Many of the risks associated with logo design are arguably trivial compared to the dangers faced by the military. But even the military needs to be careful about rebranding and communicating it.
In the case of the Canadian Armed Forces logo design failure, part of the problem was communication. And some of it may just be bad design. In any case, they probably shouldn’t have asked the public for input on new icons like Minecraft’s pixel art.
Introducing the Canadian Forces’ revived brand. Let me know what you think about it in the comments ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/MInoJ51tjyMay 3, 2024
The Canadian Forces’ official Twitter account revealed the military’s “rebranding” while imploring people to “tell us what you think in the comments.” And people didn’t hold back. One person replied, “Looks like a moose is getting a prostate exam.” Another wrote: “Looks like a Minecraft character milking a moose.” Another commented, “To me, it looks like a giant garbage-sucking moose, but it keeps getting bigger and bigger, actually bigger than the moose.” People also quickly created their own alternative designs.
I suggest this as an alternative… pic.twitter.com/a30YG2EHshMay 3, 2024
Other citizens expressed concerns about how much the exercise would cost, while others suggested redundancy measures should be taken. “How did you do this?” one person asked. “What policies do you have in place to ensure this doesn’t happen again?”
The backlash prompted the Canadian Forces to follow up with a series of tweets to clarify that the strange pixelated moose was not replacing its main logo. Instead, this is a camouflage pattern that appears on uniforms, and is also used as an auxiliary logo design in the “bottom left corner of certain communications”, for some reason that is not entirely clear.
The Canadian Army has not changed its official logo. We are proud of our official emblem. The icon released today is a supplementary design used only in the bottom left corner of some communications products and in video animations. pic.twitter.com/iOLvJ2HBlBMay 3, 2024
The designer, who has experience working with the Canadian military, also tried to find out more about X. “The pixelated image that looks like a moose reaching for its surroundings is not a logo redesign, but a new camouflage pattern known as CADPAT (Canadian Disruptive Pattern).” It started with a lack of clarity and suggested it might have been wrong: “The announcement was intended to promote the new logo, refreshed motto and CADPAT MT (Multi-Terrain) design, but the message was It was muddy. By combining all the elements into a single image without clear distinction, the essential message was lost in translation.”
As Meta Pills points out, effective communication should not depend on the audience’s prior understanding of military terminology and concepts. The decision to include the CADPAT pattern in the same image as the logo added to the confusion.
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This is a shame, as Canada seemed to be getting carried away with the design of the Canadian passport and the Canadian Space Agency logo. Sadly, the Canadian Army can take solace in the fact that this is far from the worst logo for a military unit or provincial government agency. Director of Aviation at the U.S. National Intelligence Agency.Remember his clipart UFO on the U.S. Aviation logo?