Badge Design
Congratulations on starting your badge design! You’re at a great point to build a solid foundation for your badges.
In the following pages we outline some best practices for creating a cohesive badge family that will resonate with your audience.
Let’s get started!
STEP 1
Ask Questions
Who will receive our badges?
Considering who will receive your badges helps coordinators and designers determine what will resonate most with your badge recipients. Identifying demographics, goals, and pain points can help to hone a design direction that creates a lasting impression.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
How will our badges be perceived?
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
Understanding the environment in which your badges will be awarded has a significant impact on how they look. Similarly, your level of engagement and type of interaction with your recipients will impact their level of familiarity and comfort with your organization’s personality and voice.
Are our badges easy to understand?
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
It’s important that badges are engaging and dynamic when they are viewed at full size and they don’t become unrecognizable when they are resized. Incorporating brand elements such as color, shapes, or logo marks can be enough to ensure that your badges read well at all sizes. Text can be used as well, but it must be large enough (and short enough!) to read at smaller sizes.
Is it easy to differentiate between our badges?
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
Badges should feel like they’re part of a cohesive badge family while also maintaining their own unique look. Creating visual identifiers for each badge results in a rich and robust badge system. This can be accomplished through evolving badge shapes, iconography, colors, or any other elements that exist in the badge design.
STEP 2
Develop Badge Content
Badge Content
Every badge must include a title, description, and a set of criteria. This information gives the badge designer enough context to create a unique and meaningful design. Since it’s so important to producing good badge design, we recommend outlining badge content before design begins.
Now that you have a clear sense of your audience and how you want to communicate with them, you can begin to map out your badge content.
Your badge title here...
Description
Your badge description here...
Your badge criteria here...
STEP 3
Consider Badge Elements
How do we create unique badge designs?
ICONOGRAPHY�Iconography is a great way to differentiate badges within your system. Decisions about illustration style and imagery should be made in conjunction with your brand and audience.
TEXT�The inclusion of text in a badge should be well thought out. Text only works if it is large enough and short enough to fit into the badge image. At smaller badge sizes, text tends to be illegible, so consider why text is critical to include as part of the badge image.
PROGRESSION
Progression can be communicated through combinations of badge elements that visually represent progress, tiers of achievement, and leveling up.
SHAPE
The shape of a badge is typically the first thing that your recipients will see. It can be used to convey meaning and evoke feelings. Unusual shapes, if used correctly, may be more eye-catching and help to set your badges apart. It’s important to remember that all badges must fit inside a square aspect ratio.
COLOR
Color is an easy way to differentiate your badges and impart meaning. We recommend starting with a limited palette of three to five colors, as too many colors can make your badge designs feel disjointed and chaotic. We’ve found that a carefully chosen and branded color palette will help focus your message.
STEP 4
Design and Iterate
Take everything you learned in Steps 1-3 and create your badge.
Once you have some badge options, gather feedback and iterate. When you have a badge design that you’re happy with, you can start issuing it.
Case Studies
Pacific Science Center
We worked with PSC’s Discovery Corps youth development program to design a multi-level badge system for high school and early-college aged students. Their goal is to fuel “a passion for discovery, experimentation, and critical thinking” through hands-on training in an exciting learning environment.
Badge Content
Content was provided for each badge before design work started.
DCA Training Badge
Description
This badge is awarded to students who have completed the Discovery Corps Assistant (DCA) training to orient them to the jobs and responsibilities available at this level of the Discovery Corps career ladder.
Criteria
Students must attend a three day training oriented towards welcoming them to Pacific Science Center and the Discovery Corps program. This training includes attendance at workshops led by a life sciences professional, adult science interpretation program staff, and an orientation with Pacific Science Center’s Human Resources department.
Training, Level 1
Training, Level 3
Training, Level 2
Training, Level 4
Space
Physics
Good Employee
Customer Service
PROGRESSION
Using a consistent badge shape and icon combined with variations on color and layering provides a sense of progression through the training program.
CATEGORIES
Using different badge shape and color for each category provides a clear distinction between types of content. The custom icons included in the design help to differentiate the badges within the same category.
Elevate Lane County
We worked with Lane ESD to design a pathway that helps high school aged students who are entering the job market after graduation bridge their skills gap. The Pathway provides guidance for students who are interested in the tech industry.
Badge Content
Content was provided for each badge before design work started.
Title
Technology: Coursework
Description
Students earning this badge will have demonstrated familiarity with the basic principles of a personal computer, including the internal hardware, the operating system, and software applications. Students will have practice in using key applications such as word processors, spreadsheets, and presentation software, as well as understanding social and ethical issues around the Internet, information, and security. Possible course names include Computer Fundamentals, Exploring Computer Science, Year One CTE Concentrator.
Criteria
This badge is awarded for completing preliminary coursework. This includes at least one math and an intro to CS course.
Category 1
Completion
Category 3
Category 2
Category 4
CATEGORIES
Using a consistent badge shape and core illustration creates a cohesive badge system. The use of different icons helps to set apart the different categories, but color is the primary determining factor.
COMPLETION
Using the same badge shape and core illustration keeps the completion badge in the same visual family. The use of all four category colors helps to set this badge apart from the other category badges.
How have other organizations done it?
What’s next??
We hope this provides a foundation for kickstarting your badge design efforts!