Delta Chapter 75th Anniversary Video - Tribute slide show shown during the 35th General Convention Banquet.
Step-by-step progress of updating the Coat-of-Arms - My pride and joy. Using an old jpeg of the coat-of-arms, a scan of a coat-of-arms sticker, and a copy of the original drawing of the coat-of-arms provided to me by Brother Featheringham, I was able to clean up and modernize the coat-of-arms. It was a labor of love and took a while to do.
Graphics Standards Manual Proposal - This may be of interest...During the course of planning the 35th General Convention, of which I was the committee chair, I proposed a Graphics Standards Manual for the Fraternity. Such topics included the official "red" of the Fraternity and a more unified look for Fraternity print media and correspondence. I've stuck all my work here, letterheads, memos, and envelopes. I met some resistance because the Fraternity wanted to push the new logo (the one with the castle inside the Phi which I also designed from an original Eta idea). In any case, my work is presented here in case it might provide any value to our organization.
The fraternity flag, designed by the late Bob Beals, Grand Old
Man of Sigma Phi Delta, has suited us just fine since it's inception at the
Thirteenth General Convention
in 1959. I see no reason why we need to drastically change it's
appearance.
A flag should be instantly recognizable from a distance, and our flag is. Red is the color of passion and power. Within Chinese culture it is the color of happiness and prosperity. Red is the color of Engineering in the original Star Trek (pardon my nerdiness). Black is the color of seriousness and authority. The Castle has special meaning for Sigma Phi Delta as expounded upon in the Ritual.
So it concerns me greatly, that with a new redesign of the flag, that we may be going down the path of "gimickiness". If you go to Wikipedia and look at other Fraternity flags, our flag can hang with the best of them. Our flag has withstood the test of time, will a new flag be able to say the same? Forty years from now will people be saying, "What were they thinking?" I fully expect many of the submissions to be chock full of symbolism and crazy designs. Take a look at sports uniforms from the 70s. They followed the mode and fashion of the time and we can say without any hesitation that they're butt ugly. I believe there is an aesthetic that is universal and spans generations. The simplicity of our flag has this aesthetic.
If anything, if we want to update our flag to fit modern sensibilities, we need to adhere to the principles of a universal aesthetic, and pay tribute to our past and our heritage. My two submissions follow. I have the original *.ai files or *.eps files if you require them.
The Castle is the same Castle taken from the escutcheon of our Coat of Arms that I updated. Yellow is the color of happiness and peace. White is the color of virtue. The meaning of ENGINEERS is apparent. Thank you for your consideration.