Branding for inspiration

Communicating a spiritual message

This graphics project has significant emotional, personal, and spiritual meaning for me. It has piquancy: meaning sharply stimulating or provocative; refreshingly interesting, stimulating, or provocative.

My friend Jerry Weltner and his son Matt were chosen by Puget Sound Chrysalis to serve as adult and youth lay directors for the scheduled three-day spiritual retreat. I was thrilled; what an opportunity to see these great men, father and son, sharing their faith with other impressionable young men in the 16-19-year-old age bracket.

I've known them since Matt was in elementary school. He and my son Troy played guitar together, went on United Methodist Youth outings, and camped together. When we started the church website, Matt was the webmaster and I was the production guy.

When they asked me to help design the unique logo that would symbolized everything that blessed their Chrysalis flight, I jumped at the occasion. Jerry had a very clear vision of the flames of Pentecost raining down and Matt wanted people, groups, crowds. The more I heard them describe what they wanted—the stronger grew a sense within me that I knew how to meld their ideas together.

Pencil on paper napkin

This logo was born—literally—on a paper napkin in the Weltners' kitchen on a cloudy winter day. As I sketched out the concept of "morphing" silhouettes of men praying in the dark upward into tongues of flame shining out into the world, I could tell they were as excited as I about the message and the significance.

It was Matt's idea to incorporate the butterfly, symbol for Chrysalis, an international non-denominational three-day spiritual retreat patterned on the Catholic Cursillo program and administered by the Upper Room publishing arm of the United Methodist Church.

I remember Jerry especially liking the idea of a cross emblazoned over the entire crowd-to-flames motif. I think that on the napkin, he might have sketched the cross over my artwork. It made sense; the youth retreat was, after all, a short course in Christianity.

Later, after I went home, I remember calling Jerry to report that I was going to do build the whole logo in what was then Macromedia Freehand. We'd been using CorelDraw for years (since I was a beta tester on version 0.92), challenging each other to dig deeper into the capabilities of the program. Nevertheless, CorelDraw was showing its age, and as the web manager at Tally, I needed to know Freehand so I could work closely with my design agency. I always say the best way to learn something is to use it when there's no pressure from impending deadlines.

The actual production of the logo was a case study in creating graphics; no need to explain how I pulled control points until I captured just the right sweep to the Bezier curves; no need to explain how I carefully considered which colors to use in the logo's palette; no need to describe how I layered the elements upward from each other to a crescendo.

I don't need to explain that the organization had standardized on the "Die, Rise & Fly" theme for all the flights that year, but Matt was set on using "Be Bold, Be Strong" as the theme song and … could I work it in, if possible? As Jerry and I like to say, "No problemo!"

What does need special notice is an easy-to-overlook moment in our relationship—because it was one of those times when the Lord led Jerry to put himself in my hands. Understand, yes, but deeper than that—trust!

From inspired to … inspirational!

See, the original design had the cross fully upright in the center of the logo. It was nicely symmetrical and from the napkin sketch onward, was "right" in an intellectual way. But then divine inspiration took over … well, here's how Jerry recalls it:

"I do have a special request about when you write it up: PLEASE put in how you decided to tilt the cross in the image (from the original, which was straight up and down) about a week after having given me what you thought was the 'final' artwork, how I resisted (because I had already been using it), until I saw it myself, and immediately changed my mind.

"As I recall, even you hesitated to tell me about the change; you were just going back to look at it, and your creative side took over. The tilted cross gives the image depth, and has its own spiritual imagery.

"In my opinion, this is a prime example of where your little details really add up and make all the difference in the world.

"You're absolutely correct about the napkin-to-life inspiration our initial conversation had. But I'm absolutely right about how, even against my resistance, your creativity could turn a good image into a great image.

"I'll always remember both aspects of this project, and be open to your advice, whenever it arrives."