Alberta PCs ditch 'Wild Rose Country' slogan on new licence plates

[steveo]

Originally Posted by kunkstyle

cliff notes?

most of them were spamming number 1 as well.

[Regular_John]

Man this whole mess is upsetting me more than it should... I honestly care more about this than Redford's spending habits.

Anyways here's a run down for ya:

Calgary Sun says the plates were designed for Free by 3M

Battle begins to include slogan in new Alberta licence plates

Seems the 3M Company, the Scotch tape people, will put the easy-to-see reflective coating on the new plates, expected to come out next spring.

The 3M folks designed the province’s three licence plate choices for free.

http://www.calgarysun.com/2014/07/09...licence-plates

Oh, and the mountains in plate #1?... yeah that's a stock graphic.



So free designs with cheap ass stock graphics? Yeah these plates aren't gonna fly.

[Ducay]

Originally Posted by jaydorn

Man this whole mess is upsetting me more than it should... I honestly care more about this than Redford's spending habits.

Anyways here's a run down for ya:

Calgary Sun says the plates were designed for Free by 3M



Oh, and the mountains in plate #1?... yeah that's a stock graphic.



So free designs with cheap ass stock graphics? Yeah these plates aren't gonna fly.

I demand much more expensive original artwork, no stock artwork, and handpainted license plates as well.

If no one had told you it was a stock image, would you have cared? No. Now unless you want to pay an extra $10 on your registration, lets stick with the free version. It looks good, its new, and it makes Sun readers angry. We all win.

[Mazrim]

Well at least 3M does good reflective sheeting!....

Current Standings (they removed the second decimal place!)

(1) Freedom Fighters 44.7%
(2) Russian Votebots 49.3%
(3) Edmonton Oilers 6%

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Ducay

I demand much more expensive original artwork, no stock artwork, and handpainted license plates as well.

If no one had told you it was a stock image, would you have cared? No. Now unless you want to pay an extra $10 on your registration, lets stick with the free version. It looks good, its new, and it makes Sun readers angry. We all win.

Even though our cause (#1) is just, surely it's not that hard to admit that it would easily be improved if the silhouettes were of mountains that are actually in Alberta, and that it would be rather easy to execute.

[Dion]

Rob Anderson@RAndersonMLAFollow
That's does it - Wildrose Party will now rename ourselves the "Alberta.ca" party...take that #pcaa! #wrp #ableg

[SebC]

There's already The Alberta Party. Rename the province! Can't be giving those guys free advertising.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by jaydorn

Man this whole mess is upsetting me more than it should... I honestly care more about this than Redford's spending habits.

Anyways here's a run down for ya:

Calgary Sun says the plates were designed for Free by 3M



Oh, and the mountains in plate #1?... yeah that's a stock graphic.



So free designs with cheap ass stock graphics? Yeah these plates aren't gonna fly.

But it's not a stock graphic. Compare the mountains they are entirely different.

[sun]

Originally Posted by pylon

But it's not a stock graphic. Compare the mountains they are entirely different.

Yeah, I stared at it a while and thought the same.

But it looks like they edited the stock image. Tallest mountain in both is the same. Darkest mountain on the plate is the second tallest on the stock, but it's mirrored. Looks like the lightest one on the plate is the same as the second tallest on the stock, just moved up and left.

Not identical, but modified. I'm sure the wheat is just yanked from somewhere too. Not the end of the world, IMO, but how hard would it be to put an Albertan mountain in there like SebC suggested above?

[Reggie Dunlop]

They only sensible solution would be to have the plates say "Alberta: Flames Country."

Surely all Albertans would agree on this one.

[Barnet Flame]

Rat free since 53?

[Dion]

The government needs to create a plate for us sports fans

[Roughneck]

Originally Posted by Drury18

Come gather 'round children,
It's high time ye learned,
'Bout a hero named CP
And a devil named Griffiths

We'll vote till we drop,
The girls and the fellas,
We'll vote till the death
Or else fold like umbrellas.

So we'll vote day and night,
By the CPU cooling tower,
They have the plates,
But we have the power!

Now do Classical Gas!

[Regular_John]

Originally Posted by Ducay

I demand much more expensive original artwork, no stock artwork, and handpainted license plates as well.

If no one had told you it was a stock image, would you have cared? No. Now unless you want to pay an extra $10 on your registration, lets stick with the free version. It looks good, its new, and it makes Sun readers angry. We all win.

I actually know a lot of very talented designers/illustrators who could provide much higher quality artwork, and no, it wouldn't cost as much as you think. We're talking less than $5k to commission a custom piece of work for something like this.

Heck even if the province went to go to a fancy pants design studio with their own line of berets and turtle necks the cost would likely be under $50k.

And you know what? For something that's going to be on all of our vehicles, for upwards of 20-30 year, it's absolutely worth paying for custom design work instead of relying on free work from the vendor. Particularly when that vendor is providing lazy clip-art assembly work.

[Regular_John]

Originally Posted by pylon

But it's not a stock graphic. Compare the mountains they are entirely different.

I'm 100% certain the vector graphic on the left is the source of the mountains in design #1. The graphic itself is vector based which makes it really easy to pull pieces out of and make adjustments like mirroring, colour changes, and scaling.

Stock graphics are a double edged sword in the design industry, at times they are easily the best solution VS illustrating it yourself. If you're doing an 80 page annual report with dozens of custom charts/infographics on every page, then yeah, using stock vectors will save a ton of time, while still allowing the you to maintain the integrity of the overall piece. Given that you've got 80 pages of content and likely 1000's of words around the graphics, so they arean't the focus of the piece.

But when you're doing a piece that's 6 inches by 12 inches, and the graphics make up 80% of the design elements you really owe it to the client & the project to push it further. Grabbing some stock vectors and assembling them isn't really "design", it's art production in a way, but very lazy.

As I said in my prev post, these plates are going to be on thousands of vehicles for 20-30 years. Something with that much exposure deserves more attention and effort put in then what was displayed in the proposed designs.

[photon]

Designed for free by the company that makes the anti-reflective coating? That's the funniest thing I've heard all week.

It's not the license plate we need, but it's the license plate we deserve.

[speedog]

Originally Posted by kunkstyle

cliff notes?

Albertans to vote on new license plates

Is changing Alberta's license plates a political move?

Plate #1 seems to be the plate of choice on Beyond.

First thread includes a slight derailment regarding stuffing votes.

Second thread is almost a waste of time.

[Resolute 14]

1. is nothing but clip-art.
2. has an ugly white band
3. Looks like it was drawn by a six-year-old.

This is what free gets you.

As noted above, these plates basically serve as miniature billboards that will promote Alberta for the next 30 years. Take the time, and spend a little money, to get it right.

[EldrickOnIce]

alberta.ca on the plate is dumb, imo
People can google Alberta - its the first return
I always read the slogans on any plates I don't recognize. I find it interesting.

Canadian provincial/territorial plates:
BC: Beautiful - optional 'The best place on earth'
Sask: Land of living skies
Man: Friendly
Ontario: Yours to Discover
Quebec: Je me souviens - translation 'I remember'
Newfoundland and Labrador: Newfoundland Labrador
New Brunswick - New Nouveau Brunswick Canada
NWT - Explore Canada's Arctic, bear plate
Nunavit - ᓇᕗᑦ Nunavut
PEI - Canada's green province
Yukon - The Klondike

We can do better than alberta.ca - market better than that

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

As noted above, these plates basically serve as miniature billboards that will promote Alberta for the next 30 years. Take the time, and spend a little money, to get it right.

Playing devil's advocate...there's a segment of the population that must be satisfied that these came free, since they abhor any spending of money whatsoever. If the government spent $100,000 on some nice plate designs, would the general tone be more like "oh my god I can't believe they spent so much on a little thing on the back of my car!"