Hey folks – it’s been a looooooong long time since I updated this blog. That’s usually a good sign, because if I’m too busy to write blog articles, it usually means I’m busy lettering comics. But lately, I’ve been doing some other odd jobs as well – some of which still draw on the same skill set I use in comics. Sometimes these have pushed me to think in ways that I might not when lettering sequential pages, so I figure they might be worth sharing here.
For this update, we’re taking a detour into vastly different territory. And it probably warrants doling out a bit of my background from days gone by.
Folks who follow me on social media may be aware that, for a period of around ten years, starting in my early 20s, I pursued work as a musician. This was a long slog that basically went nowhere, even though I did have one or two modest engagements along the way. I play several instruments, but the one I always gravitated towards the most was the guitar. At the age of 22 I bought an Ibanez S-series electric, which was the first of several high quality instruments I’ve been lucky to own. I still love the guitar, and I still own some of the guitars I acquired early on in my abortive musical career. But the things I REALLY fell in love with were effects pedals.
Pictured above is a selection of the pedals I still own to this day. Over the last few years, I’ve been writing and recording more music, and I’ve picked up some new toys along the way. I write and record with synthesizers more these days, although I still occasionally pick up a guitar to add some colour, or the odd solo. These effects pedals will work on anything with the appropriate quarter-inch jack connections, so for the choice of extra sounds they offer me to play with, they’re a good spend. I get a lot of use out of them.
But here’s the thing about guitar pedals – like any luxury consumer electrical product, they look a certain way. Each major pedal manufacturer tends to develop their own particular aesthetic for their products, and sometimes a sub-line within a company’s product will have its own unique set of identifiable design cues. This can dictate to anything from their shape and form factor to the style of the control knobs on them. And of course, graphic design is a big part of this. If you look at effects pedals made by companies like Earthquaker Devices, DOD or Electro Harmonix, they often have a visual style that makes them immediately identifiable as the product of that company. Sometimes they’ll follow a uniform design language, with each pedal being the same shape and size. Sometimes the identifying badge will be no more than the parent company’s recognisable logo. You could take a look at the BOSS pedal range, where the standardised form factor of the pedals is pretty much their identifying characteristic – a trick that several other manufacturers have tried to replicate over the years. There’s a HUGE variety of different approaches to their presentation.
And sometimes they come out looking butt ugly.
Now. Let’s bring this story back home. A couple of years ago, I’d started putting together a modest recording rig so that I could get into writing and recording more music at home. This is the kind of undertaking I could write an entire series of online blogs about, because it entails a good degree of problem solving and its own set of creative decisions. But… it’s not really what we’re here for. This is a blog about lettering design. So I guess I need to make all of this relevant to that, right? Bear with me. I’m going somewhere with this.
One of the issues I’d run into was that I needed a better way to record electric guitar. This led me to look at a fairly new phenomenon in the guitar pedal market – at least, one that wasn’t so commonplace when I was actively pursuing music – namely the ‘amplifier in a box’ type of pedal. And I found one in the shape of the Joyo American Sound. It was a pedal so cheap that my dad – himself a veteran of the 1970s Inner London music scene – decided he’d buy it for me as a gift after I offhandedly mentioned to him that they even existed. So it arrived on my doorstep one day out of the blue.
And it looks like this:
That is one uuuuugly looking pedal.
Now, let’s be clear on something: you don’t – or shouldn’t – buy a guitar pedal based on how it looks. It’s what they do to the sound of your instrument that counts. And this pedal sounds FANTASTIC. It’s very much a serious studio tool. But it does strike me that its presentation doesn’t do it justice.
This is a problem across the entire range of amp-in-a-box pedals made by Joyo. There are several, which all feature the same chintzy case dressing. It’s a perplexing decision on their part. I own other Joyo pedals that, while they may be kind of functional in their aesthetic, are certainly more attractive to look out.
Just take a look at this line selector – it has the same form factor exactly, but it’s a lot nicer to look at.
The American Sound, though? Let’s not kid ourselves. This looks BAD. And it strikes me that it could use a re-design.
Well, here’s the thing. The whole reason why I decided to make the design of this little box of electrics the focus of a blog article is because it highlights one of the key concerns in any kind of type design project. Namely that type should be legible first and foremost, AND attractive to look at. In my opinion, the application of text on this pedal fails on both counts. It’s the butt of many jokes among guitar gear enthusiasts for that precise reason. The part that gets me is that somebody approved this design and sent it to market thinking it would look like an enticing product. But the design and application of the lettering on its enclosure is ATROCIOUS.
But what, precisely, is so wrong with it?
Well, here’s a breakdown of the design sins committed on this pedal.
- Text is too small and poorly arranged.
I often mention that lettering needs to look legible above all other concerns. Usually, of course, I discuss this in the context of comics, where there’s a greater need to balance legibility against attractive design.
In this context however, we’re not talking about creating art. We’re looking at a musician’s tool that benefits from having all its different controls clearly labelled. And the Joyo American Sound fails abysmally in that regard. Apart from the fact that the text is too small, the odd arrangement of it is quite unnecessary.
I can understand why the designer may have been tempted to do this. It looks like an obvious attempt to make the type design a bit more interesting. But, to be honest, I think it would have been better to spend a little more time over the choice of font. And that font certainly needs to be bigger. These things are often placed on floor-mounted pedal boards, where I’d defy anybody to be able to easily read the labelling. But even used on a desktop – as I frequently use my pedals and synths – this is needlessly difficult to read.
- The face of the pedal is too cluttered.
Despite the fact that the lettering on this pedal is too small, there’s a bizarre overload of text on the enclosure. I’d personally suggest that certain details don’t need to be included. For example, the labelling of the DC power port, the ‘in’ and ‘out’ markings for the cable input and output, and the ‘bypass’ label under the footswitch.
In the interests of fairness, it has to be said that these elements may well be included out of necessity. I’m an old hand when it comes to mucking about with guitar effects boxes, so I don’t need to have the purpose of every switch, port and knob spelled out to me. Of course, there’s always the possibility that this could be someone’s first ever guitar pedal, so maybe there’s a case to argue for all of these labels.
Certainly, it makes sense to have the DC jack input labelled. Not every pedal accepts the same type of power supply. But I personally question if it needs to be on the front of the enclosure. I’d like to see it applied next to the jack input itself. Although it has to be said, this is a budget priced pedal, and printing on more than one side of the enclosure might entail extra manufacturing cost. I have an old DOD Deep Freeze bass chorus pedal where this information was put on an adhesive sticker.
The labelling of the ‘bypass’ switch, though, seems entirely unnecessary to me. If there were another footswitch on the pedal, I could see the sense of labelling them. But given that there’s an LED right next to this switch and most guitarists are pretty well aware of the function of these switches… well, I don’t think we need it.
- The name of the pedal is badly composed
This is the part I just can’t look past. It’s an unforgivable sin.
I’ve joked with friends before that this pedal should be sold as the Joyo Amerisoundican. Because, honestly, that’s how the logo reads. If you can even call this a logo. The font choice is terrible, there’s been no real attempt made to turn it into a proper logo, the letters aren’t properly kerned and the whole thing screams that it was done five minutes before lunch break on a Friday afternoon. Or maybe after a nasty argument with the boss.
Why is this an issue for me? Well, as somebody who’s worked with typography for almost 16 years at this point, I’ve had my fair share of being asked for stupid nonsense. For all I know, this arrangement of text may not have been applied by a designer at all. All I can tell you is that, if it was asked for, a designer worth their salt would have refused to do it. Because, I repeat, this is a terrible design. It’s not something you’d proudly put your name to. (It may be worth mentioning that I’ve since learned that this pedal is available in other regions with slightly tidier design. Why that cleaner design hasn’t outright replaced this one is beyond me.)
The worst part about this logo, though, is that it simply doesn’t evoke what the pedal is supposed to do. It’s named the ‘American Sound’ because the pedal is supposed to emulate the sound of classic US manufactured Fender guitar amps – something I can attest that it does with great authenticity. But there are really no visual cues to suggest that.
Am I being needlessly picky here? Well, that depends on your point of view. Speaking solely as a musician, all I really care about is how this thing sounds. But after working in my field of graphic design for so long, I just can’t NOT notice the lazy design on show here.
Also, it’s worth mentioning that other pedals with similar functionality do a much better job with their presentation. Take a look at this NUX pedal for example:
The NUX Steel Singer is a very simple stomp box that aims to replicate the drive channel of the infamous Dumble amplifier. It’s design may be simple, but it accurately evokes the design of the amplifier’s front panel – right down to having the same style of skirted chrome control knobs!
I don’t have images for them, but it’s worth checking out the look of their Plexi Crunch and Recto pedals as well – both very clean designs that similarly ape the look of the guitar amps they’re based on. When you look at these, the real problem with the design of the Joyo American Sound becomes clear. It utterly fails sell onlookers on the product it’s been applied to.
So, how could it be improved?
Here’s my take on it.
So, what are the principal changes I’ve made here, and why?
First up, I’ve altered the colour of the enclosure. Light blue feels to me like a nice alternative to the original’s metallic copper. Is it reminiscent of the look of a classic Fender amp? No. But then, neither is Joyo’s design. I just went with what looked nice to me. I think this lighter colour plays well with the white accents on the control knobs as well.
The DC input jack label is gone. Like I say, if it’s really necessary it could go on the side next to the ‘drive’ knob, where the jack is present on the original in a recess. I didn’t really feel a need to depict that for the sake of what’s (hopefully) just a fun little blog entry.
All control knobs are now clearly labelled. I’ve chosen black text for contrast with the blue enclosure.
The input and output jacks are still labelled, but I’ve opted to use simple arrow graphics here instead of explicit labelling. This is a cue I’ve borrowed from the NUX Reissue Series pedals, which dispense with text and still seem crystal clear in how they’re intended to be used. I’d debated whether to use white here to create a unique design cue, but keeping them black creates better contrast. It’s good to be able to see these kinds of labels really easily.
The really interesting part, though, is the logo design. For the ‘Joyo’ and ‘American Sound’ logos, I’ve opted to use a varsity style font. To my mind, this ties straight into the aesthetic of things like American sports shirts. I could have used something that was more suggestive of the famous Fender logo, but… eh. Copyright infringement. And it never hurts to build a more distinct visual footprint. The colour choice is pretty easy as well – what says ‘American’ more than red, white and blue? There’s a star. And two stripes. I don’t think it needs any more. If I’d had a bit more time, I might have pulled the logo layer into Photoshop and distressed it a bit by using a grungy brush set as an eraser.
Is this the only way that the design could be improved? Of course not. I imagine somebody better versed in the actual business of pedal engineering might be able to school me as to any errors I’ve made. Maybe there’s a solid case for including some of the elements I’ve omitted. But the key is, this redesign took me a whopping 35 minutes.
Does that make it low effort? Maybe.
Is it better? That’s for you to decide.
letterpunk 