In response to our first creative pitch, we’ve also experienced some healthy feedback, both positive and negative, which has been invaluable. To our slight surprise, the poll results for the creative pitch have mirrored the previous poll findings, which suggested the Tasmanian Devil is a marginally more popular state symbol than the Thylacine.

More importantly, there is a genuine hunger to find a more contemporary, less pictorial expression of Tasmanian identity, as shown by the relative popularity of the partially abstract “Innovation State” concept, which experienced a winning 45% of the total votes. We received passionate and well reasoned feedback particularly from fellow designers, some of which argued that we didn’t go far enough to discover any new ideas. This is a criticism we cop on the chin, mindful that the first round of ideas were creative expressions of rational opinions, collected through the open forum.

Right now, we are putting the finishing touches on a concept which has evolved out of the Innovation State idea, inspired by everything the project has thrown up so far. It’s a solution we are proud to put our name to, and one we believe is a comprehensive response to the brief. Thanks for being a part of this process, check back soon for our latest creative pitch and your chance to shape the project.

After a short break we’ve jumped back into the project with some fresh energy, having now completed both the stage one findings and the creative brief. Sifting through all of the discussion so far, we were quite humbled by the response and are really excited by the creative potential that exists in this swirling mix of thoughts, ideas and opinions.

As with anything on our blog, we are really keen to hear your feedback so don’t be shy. We are currently gathering our thoughts and nutting out the plan of attack for the design phase, so stay tuned as things will be heating up in the coming days and weeks.

Click here to download findings document (PDF)

Click here to download creative brief (PDF)

You will notice we have reskinned the blog to be more neutral and suitable for the showcasing of creative. The next part of the journey will consist of us publishing the findings from phase one, in the form of a discussion paper and design brief. From there, we will start pitching to you online, asking for live feedback and input as we turn ideas into images.

It promises to be a very interesting experiment and we can’t wait to get cracking early in the new year.

Have a great break and we’ll catch in a few weeks.

-Jonathan Price

Re: State Logo

For the record, the current logo that we have critiqued was not designed by Ian Kidd, as suggested by Tim Sauer. In 1996 Ian delivered a well-considered brand identity, placing Tasmania well ahead of our interstate counterparts at that time. The focus of our project is replacing the 2006 update, which we believe has taken us backwards from there.

The basic premise of our experiment is that the state brand belongs to us all and should be shaped by us all. It’s an exercise in open democracy, designed to encourage lively debate and meaningful dialogue, not to land business. We knew there would be doubters and those who quite reasonably, just want to keep things as they are and we respect and welcome those views, along with the many other lively perspectives we’ve heard on what is right, wrong, unique and misunderstood about this beautiful island.

Regards

Jonathan Price

See below to compare the original Ian Kidd identity on the left and the 2006 update on the right.

“For two hundred years visual images of the extinct Thylacine, or Tasmanian ‘tiger’, have played an important role in influencing attitudes and actions toward the species and suggesting how this animal is perceived”. Imaging the Thylacine from Trap to Laboratory was an exhibition held at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery and is thoroughly documented online here.

Given many of the original records/images examples relied on drawings and sketches, it’s fascinating to observe the European influence on the shape of the beast and how it evolved over time.

“The longer the Thylacine stays dead, the greater the interest it arouses.” Another interesting article from 2003 by David Owen discusses the power of the symbolism of the Thylacine. Read it here. We’ve got our eyes out for any more sightings and would love to hear your thoughts, stories or close shaves.

When approaching any identity or branding project, it is important to conduct a complete review of the current brand footprint. This audit looks at all aspects of the brands communication strategy and evaluates effectiveness, strengths, weaknesses, and potential for improvement. A crucial aspect of this journey is also to understand the visual landscape that the brand inhabits.

As seen above, the local landscape is made up of a wide range of other brands or at the smaller end, logo’s. These may be direct competitors, affiliates or sub brands, or a brand that the primary audience is most likely to be aware of, or may become aware of over time.

Beyond this immediate space, it also important to research brands both nationally and internationally, as well as across a broad spectrum of other non-related industries. For example, how does New Zealand or the Toyota Prius articulate their clean green image? What can we learn from this?

Given the proliferation of branding in recent times, this process is likely to dredge up any number of similarities that will require serious consideration. While it is true that sometimes it is difficult to avoid similarities when developing iconic easily recognisable symbolism, it is equally true that each brand should always endeavour to stand out from the crowd and establish it’s own unique voice.

After only a few hours spent looking back through the visual landscape of Tasmanian branding over recent times, it is hard to define exactly how any of these examples manage to clearly stand out from one another. How many of these would you recall the subtleties of over time, beyond maybe “It was green and had a devil poking it’s head out”?

We return to a question that seems to have been running through many of the posts and comments so far, is the devil, the tiger or the shape of the state iconic enough or original enough? Is it acceptable for the state government to share symbolism with the states biggest brewery, the council of the second biggest city, Cricket Tasmania, Athletics Tasmania, and many others? If all aspects of the brand visuals should reflect the brand values then does the state government share values with all of the aforementioned? Shouldn’t our state brand be leading the way, rather than just averaging out everything within it?

While it’s questionable as to whether or not the Thylacine is extinct in the wild, there’s no doubting it’s reaching plague proportions in the visual landscape.

This part of the process in a more traditional approach, would be done through consultation with business leaders, community groups and government departments, something our guerilla, self-appointed blog is creatively replicating. I should point out, the catalyst for this project and our objection to the current identity firstly relates to it’s poor design. If we were to redesign to the old brief/brand values, I’m confident we could move a long way forward, but to make full use of this opportunity, we need to throw open the discussion to cover the underlying strategic intention behind the brand.

For the uninitiated, brand values are much like their human equivalents i.e. they are the code that you live by. In a literal marketing sense, they are the keywords used to describe ideas, which underpin the behavior of an organisation.  By clearly defining and expressing them through the branding process, an audience is able to develop a relationship with a brand, built on a solid foundation of trust.  A human example being, I know Steve and I like him because he is honest and trustworthy. Values give us confidence in others, because they offer predictability.

The current Tasmanian brand values according to the Government website are: Trustworthy, Resourceful, Creative, Pure, Friendly, Distinctive Quality.

What’s wrong with this you may say? The nature of values are that they are unobjectionable, positive words. You could run a list of every possible value and it wouldn’t seem bad. The problem is, we are trying to create a unique mix of these identifiers that we can be known for. We need to boil it down to a potent brew that intoxicates all that it touches.

More important still,  brand values are only valid if confirmed by actions. Can we be truly “Pure” in our values and still be allowing large-scale heavy polluting industry? Some would say we can’t. Can the current Government say the existing brand is known as uniquely “Trustworthy”? Without getting bogged down in the politics, I think it’s easy to see how values can become meaningless and once that has happened, the brand stands for nothing. A situation I’d suggest we are in today and one that does nothing to help business, government or our own sense of identity.

So what are the values we want to be known for? Can you narrow it down to three, powerful words?

* Read about what Reg Watson and Rodney Croome believe is our heart and soul.