Design

Just for a moment let’s ignore the gradient in the blue box, and indulge me by pretending you’ve never seen Helvetica used in a logo this way. Let’s pretend that the logo doesn’t have flaws and it’s something we’ve never seen before. You’d still hate it. And the reason you’d hate it is because you are yet to have any emotional attachment to it.

Imagine if some flash Gok Wan type in thick-rimmed spectacles had just come along and chucked your favourite Levi’s in the bin and presented you with a brand new pair. You’re understandably resistant. They feel stiff, they make your shoes look old and, more importantly, not one member of the opposite sex has ever said how good your backside looks in them!

You’d want your old pair back wouldn’t you? And no doubt your moaning would perpetuate until at least a few compliments about the new pair had been heaped upon you. By this time, though, you would have probably realised you like the new pair just as much as the old pair, if not more! It’s no different in branding. Change is uncomfortable, but in the long run, it’s needed. more…

Anyone who has ever had the good fortune to work in – the Jewel in the Adobe crown – Photoshop, will know about the seemingly unending chasm of tools and techniques you can use to get it to do what you want.

A huge amount of these techniques are workarounds to achieve results that, to the layman, look perfect. On closer inspection however, most professionals will agree that the workarounds used can create confusion, delay and in a lot of cases will need to be totally re-worked using best practice design techniques to avoid future editing problems. So here it is… a series of best practice design techniques for the Photoshop digital designer. more…

Most designers will be all too familiar with the communication issues that can arise between the creative and development teams in an online design environment. Fundamentally the characters involved in each department are polar opposites. Priorities will differ and a happy medium needs to be struck between the two parties if the best result is going to be achieved.

The debate between these teams rarely stops here at Zeta. We work through our individual desires together for each project and by listening to one another (with the occasional raised voice) we achieve results that we can all be proud of.

However, workflow can sometimes dictate that we need to outsource development to one of the many extremely talented teams that Zeta occasionally work with externally. more…

A call to action is a marketing concept, a request to ‘do something’, often the next step that a customer takes to purchase your product or service. It’s very important because it dictates what the website can achieve, and is a measure of whether it serves its purpose: to generate sales and enquiries.

Calls to action are important on any website, but most importantly e-commerce sites and email newsletters in which a business is driven by sales, so encouraging a user to proceed with a purchase is vital.

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“Over deliver” – the mantra all good digital agencies should live by and one we take very seriously here at Zeta. Meeting client expectations and delivering beyond the brief takes careful planning and consideration.

With that in mind, knowing exactly how browsers will display your design is imperative. Producing stunning visuals is a must. But if you present clients with concepts that don’t represent how the live site will look, your final delivery will not have the impact you hoped for. more…

Digital agency Zeta has recently transformed its office with three striking graffiti murals. The all important working environment now makes a bold statement.  It reflects the company’s identity and attitude and critically the Zeta crew is very happy with the street art.

Managing Director Roger Allen says, “In any business the workplace has to be fit for purpose and that doesn’t just mean practical.  People have got to feel at home, comfortable and proud of the company they work for. The graffiti art on our walls is great and I just love the process we went through to do it.”

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Roger’s previous post on the regeneration of Weymouth’s seafront has been published in this week’s Design Week (Volume 24 / Number 25)

You can read the article on the Design Week website.
http://www.designweek.co.uk/let-weymouth-beach-group-boost-the-resort/3001720.article

The historic English seaside town of Weymouth has been scuppered by SWRDA, (Design Week 24) Weymouth has been lead up the garden path. Encouraged to apply for government funding to regenerate its seafront and then to be refused at the eleventh hour. The opportunity to create a magnificent urban regeneration spectacular to be ready when the world spotlight shines on Weymouth at the Sailing Olympics has been thrown away. Zeta is a digital agency that started out in Weymouth. more…

We have just published a video for Magicard to help explain how their unique ID card security printers work. It might not be the best video on YouTube but the 16:9 aspect ratio now used as standard and the white background definitely help the video to sit well in the page.

The brief was to explain how the printers frost a security hologram identity onto the ID cards and how it will benefit businesses. After much collaboration we decided that video was the best format to communicate the message and also target customers through the second biggest search engine, YouTube.

The video is part of the online Holokote Tool which we recently built for Magicard.

The Holokote tool is a unique way of encrypting a company logo onto an ID card. The watermarked logo is frosted onto the card creating a secure hologram. It is a really neat tool which we wanted to reflect in the ordering process.

So we built a truly bespoke application which allows customers to upload the background image for their card and their company logo. Once both images have been uploaded customers can alter the threshold of the logo to ensure it is pixel perfect and then play around with sliders to position the logo on the card. The preview stage shows how your card will look, fantastic!

One of the issues we had when re-branding Zeta was what to do with our old business cards. We had hundreds of cards with outdated information styled in the old brand, so instead of just throwing them away I tasked myself to research into different uses for old business cards.

I was quite amazed at the number of ideas online. Some were good, some were bad, and some were just strange.

Here are a few ideas I came across: more…