Fictional client: “Harbor Line,” a small coastal pottery studio (illustrative).
The job
Need, by end of day:
- Three logo directions (sketches → one vectorized favorite)
- A six-image mood/product set with consistent light
- Palette + type pairing recommendation
- One-page board for founder approval
Out of scope for day one: full guidelines PDF, packaging dielines, trademark filing.
Success test: founder can pick a direction without asking for thirty more random spins.
Morning — Brief and logo sketches
Brief (compressed)
| Line | Content |
|---|---|
| Job | Brand direction kit |
| Audience | People who buy handmade ceramics online |
| Adjectives | calm, coastal, handmade, modern—not rustic cliché |
| Must avoid | skulls, flamingos, hyper-luxury gold foil tropes, unreadable script |
Logo generate
Prompt family focused on flat silhouette marks (wave + vessel motifs), single color, no text in-image.
Batch: 16 sketches across geometric / organic / monoline.
Critique table:
| Direction | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Wave monoline | Keep — scales small |
| Full pottery wheel scene | Kill — too complex at favicon |
| Abstract H letter | Maybe — needs uniqueness check |
| Seashell realistic | Kill — stock cliché |
Human vector hour
Rebuilt monoline wave+vessel in vectors. Tested at 24px and one-color. Adjusted bowl curve optically (AI curves were slightly “mushy”).
Lesson: generators propose; vectors decide.
Midday — Imagery set with style lock
Style paragraph reused every prompt:
soft daylight coastal studio, linen and clay textures,
muted sea-glass palette, photoreal editorial,
gentle shadows, no logos, no readable stampsSubjects varied: hands finishing a rim (anonymous, no identifiable person focus), shelf of cups, single hero bowl, glaze detail, packing tissue moment, storefront-adjacent still life.
Batch discipline: 3 candidates per subject → pick 1 → contact sheet of 6.
Two rejects for neon window cast and for inventing a brand stamp on clay.
Finish: shared Lightroom-class preset (warmth −5, slight fade) so the set coheres.
Details: AI image workflows.
Afternoon — Palette, type, board
Palette extraction
Pulled six swatches from the contact sheet; checked body text contrast on the lightest background. Adjusted one gray that failed readability.
Type
Recommended a licensed humanist sans for UI/web and a restrained serif for long editorial—real fonts, not AI-drawn letterforms.
Board layout (one page)
- Wordmark sketch + monoline mark
- Palette chips + type specimens
- Three hero images
- Do: soft light, negative space / Don’t: neon, clutter, joke mascots
- Next steps: trademark search, full guidelines if direction approved
Assembled in Figma. No generator text on the board.
Direction lock meeting (same day)
Founder review rules set in advance:
- Pick one imagery direction and one mark direction
- Feedback must be actionable (“more clay texture,” not “make it pop”)
- No live regen during the meeting—notes only
Outcome (illustrative): monoline mark approved; imagery approved with “slightly less prop clutter.” One targeted regen + re-grade—not a full restart.
What shipped at 6pm
| Deliverable | Status |
|---|---|
| Vector mark (AI-assisted origin) | Yes |
| Contact sheet of 6 finished stills | Yes |
| Palette + type note | Yes |
| One-page PDF board | Yes |
| Full brand book | Explicitly not today |
Timebox (illustrative)
| Block | Hours |
|---|---|
| Brief + logo gen + vector | 3.0 |
| Imagery + finish | 3.0 |
| Palette/type/board | 1.5 |
| Review + small fixes | 0.5 |
| Total | ~8 |
Without timeboxes, “one day” becomes three days of aesthetic panic.
Failures avoided on purpose
| Temptation | Why we refused |
|---|---|
| AI wordmark letters | Unfixable geometry |
| 80 logo options for the client | Decision fatigue |
| Photoreal seashell logo | Cliché + poor small size |
| Mixing five lighting dialects | Broken campaign set |
| Skipping trademark conversation | Business risk |
How this maps to site methods
- Workflow system stages 1–7
- Design & brand exploration then vector
- Image workflows style-consistent series
- Writing for creators for the board’s do/don’t copy
Template you can reuse
Project:
Day goal:
Out of scope:
Logo directions to explore (max 3 families):
Imagery style paragraph:
Review rules:
Archive folder checklist: prompts, vectors, board PDF, postmortemRelated
Published by Tabaconda LLC, Florida, USA. Educational composite—not a confidential client case and not legal advice on trademarks.
Lessons learned (brand kit day)
- Morning: lock palette and type before AI image runs
- Midday: three mark directions, kill two early
- Afternoon: application mockups beat logo-only PDF
- Ship: usage sheet + don’ts + file tree
What we’d change next time: fewer mark explorations, more mockups on real layouts (social, invoice, packaging mock).
Related case studies: Product shot · Album cover.
Published by Tabaconda LLC, Florida, USA.
Related tools & gear
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