The turtle idea is interesting -- I immediately thought of the tortoise vs. hare story, and how applicable that analogy is in light of the recent banking crises. But the old-age link is great as well. I would not, however, get the idea of tortoise from the abstracted shapes in 1d-f if you hadn't mentioned it in your description. This is a concept where you're already asking the viewer to get the idea of what the tortoise represents, so I would maybe make the visual representation of that tortoise as literal as possible. An old engraving might be one option -- something that communicates "we've been here a long time," like the Wells-Fargo horse-drawn carriage.

Overlays seem to be au courant (thanks perhaps to work like Paula Scher's "Truvia" logotype) (Why those particular colors in the A1 sample plus another overlay color?)

Speaking of Scher, it seems banks (and many other institutions) love to use the "thick-typeface-word-then-thin-typeface" bit as a visual word separator. I recalled noticing she used that with her Citi-stuff (citibank, citifinancies, cititravelers, etc.) Scher's Thick-first-word, thin-second-word logotype

(I guess I've got Scher on the brain today)...

Thank for your feedback FeeltheKern. I'm working on a engraving style one but I'm hesitant to make it look too dated (faux engravings often remind me of the clip art revival of the 90s by Charles Anderson and etc..)

And to answer your question designpuck, I chose those colors, because their friendly, familiar, and bright. Or probably because Paul Rand used them often to make his overlays (as noted in his book Design, Form, and Chaos) and I was just reading it. To me the overlay implies a growth (which you want in a bank), a multiplying effect.

Another reason overlays are popular is because they are efficient? They often create new colors. I need to think more about this...

Again thank you! I will continue working and post updates.

Updated and most recent iterations of the Fifth Third Bank logo. I think I'm liking the upper left type better (its Rotis Semi Sans).

Your praise and criticism is greatly encouraged.

looks like those things you put out for birds during winter. Hay or some kind of seed tied together with a string.

Not a big fan of the type. The type you have in 1a, 1b, 1c and 1d is much nicer.

ah I see that's what you were going for, so that works pretty well then.

the VIII might be seen as 8 though.

Thanks, katttor. Yeah, I figured that making the V black would be enough of a contrast for that not to happen. But yeah, its a issue..

Well, you could try to place the V above and the III below.

i like the V and III concept. how you tried something like this?

I like what Hola has done. It looks both like a wheat stock OR like a wheat field with rows to be sowed which is so common in the midwest.

I'd like to thank everybody for the suggestions. I presented my work to the class today to a positive reception. Hola, I can't remember if I made a variation like that in my sketching or not. I like the simplicity, but formally the V shape looks unbalanced. Here are some of the finished and printed collateral pieces. I used a unpolished drawing style and bright color palette to contrast the restraint of the logo.

I'll still be working on more related designs for my portfolio. Thanks again!