The Artwork


The official design, flanked by the drawings of Dong Yue (left) and Oleg Golovin (right).

Designing process

Dong Yue (left) and Oleg Golovin with Soyuz TMA-17 commander Oleg Kotov.

On June 23, 2009, Roscosmos announced Nastya Mestyashova (14) as the winner of the Soyuz TMA-16 contest, as well as two runners up. The little figures in the 2nd and 3rd place drawings - a black cosmonaut (drawn by Oleg Golovin from Russia, 10) and a thinking girl on a heart-shaped balloon (drawn by Dong Yue from China, 13) - were very cute and most people involved in the Soyuz patches project, agreed it would be a shame to not do something with them.

It was decided to have the cosmonaut and the girl go through cosmonaut training with TMA-16 commander Max Surayev and their lucky friend (called 'Maks 2009' - refering to Surayev and the Russian airshow) in a series of pictures, which would be released in the weeks prior to launch. On the website of Russia Today, a story writing contest was initiated, involving the "Three Little Space Kiddies".


Two images of the "Max and the Three Little Space Kiddies" series.

Then, in early July, it was time to start planning for the Soyuz TMA-17 logo, that would have to be based on a children's drawing again. There were some complications. Because of the cold temperatures at Baikonur in December, the young winners would not go see this particular launch. They would have to tour the launch facilities at another time.

Also, because of the short interval between the TMA-16 and 17 launches, as well as the summer holidays, it would be very difficult to get good designs by children for TMA-17 in time. The batch of drawings still available, did not contain anything that really stood out for this flight.

Then, a plan hatched. Why not use the two remaining Space Kiddies for the TMA-17 patch? Everyone agreed it would be a wonderful surprise for the other two winners - who were already invited to visit Baikonur to see the TMA-16 launch in September!


Luc's original sketch, dated July 13, 2009 (left) and a little variation that was tried at an
intermediate stage (right).

Luc van den Abeelen was tasked with the final design. The crew liked his first - rectangular - version very much. Because their Expedition 23 patch also turned out to be rectangular, commander Kotov requested a different shape though, along with some other minor changes. In the final stages of designing, Kotov worked directly with the digital artwork himself to fine-tune some of the elements.


Anatoly Perminov showing the TMA-17 design at Baikonur in September 2009. Photo NASA-HQ/Bill Ingalls

The final art for the TMA-17 patch was ready on September 5, 2009 and after some final color adjustments for printing purposes, approved by Roscosmos head Anatoli Perminov on September 16, 2009. The logo itself was revealed on September 29 at Baikonur, with the two surprised designers (who believed they had only won second and third prices in the TMA-16 contest) present. The crew received their patches in Moscow on November 9, 2009.
All designs copyright Roscosmos/Spacepatches.nl.