Pimp my Prometheus

[whoatherechunk]

i actually think that the new echobox graphics look fine....i just think the echobox font looks whack. i actually dont mind the swirls. i think that should be a continuous theme with all subdecay pedals.

 

[Smallequestrian]

I'm not trying to argue the point, but honestly asking - do you think many people buy boutique pedals based on aesthetics?

Perhaps my view is skewed by the amount of time I spend in the this forum, but I imagined that most boutique pedal buyers are generally aware of the different pedals before they ever set foot in a store. And even if they aren't, if you are buying something beyond a run-of-the mill delay like the Echo Box wouldn't they play most of them and base their decision on that?

Maybe I'm just biased, but I didn't think the designs needed to be any more attention grabbing. I like the simple and classy look, not just of those two, but the majority of the Subdecay line.

Aesthetics always play a part whether its logical or not. Sometimes just the right colour catching the eye is enough to convince somebody to try something out. A quality graphics job also implies on some level a quality product/construction. Obviously what a quality graphics job is in the eye of the beholder though.

FWIW, I think the new designs are cool, don't understand the hate. I actually kind of thought the previous ones looked half assed.

 

[Jared Lash]

i actually think that the new echobox graphics look fine....i just think the echobox font looks whack. i actually dont mind the swirls. i think that should be a continuous theme with all subdecay pedals.

Unless I miss my guess, those aren't swirls but a diagram of sound waves. At first I thought it was depicting the doppler effect the distance between compressions looks to be constant. I think it looks fine too, though it isn't actually depicting an echo per se.

 

[kevteop]

Ok, I'm not trying to be dickish... and you are certainly entitled to your opinion. As far as your original post i responded to:

...

I do take major exception to the last part of your statement. "There's no design going on" is stated as if you are an expert on the subject. ... If I were to hire a designer what exactly would I get out of it. If I hire a graphic artist they aren't going to do much more than I ask them to, and I would risk losing brand coherence.

...

... I really don't think hiring a designer would have yielded a result that would leave you any more impressed. Truth is when it comes to half tone screen printing on a small solid surface simple geometric designs usually offer better results than something with too much detail.

...

Anyway, like i said, I am not trying to be dickish, but i don't think you know what you are talking about when you say there is no design going on.

I'm not trying to be a dick either, but (there's always a but): You can't declare that I don't know what I'm talking about when I say it's obvious a designer wasn't involved, and then tell me that, indeed, this isn't the work of a designer.

And yes I do understand the limitations of halftone printing, but more to the point so do professional designers. If you'd approached somebody with any design talent and education, given them the medium and the design goals, they no doubt would've stuck to a simpler palette and you would've got smart work out of them. The obvious approach to me would be to use the print method as a design element and do something comic-book. A professional designer would no doubt have more ideas.

You obviously appreciate the value of good design because you're conscious that your old minimalist designs (which I personally thought were really nice - I like simple typography) might have looked a bit bare on the shelf next to your competitors. But you're not willing to pay a designer for a few hours of his/her time? I'm sure if you'd taken the time you've spent on those designs and spent that time doing what you do best instead, and paid a designer for those hours, you would have some beautiful boxes to show for it.

I work with designers every day. While I can produce functional design work myself (and in a pinch sometimes I have to) it really isn't my forte, and I'm reminded of it every time I farm some work out to somebody else, who inevitably turns it around in an afternoon returning something that I couldn't produce in a lifetime, and they charge me a measly couple of hundred quid for it.

It's exactly the same reason I wouldn't try to build a delay pedal - it would make infinitely more sense for me to buy one from you.

Edit: Sorry - just realised there were some very important points I should've responded to in your last reply:

If I were to hire a designer what exactly would I get out of it. If I hire a graphic artist they aren't going to do much more than I ask them to

That depends what you ask them to do. If you say "It's a delay pedal, we're doing half-tone screen printing, here's the control layout, here's the dimensions, it's called 'Echobox', off you go" then you'd get much more interesting results than if you'd said "I want concentric rings".

I actually started out with several ideas for the echobox... some of which would have looked like a lot more "work" but really looked very busy to me.... just trying to add too much to such a small product,

This perfectly sums up the best reasons for hiring a designer. If you can't manage the space on the canvas, if you think things get too busy when you go beyond simple ideas, that's because you're not a designer. This is no criticism of you personally - hell, I'm not a designer either - but like I said I work with designers and they are masters of exactly this, and that's why their time is worth paying for. Quite beyond their original ideas, even just their compositional skills alone are worth paying for.

 

[brian m]

I'm not trying to argue the point, but honestly asking - do you think many people buy boutique pedals based on aesthetics?

Perhaps my view is skewed by the amount of time I spend in the this forum, but I imagined that most boutique pedal buyers are generally aware of the different pedals before they ever set foot in a store. And even if they aren't, if you are buying something beyond a run-of-the mill delay like the Echo Box wouldn't they play most of them and base their decision on that?

That depends on what you consider "boutique." I don't really consider us a boutique. We don't do one of's or custom work. Basically we do micro-mass production if that makes any sense. We are a small company, that is only a couple degrees removed from the days when we worked out of my garage.

There certainly are small pedal companies where i think aesthetics play a major role. Zvex would be a good example... Then again there are guys making $400 overdrives and the only artwork on them is done with a sharpie. I think it could go either way. I think in the $400 overdrive case this can only be done if you under produce a product. it get's a lot of people talking about $1000 ebay listings, and certainly can make a brand appear very wide spread, even if that is not the case.

Our buyers are generally younger than a lot of other boutiqueish/smallish companies are. Our prices are also down in the range where they have a chance of being put up against more common brands... whereas I suspect most of those $400 overdrives are being purchased by people older than I am.

Maybe I'm just biased, but I didn't think the designs needed to be any more attention grabbing. I like the simple and classy look, not just of those two, but the majority of the Subdecay line.

I understand where you are coming from. It is certainly easy to over do pedal graphics, especially when you are working on them with a 23 inch monitor, and can view the art works finest details. There is always that temptation to add too much... but to be honest the stock fonts can kind of look cliche on pedals. Comic Sans is a good example, and I see it everywhere, not just on pedals. I never noticed until after I used an alba type font on the echobox, but it is way over used. Of course this is probably MY BIAS, simply because i did a little graphics work at my old job, and currently spend a lot of time working in photoshop and inkscape and looking at other product lines. Some things just look silly to me that other people wouldn't really notice.

I think the artwork on the echobox is still fairly simple, and not overly busy. Simple geometric vector design with some half tone effects.

When we had another shop doing our printing it wasn't easy to take risks. I kept things extremely simple, primarily to avoid screw ups, and account for their sometimes sloppy work. It was basically impossible to get one of anything done just to see what the results would be.

I am sure that some people will have different opinions, and I totally accept that. I probably shouldn't have even posted here, as I want anyone to feel like they might "incur the wrath" of some crazy paranoid builder guy. I just took exception to someone basically saying our stuff was totally lazy looking, and that we just slapped on some google'd image. Let's face it... There are a lot of guys out there doing a lot less work and charging much more for it.

 

[brian m]

Unless I miss my guess, those aren't swirls but a diagram of sound waves. At first I thought it was depicting the doppler effect the distance between compressions looks to be constant. I think it looks fine too, though it isn't actually depicting an echo per se.

One of the other ideas I had, which I actually looked pretty bad, was to have a circle in circle in circle etc design, where the line of the outer circles had sort of a wave effect going on. I couldn't really pull it off in a way that looked appealing to me.

The "concept" for the graphics i used was essentially ripples on water. It doesn't really look like that, but I wasn't attempting total realism. One of the limitations we have to deal with is that most screen printing inks are meant for fabrics. The half tones are made up of little dots, and the inks that I've found that stick well to powder coating don't seem to do very well if your LPI goes below 60 or so.

 

[CrispyDelicious]

I'm not trying to argue the point, but honestly asking - do you think many people buy boutique pedals based on aesthetics?

Perhaps my view is skewed by the amount of time I spend in the this forum, but I imagined that most boutique pedal buyers are generally aware of the different pedals before they ever set foot in a store. And even if they aren't, if you are buying something beyond a run-of-the mill delay like the Echo Box wouldn't they play most of them and base their decision on that?

Maybe I'm just biased, but I didn't think the designs needed to be any more attention grabbing. I like the simple and classy look, not just of those two, but the majority of the Subdecay line.

I have to agree with you on this, to a degree; most of the time, looks are the last thing I care or think about when buying a pedal - I mean - it's not like i'm wearing as a hat.

There was one instance, however, where I was considering buying a pedal, but get this - it was hand-painted all right - AND HAD NO LABELING - nothing to idenify which knob was which, and the paint job litearlly looked like someone has spilled paint on it. It was just a hideous disaster, like a bloody mess. That time I actualy did change my mind because of a paint job, but that was extreme. How the maker could justify that I'll never know, not for $200+ dollars.