squares gain some of their positive visual emotional reactions, like completion and honesty, from their symmetry. It is important to be aware of the emotional reactions evoked by shape.

Here again this link says – Circles suggest infinity. They are also protective (think of protective encircling arms). They can also denote free movement such as a rolling ball or a more controlled movement such as a spinning globe. Outside of logo designs, circles are less common elements of design which makes them good for grabbing attention, providing emphasis, and breaking up familiar rectangular blocks of text. You could set text in circles or simply use a circle as the background for more traditional blocks of text. Some ways you can use circles: to symbolize infinity and protectiveness. Circles could also suggest something well-rounded or complete. Similar to protectiveness, circles could also imply security.

And while I designd the logo and receive the feedback from different people, it also is a learning process for me. I did make some minor modifications in the colors based on the feedback received from different people. As the Wikipedia says about logo “Logo design is commonly believed to be one of the most important areas in graphic design, thus making it the most difficult to perfect.”

So even if my logo design might not be prefect, it is still an effort and learning and improvement is a never ending process

‘Blue N Blaze’ logo design and the thought process behind it

Deciding about a logo is never easy. This is what I have come to know from different people who have gone through this process. It was not very easy for us either. You need to think not only about the significance and meaning of the logo, but also the color, appearance, appeal, the message it conveys, its symbolism, the overall appearance and impact it creates, etc. Most important, it has to convey what it is being designed to convey.Here I am going to tell very briefly about the thought process that went behind the design of our logo.

The logo has been designed to represent the name ‘Blue N Blaze’. It has a circle filled with blue color. Inside the circle is the representative symbol of a rising flame in red and orange color to represent ‘Blaze’. The logo represents the cool blue and the contrast created by red and orange is to bring out the warmth of the latter two colors against the blue background.

Colors are a form of non-verbal communication. Colors have symbolism and color meanings and the eye and the mind perceive certain colors and the color meanings that are associated with those colors. The following colors have been used to represent ‘Blue N Blaze’ logo.

Blue

Blue is the most popular “favorite color” and many polls have also shown the popularity of the color blue. Blue. The color ‘Blue’ stands for cool, serenity, vastness like that of the sky and the sea. This color is seen as soothing, trustworthy, dependable and committed. The common connotations because of which we have chosen this color is that blue stands for sea, sky, peace, unity, harmony, tranquility, calmness, coolness, confidence, water, loyalty, dependability, cleanliness, technology, air, wisdom, Earth (planet).

Blue is considered to be one of the three primary additive colors in the RGB system; blue light has the shortest wavelength range of the three additive primary colors. The English language commonly uses “blue” to refer to any color from navy blue to cyan. 
 Blaze

Blaze in simple terms means fire, glow, shine, radiate, flash. It means a brilliant burst of fire; a flame; a brilliant, striking display; a bright or steady light or glare.To represent the warmth, glow, radiance, eye-catching and attractiveness of ‘Blaze’, it has been represented by the warm colors Red and Orange. Both red and orange symbolize heat and fire and that is why it has been chosen to represent ‘Blaze’ in our logo.

Orange

This reason for choosing Orange color is because it stands for energy, balance, heat, fire, enthusiasm. It radiates warmth and energy. It is a vibrant color and a stimulant, and still it is the color of change between the heat of summer and the cool of winter, lesser intense than red and carrying the cheerfulness of yellow.

Red 

Red is the hottest of the warm colors. It is a strong color, a stimulant. Reds are also viewed as powerful, active and exciting. Some of the common connotations of this colour is passion, strength, energy, fire, love, excitement, speed, heat, leadership, masculinity, power. Red is one of the three primary colors of visible light.

One of the meanings of the proprietor’s name ‘Rashmiman’ (Hindi name ‘रश्मिमान’) is rays of the sun. It also means full of light. His nick name or pet name at home also has a meaning that relates to light. This is also one reason why the name ‘Blue N Blaze’ has been selected as it relates to light, apart from other wonderful connotations of light.

A Meditation and Prayer

I have been reading this book ‘The Power of Your Subconscious Mind‘ by Dr. Joseph Murphy. and something written here has really inspired me. Call it a payer, a conscious wish and desire, a meditation, or whatever one may like to call.

• I realise I am one with the infinite intelligence of my subconscious mind, which knows no obstacle, difficulty, or delay. I live in the joyous expectancy of the best. My deeper mind responds to my thoughts. I know that the work of the infinite power of my subconscious cannot be hindered. Infinite intelligence always finishes successfully whatever it begins.

• Creative wisdom works through me bringing all my plans and purposes to completion. Whatever I start, I bring to a successful conclusion. My aim in life is to give wonderful service, and all those whom I contact are blessed by what I have to offer. All my work comes to full fruition in divine order.

This form of meditation and positive thought is quite motivating and that is the reason I am writing it here – for us as well as for others who would be interested.

- SK

A dream -’Blue N Blaze’

‘Blue N Blaze‘ is a dream which we are now converting to reality.

We say ‘Blue N Blaze‘ is ‘Cool as blue n hot as blazes’.

It was my dream and now it is our dream – my husband’s and mine. And we plan to take it to great heights. We know this is just the beginning and we have to build this brick by brick, day after day. And as we start doing that, we also start this blog to share about ourselves and to seek advise from all of you.

And as I write this, I look at this quote that I have kept for inspiration in my cabin:

 

“Rest not! Life is sweeping by;
Go and dare before you die.
Something mighty and sublime
Leave Behind to conquer time.”
                            -Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

- SK