First game logo drafts: ARVELIA in three different moods

The game didn't have a title logo yet. I settled on ARVELIA for the title and EMBERS OF THE AZURE FLAME for the subtitle, and drew them in GIMP 3.2.6 on a black 4K (3840×2160) canvas.

Instead of committing to one right away, the idea was to lay out a few drafts with different moods and pick a direction first.

What I built

Private image

All three drafts have a blue flame emblem above the title. It's a way of showing the "Azure Flame" from the name as a picture.

Draft A is silver-gray metal. Perpetua Titling MT Bold with a metallic gradient fill, a dark band and a silver rim, plus a blue glow (#3aa8ff) spreading out around it. It's in the same family as the UI skin I already locked in (B, blue).

Draft B is fantasy gold. Castellar engraved lettering with a gold gradient and a bright gold rim. The subtitle is gold text framed by triple gold lines and blue jewel diamonds.

Draft C is a brighter look to match the SD characters. It uses Eras Bold ITC and Berlin Sans FB Demi Bold, with a white → sky-blue fill, a gloss highlight on top, a triple blue/white/navy outline and a drop shadow. The subtitle sits on a blue ribbon.

Private image

Draft A's subtitle is sky-blue text with decorative lines and diamonds on both sides. All three drafts are built the same way: turn the text into a selection, then stack up outline layers grown step by step and gradient fill layers one after another. The fill, band, rim, glow, flame and subtitle are all on separate layers saved in the source file, so once I pick a direction I can edit it right away.

Rabbit hole: dark halos around the glow

At first I made the glow with a Gaussian blur filter, but dark halos showed up above and below the letters. I dropped the blur and switched to feathering the selection edge and filling that instead.

Rabbit hole: the flame looked like a water drop

No matter how I looked at it, the first flame emblem I drew was a water drop. I redrew the outer flame with Bezier paths as three tongues and kept the drop shape only for the inner core.

Next up

• The draft fonts (Perpetua Titling, Castellar, Eras, Berlin Sans) are commercial fonts bundled with Windows and Office, so once I pick one I need to check whether it's OK for a commercial logo. If not, redraw it with a similar OFL font (e.g. Cinzel)
• It's not in the game yet, and there's no title screen either
• These drafts were later replaced by the second round in 183