Rebuilding a Brand Identity
In taking the next steps in reevaluating an established application is dissecting the brand identity specifically and how it ties the app altogether in unity or lack thereof. When analyzing what needs to be changed, designers usually look at several items: the colors, UI style symbols, and buttons, typography, logotypes, and tone of voice throughout the application.
When redesigning the TV Time user interface, I experimented with three different designs or overall aesthetics. I wanted to step away from the dark and overwhelming color scheme of black and yellow and explore the many options that I was inspired by based on different eras in television. For the first branding redesign, I wanted users to feel like they were transported to a day in the 80s when they opened and began using the application.
There is no shortage of colors being considered for the color scheme because I took inspiration from the iconic tv glitch we all know and love, which represents many colors that are bright and eye-catching. The typeface chosen for this branding idea is called Silom, which is a more legible version of the classic glitchy typeface that has been recreated many times over the years. I wanted to incorporate more glitchy elements through the type but didn’t want to compromise the legibility and message quality of the product, so I kept the glitch style elements within the UI symbols.
Compared to the other brand redesign concepts, the UI symbol style is intentionally a bit bulkier and bolder as well as keeping the edges and small pixelized elements to signify the era we’re trying to emulate with the application design. The tone of voice signals to this as well with the use of catchphrases and decade-correct verbiage to entice the user and bring them into the application to explore.
On the other end of the design spectrum, I wanted to emulate the popular mobile application designs of today’s age, the slim icons, the simple typefaces that are easily legible and look equally professional in most situations, mainly keeping to the safer route design-wise and not taking any risks while trying to create a new brand image.
I did want to take a step forward and choose bold and nonuniform colors to draw in the consumers with warm and cool colors that are rarely chosen to blend in unison. I often see cool colors such as blues, purples, and darker greens being used in UI/UX application development, and I wanted to take a piece of that and run with it to see if it could be successful within the parameters of my redesign and overall functionality of the app.
The tone being incorporated in this version of the brand identity redesign is similar to many applications on the market currently, regardless of what they’re promoting or what category they fit into. I wanted to keep the ton simple to let the users be able to focus on the content they want to log into the application and keep track of, as the original UI/UX design was intended to do.
In the final brand redesign, I had the idea to combine both ends of the design spectrum and allow them to blend to create an all-new concept in today’s application market. I wanted to shy away from popular typefaces and incorporate a more rounded design, such as the All-Round Gothic, into the design to allow some users to feel a sense of familiarity when using the application due to the association with previous eras of television.
The complete color scheme and design of the UI symbols are a direct result of combining both the design aesthetics of previous decades and current popular styles in the industry. They produced symbols with a wider stroke than the more modern design to appeal to every user, so they’re able to identify the icon when using the app and using a color scheme that blends well together but is not often seen alongside each other because they are cool and warm hue variants of basic colors on the color wheel but are still intriguing enough to draw in the user to want to interact with the interface.