Here are some designs from recent years. All are pretty typical.
I know... it is so easy to make fun of these things. Certainly you can't please everyone, but it would be nice to have one design that doesn't make me gag. Maybe one day.
I recall very distinctly that the second one down [yellow/red gradient] was the worst of the group of designs from that year.
I can't claim to recall all of the other designs from previous years, but I had long since noticed a trend that the worst designs inevitably get the most votes. It seems doubtful these were the best of the best, but so it goes with choosing design based on popular public opinion.
I actually predicted the yellow/red gradient plate would win that year. I remember finger-jousting the newspaper and telling a friend, "That one will win because it is the ugliest."
"It's not that bad." I was told, but persistently replied "Ugly. We're talking mother-eating-her-puppies ugly... Wrong. Wrong."
Well, here are the designs from this year:
If we assume that the worst design attracts the most votes, then I predict that "B" will win hands down. I didn't think anyone could make that yellow/red gradient worse, but here we are with a black and white gradient with a reverse gradient on the text (which is inexplicably on its side). And white stroked red type on an already difficult to read serif font? What's with that? And, "Nebraska" twice? Talk about redundant. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they all have it twice because they want to plug the web address on there. Claiming you only had Word to design with is no excuse.
What's with the redundancies and the crazy obsession with gradients? Seriously.
Even plate "A" with the simple blue Nebraska plate inexplicably has a gradient. Why? And why do we have to keep using the shape of the State so often? If you must use it, why not stylize it and make it more subtle? Maybe the shape seemed necessary because we are near Kansas and blue is a Kansas color (unless you are Bluejay, in which case, why all the damn red all the time??). We don't want to confuse anyone.
Typography has never been a strength in these designs. Look at the horrible brush script we adopted for so long. I know it is fun to slam obviously horrible fonts like Comic Sans (such an easy target - yawn), but sheesh, people who think those awful brush scripts are any better are deluded and shouldn't be allowed to vote on designs. I don't forgive designers who use brush scripts.
If we conclude that the ugliest will be the most popular, then I predict these rankings, with ugliest at #1:
#1 - B - 'cause I want to vomit. I would not accept it even as a class project.
#2 (two way tie) - A/D - equally bad, but if pushed, I might give the red outlined plate with a subtle capital graphic a slight upper hand. Too bad the design seems slapped together and uninspired. Too bad the red outline is so bold. Too bad the typography was lazyily placed. Too bad the subdued capital building doesn't have any environment in which to exist (clouds, wheat, whatever), other than the confinement of the State border. I take it back. It sucks, too.
#3 - C -Just because this isn't as bad doesn't make it good, but at least we don't have the damn State shape. I am not sure I've seen the State bird and flower on the plate before, so I guess it is different and there is some artistic stylings present. This one actually suffers from trying to be too pretty, though, plus we know how yellow can be distracting on tricked out cars. They might work on VW Bugs, or whatever. B.J. with his gun rack in his massive pickup might be uncomfortable. My truck can handle it, though.
Whatever. The good design rarely wins. My money is on the ugliest one.
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