Domino Records (rebrand research)

A major part of my brief - is to redesign (rebrand) Domino Records of London. I thought my best bet would be to look into current record labels around the UK to see if there are any current trends, styles or themes to their logos. The first set of logos I have below are all black and white using grey scale for shades and depths. The logos attached are a selection of the best brand designs i could first find in my initial research:

• MySpace Records is one of my favorite designs. Keeping in theme with the MySpace logo using the silhouettes of people with large headphones is simple, affective and recognisable.
• 2 Tone Records have a different approach to their logo. Taking an image of a classic vinyl and adding some collage images with classic type. It makes a very unique and distinctive design - which I feel is one of the best I have researched so far.
• Evermore Records has a brilliant logo. Using a custom typeface and a hand rendered vinyl image it produces and affective and innovative design.

The designs above using tones of green are all mockups for different brands. I chose to take this from my research to show how creative you can be - and how simple. I do like a couple of the designs above:

• Lomax - the design consists of a large curved typeface which is also 3D. It also has two arrows and paint running from the bottom of the design. I like the design as its simple yet eye catching - layout is essential in all design work, if the arrows were in a different location or the type was smaller the design would not work as-well as it currently does.
• Rubik Recordings has another simple yet affective logo. Using the basic lines from a Rub-ix Cube and a unique, eye-catching typeface - an affective logo was produced.

Domino - Other Designs

I have decided to do some very basic research to start with and see what I find. The word 'Domino' is immediately associated with Dominos Pizza - I think you will agree. So i decided to look deeper into other brands, shops, restaurants etc with the name Domino. I found around 15 examples in my research 3 of which were simple clip-art designs which I have decided not too include in this.

The examples below range in terms of design. Some are very simple, cheap and cheesy feel - where as some are designed with nice type, colour, layout etc. To some up the majority of the designs below: I will take a lot from looking at these designs e.g.: colour, scale, type, layout and imagery. I will also take this chance to see that it will be hard to make a logo for Domino Records - without some sort of association with a domino. Emailing Domino Records could help here to find out if there is a story behind the name.

Below: This design is very professional. Beautiful design using very nice font. The font itself however i associate with music - more specifically the d&b genre. The design however is nice and works its part to attract customers. By adding the simple 'Galeria' text at the bottom the logo becomes more specific and legible.

Below: This is definitely my favorite design which I found relating to Domino. Its bold vibrant background colour and stone white type is immediately eye-catching. The layout of the text and general design is very well finished. Although i see this design working more towards television - possibly for an ident, i still feel its a good piece to work from.

Domino Records

Domino Recording company, generally known as Domino Records is an independent record label based in London. There is also a wing of the label based in the USA in the Brooklyn offices. Domino Records was founded in 1993 by Laurence Bell and Jacqui Rice who cater for solo artists, bands and groups in the Indie rock/pop genre. 2003 saw the label's 10th anniversary - there were a number of new releases, as well as a compilation album and a series of gigs in London under the 'Worlds of Possibility' Banner, to celebrate the label's first decade in October of that year.

Domino Records has worked with big artists in the Indie world and remains a huge success as far as record labels are concerned. Working with artists such as:

• The Arctic Monkeys
• The Fall
• These New Puritans
• Four Tet
• The Kills
• Franz Ferdinand
• The Last Shadow Puppets

The record label works with well known artists and I feel they need a more themed logo.

Coke and D&G Advertisements

Coca Cola have got a reputation for producing brilliant advertising campaigns - from billboards to television commercials. Below are a couple of my personal favorites. On the right is the ad which uses illustrated characters - characters are a good safe way to gain customers and recognition - and although these are simple and minimal they communicate a fun tone of voice with an open audience.

The example on the right is very clever and eye catching. It is all pulled together with a great layout design. I love the idea behind an operating machine to make a bottle of coke. This is a nice concept - however it would not suite the style or tone of voice or Bacardi.

Dolce & Gabbana always have very sexually based advertisements. The examples above are no exception. In these examples you could argue some of them illustrate rape and abuse ... this is a tone of voice and style me and Andy do not really wish to replicate .. due to Bacardi's breif asking for a 'flirty' tone of voice .. not rape.

Brand Advertisments 2

Jack Daniels is a well known whisky brand with its own unique identity when it comes to advertisements. I will be later posting up some of the tv commercials JD have produced, however at the minute, i want to look at their billboard and poster ads. Straight away it is obvious that JD wish to solely advertise the drink, how its meausured and what it looks like. The ads always tend to be dark, the only mix of colour coming from the whisky in the bottle and the drop shadow in the picture.

While doing my research, i found other brands of whisky had the same idea when it came to advertising campaigns. Dark background with the only colour coming from the type and image. Very eye catching ad, but could become tedious to the viewer once its been seen more than 3 times.

Brand Advertisments

Smirnoff do some very inspirational ads. I love the piece below because of its use of type, image and layout. Its very eye catching and sticks in the viewers memory. Both me and Andy had several concepts which developed from viewing this piece however - we feel a more illustrated label would represent Bacardi better.

The above billboard/poster advertisements for Smirnoff are very affective. The tone of voice is flirty, mysterious and some what dark. My personal favorite is the top left example. It is simple and affective. And it is such a simple image ... fantastic.