I am a big fan of your Ender series, but I have one question for you. Why did you pick those logos for the Army's to be placed on clothes. When reading your book I pictured the logos much more dark, because the childern were training for war. The ones I see on your site come off very childish. I was wondering why you picked them, I would of thought something much darker would sell better than something childish. I also know after writing this the majority of the people on this forum may bash me, go head I say! Its my opinion
Posts: 10 | Registered: Jan 2006
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The look I reccommend is for example a dragon that looks scary frankly. For example the dragon from Harry Potter, looks very dark and scary and I think thats what it should be. In other words the Logos should have some toughness too them, since they are representing an Army division
Posts: 10 | Registered: Jan 2006
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I think what bugs me the must is the colouring and the placement of the letters... thats what really gives it the childish look
Posts: 10 | Registered: Jan 2006
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and mabye mr.card, different colored shirts, i'd totaly buy like a green rabbit army t, that be sweet.
Posts: 262 | Registered: Jan 2005
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Well, it is CafePress. CafePress limits what colors you can use and so on. For instance, they offer only a yellow messenger bag.
Personally, I thought the animals themselves should be shown only in silouhette. Isn't that how they're described in the book?
Posts: 767 | Registered: Oct 2003
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"The ones I see on your site come off very childish."
Do you mean childish as simple and not complicated in the visual aspect of design, or lack of skill in the execution of artistic techniques used to produce the design?
Well, frankly as the designer of the logos, I admit looking back on them now, from an execution standpoint, they are a bit childish looking, but I say that in the context of how much better an artist I consider myself now. However, if you are referring to the simplicity of the designs, that draws directly from inspiration from my research into the look of actual US fighter squadron insignias. What I seemed to find through my research was that most of the insignias were very whimsical and simple in appearance. I chose to focus on the design of fighter squadron insignias because they were more likely to have animal mascots. In many of those designs the mascots had a cartoonish feel to them, sometimes the mascot was posing with a deadly weapon. I thought it was ironic that the insignias for the fighter squadron would have such a comical or cheerful appearance in light of a squadron’s deadly serious capabilities.
"When reading your book I pictured the logos much more dark, because the children were training for war"
Initially, I thought that way too. As I said above I tried to model the logos from what I saw from real life. Very few of the designs were dark in terms of color or theme, most had that ironic imagery..
"Why did you pick those logos for the Army's to be placed on clothes?"
Only OSC can really answer that exactly, but I like to think that it's because I indirectly presented the idea to him first. A couple a years ago I made a t-shirt with the dragon insignia iron-on transfer on it, and then I wore it to a book signing. Actually I almost didn't show him at the signing because during his opening talk he spoke in depth about how ferociously he defends against any tangible attempt to violate his copyright to anything related to the Enderverse. Naturally, I didn’t want to have one of my favorite authors begin berating me in public about copyright infringement or lawsuits, but my overwhelming desire to show Mr. Card how his work inspired me to use my creative talents to take my love for Ender’s Game into the “Trekkie” realm overruled my fear.
So when it was my turn to get my book signed…
I displayed my shirt. He loved it asked for my personal contact info… The rest is merchandise history.
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Thank you very much for you reponse Darian Robbins, I asked the question not simply because I wanted them to be change or anything like that. I wanted to know why those designs were picked. Secondly, I did not find the art design of them lacking in shape or form. I did find the logos drawn very well. I simple asked the question out of wonder, it had nothing to do with the caliber of the art, but why that root. And now I know from your research the reasoning for the choice of the logo, which gives me a greater understanding of why that logo was picked for the t-shirts. From my experience in watch a large vartiy of films, due to the fact that is my life's work. I have always seen logos in Army movies either to be very dark or having a beautiful lady on the plane (Memphais Bell, 1990.) Again thank you for your response in answering my question
Posts: 10 | Registered: Jan 2006
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Personally, I like the Phoenix Army logo. I command Salamander Army over at Virtual Battle School, so I'd like to get a Salamander t-shirt. But I don't like its design quite as well.
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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If you'll allow me to apologize for my OT question, especially as I expect it has been asked before...
Why is it that Mr. Card is so protective of his Ender license? I can understand, as a writer myself that this is necessary, but even banning fan fiction?
Posts: 70 | Registered: Dec 2005
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I really like the Rat army logo; it's precisely what I'd imagine them using. The Phoenix and Salamander ones are pretty good, too. I'm not that fond of the Dragon, I've never really thought of "sitting on your butt" as a particularly fearsome pose. But maybe that's just me.
As for fan fiction, you can write it, as long as you destroy all but the first three pages before showing it to anyone. Posts: 285 | Registered: Jun 1999
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I like all but Dragon, too. I think Phoenix seems the best of them. It achieve the right balance between serious and cartoony.
Posts: 767 | Registered: Oct 2003
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It was a joke based on "Prior Restraint," in Maps in the Mirror. The guy in there has to destroy all but the first three pages of his stories. I know it was a bit obscure. Card's actual policy on fan fiction is that his fans can write all the fiction they want, so long as they don't use his characters or settings.
Posts: 285 | Registered: Jun 1999
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I dunno about the childishness of fighter squadron patches. i belong to a squadron with quite a serious and adult looking patch (makes sense considering the seriousness of our mission), and at least in the AF, our training patches from Basic Training all the way to the Academy have quite a sinister feel to them. And there's no reason to go to the Army for patch ideas anyway, I thought it was common knowledge that the IF was derived from the USAF's USSPACECOM, so it would make sense that we would do the training too, no? Silly Army.
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IF is grown out of USSPACECOM? The guys who spend their days tracking space junk?
Tut tut tut. I think not.
USATRADOC, at least for Battle School.
Anybody so sick and evil enough as to devise the current Advanced Survival School course (which includes a POW experience that stops just short of torture) would be the natural pick for the creators of the Battle School.
In all seriousness:
I've seen military logos (from unit patches, from internal documents, etc) that went both ways.
I've found that the official heraldry has a certain aesthetic charm to it, in a way hard to explain. If there's a group that knows how to do heraldry that works, it's the US military.
On the other hand, it's far too serious for the sort of bonding that the unit patch worn by members of the armies at Battle School would be trying to create.
In those sorts of situations, a whimsical, sort of silly approach works best.
I must admit, when I first read EG, I imagined Dragon Army's patch as being Puff the Magic Dragon. Posts: 19 | Registered: Dec 2005
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I'm glad you chimed in, Darian. i think the logos are excellent. Patches like that are meant to be apprehended instantly and from a distance. They aren't meant to be 'illustrations,' but rather devices for identification and developing group solidarity. something 'darker' would be hard to see; something more complicated would not be instantly recognizable.
So ... while Darian may imagine things he might do differently now, I have never been anything but delighted with his work on these. And I will do everything I can to get these logos into the movie - with, of course, payment to Darian, and hopefully a gig to design the logos for all the other armies <grin>.
But of course i have NO power, and there'll be a production designer who will probably want to design his own logos. But Darian's are the REAL ones as far as I'm concerned.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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I guess thats it, then. I will bow out after expressing how much TRADOC sucks (they don't have patches anyway), and how USSPACECOM is the only contemporary entity that could possibly spawn the IF. In my mind, anywho. (i've got a BUNCH of friends that have been to survival school. its not so much creativity as the skillful application of pain. Since there is no variation, there can't be much creativity).
Posts: 1156 | Registered: Jan 2004
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I think the shirts should have the army insignia on the back and from and they should be in the color of the army, like army hoodies would be good, i like the idea od having the dragon army emblazoned across my back, also it would be good too sell them with ranks on them.
Posts: 110 | Registered: Jan 2006
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Yeah, I would definitely get a Salamander Army Hooded Sweatshirt (a.k.a. hoody).
Edit: The rank would have to read Commander on my hoody because, of course, I AM the commander of Salamander Army.
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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I definitely like the idea of going with army colors (gray for Dragon, etc.). I'm sure I could persuade friends to buy those--right now I have a Phoenix army tee, but they aren't exactly thrilled at the color choices available for the shirt.
Of course, if the movie ever gets completed, I'm sure there would be a whole new market for EG-related clothes...
Posts: 973 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Originally posted by CRash: I definitely like the idea of going with army colors (gray for Dragon, etc.). I'm sure I could persuade friends to buy those--right now I have a Phoenix army tee, but they aren't exactly thrilled at the color choices available for the shirt.
Of course, if the movie ever gets completed, I'm sure there would be a whole new market for EG-related clothes...
yeah but the movie clothing will be like sceens fromt he movie and less about the book, i think you should keep the two seperate, because it always happens with books turned into movies. first you have some small merch venders who sell good nice clothing that actually relates to the book but when the movie comes out along with it ocmes a new line of clothing commerating the story but instead of commerating the book by have things in concept from the book they have merch commerating cool scenes in the movie and not commerating the overall theme, i guess what im trying to say is that i like the book tees and i dont think ill like the movie tees.(wow i said commerate alot in that sentence)
Posts: 110 | Registered: Jan 2006
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