Monograms

This page is to display D'ni style monograms I'm working on or have made.

1. This is the design that got me started on this current round of monogram making. Before, I'd worked on a few of them for my own purposes, but that was about it. It was made for explorer Kaaja Laroo, and was a response to her posting a nice version of Yeesha's monogram as her avatar image on Facebook. I asked her why she didn't make one for herself, and that lead to me doing this for her. She wanted a songbird and feather theme in green and black. The monogram is made of the letters Kaja ( Kaja ).

2. Explorer Hummingbird. I tried making one out of the whole name, but it just didn't look good. So these are made of the initials hb ( hb ). The first one is a take on the style used by Yeesha. The second is me just veering off wherever my head took me.

3. Explorer George Caboy. The correct way to write a name in D'ni is to use the phonetic values of the letters, not a straight substitution. The letters used in these tests are jorj ( jorj ). He just asked about a simple red on steel design with a red stripe ring. I kind of think this would look good as a set of hubcaps.

4. Explorer Yutiel Yoshi. This uses six letters, yUtEel ( yUtEel ). She didn't give me any information to work with, but stated that she liked the simplicity of Hummingbird's monogram initials. I was just beginning to experiment with glass effects, and stumbled onto a nice pearl white look, so I slapped an elegant ring design on the outer rosette and called it a day. She likes it, so job done.

5. These are for me. First is a monogram of my name, Larry, with a circle of letters that spell "Larry LeDeay" repeated all the way around. The letters are lårE ( lårE ) and lårE leDA ( lårE leDA ) . The second is meant to look like a bronze shield, and has LLOD in the center. The letters are lloD ( lloD ). It's for this web site, the Lost Library of D'ni, which is why I use books as a design element.

6. This is for Jeanne Raney, although she hasn't been around much lately because of family commitments. She's infamous for having a herd of avatars all named some variation of "Moose". The letters are mUs ( mUs ). Jeanne is from Texas, so I based this design loosely on the State Flag. It's red, white and blue glass with a white star. The extra element is another star with a pair of red metallic moose antlers that look a little like wings. This also got a thumbs up from her when I told her about it, so I'm still sinking my shots above par on these.

7. Just for the fun of it, I decided to see if I could make a halfway decent design for Richard A. Watson, a.k.a. RAWA ( rawa ). This look is based on Central and South American Indian bas relief gold work in which designs are pressed into the surface of the metal. The center letters are RAWA, and the surrounding Narayani symbols basically mean "intelligence, love and creativity merged". That's what I imagine he puts into his work at Cyan. The symbols at the cardinal points are meant to represent games he's worked on. The pen nib at the bottom just means "he wrote (worked on)", and clockwise from that is a DRC logo for Uru and Myst 5: End of Ages, a Narayan bird symbol for Myst 3: Exile, and a scarab beetle for Myst 2: Riven. It's a little difficult to try to sum up a person you don't know, but that's how I (perhaps naively) think of RAWA. When I posted a copy on Facebook, RAWA saw it and liked it. So did his mother, much to my surprise.

8. This was made by request from Angelmyst. She said she likes mountains, writing, swimming, and children. The color scheme requested was orange and green, which is difficult to pull off without looking garish. The mountain is self explanatory. The linking book is for her love of Myst games, the pen is for writing, and the water splash is for swimming. The surface texture for the whole monogram is a water ripple effect which is also meant to tie into the swimming angle. The lettering in the rosette are repeating rings of her children's Uru avatar names. From the outside working in, they are Junemyst, MrsPope, CanadianGirl, and NateDS.

9. Zesty of Xeniphers and Kirk of Xeniphers. Colors requested were shades of purple with gold accents. The first is Kirk's, with KoZ as the monogram. Xeniphers begins with an X, but that letter doesn't exist in D'ni. The second is Zesty's, with ZoZ as the monogram. They both love the sea and pets. Zesty is a pianist and likes to paint and read. Kirk is an avid ham radio operator who likes to cook. Zesty requested a lighter purple for the highlight color. I used black for Kirks's to show what a high-contrast color could do for the gold, and he liked it.

10. Rand Miller. Since I made one for RAWA, it pretty much required I make one for his boss even though he may never see it. I went with a relatively simple black print on wood theme. The name is ranD ( ranD ). The symbols are for games he's either created or acted the role of Atrus in. from about 1 o'clock, the icons represent The Manhole, Cosmic Osmo, Myst, Riven, Exile, Revelation, End of Ages/Uru, and Obduction. The yellow, red and black star along with the gear pattern around the name was inspired by the compass rose from Myst's Stoneship Age. This was the second design to get a seal of approval from RAWA's mother.

11. Acorn1. The monogram is spelled AKorn1 ( AKorn1 ) in D'ni orthography. The overall theme is intended to show that she's a beekeeper. She also likes flowers, particularly camellias. The simple symbolism of this design shows bees flying to a white camellia for nectar, and then back to the acorn that represents her, to produce the honey represented by the overall coloration. The hexagonal containers for the symbols represent a beehive indirectly, and the green ring designs are reminiscent of the plants and flowers bees visit and pollenate.

12. A currently unassigned design. I've put this together for the fun of it. It has space for four to eight personal glyphs. In the center, the monogram itself can be all in the smaller disk with a slogan in the ring around it, or a large monogram overlapping the center all the way out to the first gear-tooth pattern.

13. Another unassigned design. I just wanted to try a simple look with a cutout in the middle that appears to have a suspended monogram in it. I also tried a bit of relief to get away from the flat overlays in the previous monogram.

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I make no claims to any such rights or to the intellectual properties of Cyan Worlds; nor do I intend to profit financially from their work. This web site is a fan work, and is meant solely for the amusement of myself and other fans of the Myst series of games and books.