Tuesday: RGB Color Spectrum

Well hello there, welcome back to another Tuesday daily post. The year rolls on, and it's becoming more and more eventful here at HJC. Ongoing, we have the Semiahmoo competition, the COTY semi finals, and as always, COTW.

New for this season, it's, well, The Season! This blind-judging competition offers weekly head-to-head matchups with your concepts in a tournament style format. Check out the rules, and sign up before you scroll down to the concepts!

COTY Semi-Finals vote (ends Friday @ noon ET)

COTW Jan 11-18 vote (ends Friday @ noon ET)

Semiahmoo entries (due Friday @ noon ET)

Register for The Season (by Friday @ noon ET)

Let's see those concepts!


Adam G.- European Union versus NATO

Adam's imagination conjures up a fictional matchup between the EU and NATO. Since these are independent designs, I'll review the uniforms separately:

European Union

The dark team set, Adam sets the circle of stars as the crest, with the Euro currency symbol on the shoulder, with the individual country's patch on the opposing shoulder. It's certainly a neat way to unify an otherwise diverse team. The design falls a little flat, with the striping overpowering the crest, given the thickness against size of the stars. The white for the numbers and Euro symbol adds an unnecessary differentiation; making them all yellow to match the stripes would fit the simplistic theme better.

Grade: D+

NATO

The light set offers a strong checkerboard theme, though a miscue on the arms hampers it; the way it's laid out, the arms would be solid stripes. The Canadians-esque layout fits well, though the thinner stripes around the hem are probably too thin for the checkerboard to come across clearly. I'm not sold on the compass as the crest logo, and although it fits seamlessly into the design, it's still a weak symbol on its own. The shoulder patch text reading backwards makes no sense, and would be best omitted.

Grade: C-

Overall: D+

Lucas D.- Arizona Coyotes

Lucas takes us to the desert for next season's Coyotes' third. The color layout is flawless; the maroon-over-sand from the logo was carried excellently to the design. While we usually see a more Native American inspired pattern, the repeating triangles are a neat abstraction of shapes within the logo. At first glance I wondered why the shoulder patch was only on one side, but then I saw how the Coyote is howling at the moon, which is a great touch. I'm really struggling to find criticism for this design, though I must admit I'm not a fan of the blank pants. A minor miscue, but the amount of triangles varies quite a bit between both of your template. I much prefer the version on the right, though I can't be certain what you're trying to communicate.

Grade: A

Noah K.- Eastern Michigan University Eagles

Noah's MAC series takes us to Ypsilanti, Michigan to end today's post. This school doesn't play at the varsity level, which from a design standpoint is probably for the best given the school's identity is built around the football team (one of the worst DI records of all-time) and their interesting approach to an industrial theme, to say the least. The gray alternate is the most direct call out to the factory, but the sparse references on the home and road sets aren't working. There just isn't enough, especially since it's so close to the white, to justify having it. As for the design, "less is more" was the right approach for a team with a block letter as a logo. Since there's so little going on here, consistency is all the more important; the thick arm stripes and yoke should fit the pants and hem stripe better. The classic, diagonal script makes a fitting crest, but should be a tad smaller.

Grade: C-

My COTW nomination goes to Lucas D's Arizona Coyotes third. That'll do it for this Tuesday. See you next week, and keep your stick on the ice.