Personal Brand &
Custom Alphabet
Objective
A personal branding project |
Clay had an old branding package that he had made myself back in college, it was time for an update.
Check it out on Medium!
My Role
Branding
Design
Typography
Tools
Illustrator
Photoshop
Team
Solo
Duration
A Lifetime
Meet Clay.
Yes, it’s me!
“I can make any canvas into a work of art”
Clay is a Leading Creative and UX Designer with a background in Visual Design of over 10+ years working in Graphic Design and Photography.
He used to be more of a minimalist and hated any amount of color that was more than just a pop.
After years of self discovery he’s ready to unleash a new brand that reflects his new sense of self, life and what it means to be completely authentic.
Clay needs a new branding identity after
years of self discovery because his old one does
not reflect the person he is anymore.
Where Things Started.
As 2020 came around the corner and quarantine started Clay ended up losing his job which made him really start thinking about an inevitable job search. He knew he wanted to change his branding as it was years old at this point and didn’t reflect who he was anymore. He started with a brand that he had made in college, at the time he hated colors. He had this idea in his head that he wanted to be this “clean and minimalist designer.” He only used a pop of color here and there to give the eyes a break from all of the black and white.
Here is a photo of the final branding package Clay submitted for his portfolio at the end of design school. As you can see it’s rather bland and feels a bit stale. If he wanted to stand out he knew he needed a change. He knew that he needed to add more color to symbolize some sort of rebirth he has had within myself since then. He opened up and allowed Himself to explore how color could influence his old brand and where he could take things.
How might we change Clay’s
personal branding to symbolize confidence,
rebirth, and a new outlook on life.
Breaking Down Walls &
Adding Color.
To start things off I wanted to keep a version of pink in his branding to give a little nod to the past, and because It’s still one of his favorite colors. I wanted to have at least a 5 color, color palette to push the use of color used throughout his branding. After many hours of looking over color palettes and photos for inspiration I finally landed on the following.
#F28482
#F5CAC3
#F7EDE2
#84A59D
#F6BD60
Starting with the Pink (#F5CAC3), I brought up the saturation and brightness to make it feel a bit happier. Moving on I knew I wanted two colors that felt closely related for a nice contrast but still felt different which is when I landed on the darker Red (#F28482) to complement the Pink (#F5CAC3). From there I accompanied these colors with a Blue (#84A59D) and a Yellow (#F6BD60). Both of these felt like a great mix to add in as they brought in a vintage vibe that Clay has a love for. After that, I knew I wanted to create a more subdued feeling to the brand which is where the Tan (#F7EDE2) came in. It was perfect, random but still felt right. This was the launch point for Clay’s new branding as he instantly fell in love.
Branding Package 1.0
Now that I had his color palette I started to play with some designs and ended up with the below. I fleshed out an entire branding package in one night because I was so excited to have finally found something that Clay enjoyed. It was something that showed color and also allowed him to express his new self in a way he hadn’t done before.
Check it out on Behance Here!
Quarantine Crazies &
General Assembly.
Fast forward a month and maybe then some, Clay has absolutely lost all sense of reality. The job searching wasn’t really going anywhere with lack of motivation and starvation for his new found freedom of no longer having responsibilities… At least in that moment. After months of consideration prior to COVID and realizing things weren’t going to look up anytime soon Clay decided to take a leap of faith and join General Assembly’s UX Design Immersive program.
After weeks of hard work and learning all about UX Clay had finally been tasked to update his portfolio. He was the most ecstatic he had been since the course had started. He knew that was something that needed to be done but never got around to doing. He already had a portfolio for his graphic design and photography work so this was going to be a rather simple task of updating colors, fonts and a few tweaks here and there.
If things were only that easy.
The First Iteration &
Inspiration.
Once I jumped into things I realized very quickly that what I had designed in one of those crazed quarantine states I wasn’t thinking of how it was going to translate onto the online world. I was starting to regret the Tan (#F7EDE2) for the site background instead of white. Everything I tried I ended up hating. It felt too one way or another and just didn’t feel like Clay. So I went back to the drawing board. I ended up mindlessly doing these one day and something clicked. Maybe this is what Clay needed, an alphabet? But how? I wanted to play with the way shapes and text could interact together but there still wasn’t enough there for Clay to be completely sold on the design.
It wasn’t until I found a website that used a similar approach and also happened to not have a basic white background either. In fact they used a similar Tan (#F7EDE2) color Clay had originally wanted. After coming across San Diego Design Weeks website another fire was lit under me. The sandy color background with playful type was exactly what I was looking for and this was going to help me reach my goal and give Clay what he had been dreaming about.
Where It Landed.
I ended up playing with more organic shapes along with geometric to make it feel more loose and fun. With only a few days left before Clays project had to be done for class, I was relentless to get it done. The first thing I designed was the first thing I wanted people, like yourself, to see when you visit Clay’s website, was his name, Clay Moss.
From here I was able to pick and choose some letters to make things a bit more playful, like him. I chose specific letters making sure the viewer was able to have context as to what they were.
Next was the fun part, creating the rest of the letters for a bit of a show. Originally not knowing where this was going to come into play I went ahead and ran with it knowing something would come out of it.
The Presentation.
From there I was able to think about how I wanted to show this. I knew the limitations I was going to have working within Squarespace which is when I had the idea of a simple rollover that I could do with a simple code block. I tried it and it felt complete, Clay was going to love it. Run your mouse over it and see for yourself!
Next I was able to start to visualize and start creating the other elements of Clay's site like its headers. I wanted them to be similar to the way I designed his name, leaving the viewer to infer what the text says.
I also knew he wanted to have some sort of landing page that stood out from the rest of them to highlight this design that I spent so much time on. Clay needed a WOW factor and this was going to be it.
The Logo.
After I figured out how I was going to show Clay’s fonts I realized he needed an icon. I knew I wanted to showcase all of the colors and use the alphabet I created in the design. Below are the steps I took when creating Clay’s logo.
Once I landed on this I knew it was perfect and also left a subliminal nod to his sphinx cats, Benny and Peaches.
Last but not least.
That’s A Wrap!
After months of hard work and perseverance I had accomplished the goal that Clay had been looking forward too for so long. This was a design that he could be proud of, showed himself as he truly is and make him feel completely authentic.
“I learned a lot about myself as a designer and now a UX designer over the last few months. I couldn’t be more thrilled to finally have this all done. It’s rebirth of me as a new person walking into a new career path with a confidence boost. Although my branding will probably change in years to come this is a starting point of new found success.”
-Clay