Mario Madau is a hospitality photographer and cinematographer from Canada who works with clients worldwide. Mario came to Wonderful Machine looking for a complete overhaul of his logo and website to better reflect his work and drive new project opportunities. Since rebranding and revamping his site, we’ve recently welcomed him onboard our roster of member photographers.
Previously his logo reflected that of a stamp and the marks that a letter would accrue while traveling through the postal system. The logo did reflect the idea of travel, which seemed to fit the style of work that Mario generally shoots. Although Mario’s previous logo had some strengths, it had some downfalls as well. The logo and typeface were outdated and inconsistent with the type of work that he was trying to attract. There were distracting and conflicting elements that hindered rather than helped, so we started off getting his logo up to speed.
Previous Logo Current Logo
When you think of hotels and resorts, some words that may come to mind are clean, relaxing, and fun. These were some of the words that helped direct the new logo concept. We wanted to clean up and bring the new mark into the future with a more modern, sans-serif typeface and a simplified mark.
Elements from Mario’s previous logo, like the letters MM, alluded to an interesting monogram-style mark. The combination of the letters into a single symbol mimicked the typeface used. The monogram is contained within a diamond shape (from the Greek translation means ‘something that spins’) felt very fitting for Mario who is in constant motion. Mario works worldwide sharing his talents and is always on the move. This shape implies the concept of travel without a literal translation.
The main color palette that appears throughout the new branding was pulled directly from an image of Mario’s architecture and interior gallery.
Orange and blue were chosen both because of their complementary nature and because of their extensive repetition throughout Mario’s work. Blue reoccurs in subjects including the sky and pristine oceans. This blue is frequently accompanied by orange features such as vibrant sunsets and warm resort lighting.
The new layout of Mario’s site design was based on our Senior Photo Editor, Stacy’s new web edit. Stacy’s edit focused on the work Mario is seeking to attract for future projects. Mario’s previous website design was inadequately showcasing his photographs. One major factor that took away from his beautiful images was that the original site was not responsive for mobile, which is a must these days. Another issue was the black background. Unless the branding calls for it, having a dark background color on a website makes everything seem heavy which, in this case, was the opposite direction. In addition, the navigation was also sporadic, clunky, and confusing at times.
The previous landing page lacked any draw into Mario’s work. The focus of the new site was to catch people’s attention upon arrival through Mario’s work.
With the new landing page, the focus is on one of Mario’s more recent video projects. This video plays immediately upon visiting the site. This gives you a glimpse into the work Mario is currently making, thus, inviting you to continue to view the rest of the site’s content.
Mario’s previous gallery was a side-scrolling view. This can be a great feature but in some cases, for Mario’s work it didn’t make sense. The reason is that the white text of the navigation ‘pops’ against the black background and competes with the images for attention. The focus of image galleries should be on the work and not on the navigation. The entire page felt very heavy without focusing on the photographs.
Upon entering the interior of the site from the landing page, you’re greeted with a clean layout, simple navigation, and a thumbnail list in the first gallery. By removing the initial side-scrolling image gallery and replacing it with a thumbnail view, we get a look at Mario’s work as a whole. The viewer can then dive deeper into each image by expanding them in a lightbox view.
To easily access Mario’s work galleries is simple with the dropdown navigation that shows all of the galleries you can view. The ability to hide portions of the navigation keeps things from getting cluttered.
Mario’s about page lacked enthusiasm. People these days are skeptical to see long blocks of text. The goal here was to get to the essentials. Most of Mario’s previous about page was list of his previous clients, leaving a small blurb about Mario’s previous career as a photographer. This was the content that needed more emphasis on the new page.
The previous “About” page was eliminated entirely and combined into one contact page. The new contact page features Mario’s history in the industry, contact information, and all of his social media links.
The complete overhaul of Mario Madau’s logo and website now reflects the style of his work. His open-minded nature to better himself and his brand was key in driving his work and image into the future. Mario’s site is now live and has a fresh start in 2017!
The site is great! Getting rave reviews.
If you’re interested in a new web template and/or logo for yourself, get in touch!