Brand & Website Launch | Ginny Filer Photography
I had the pleasure of meeting Ginny last spring when she took photos of me and my husband. Ginny does beautiful work, so I was super excited when she contacted me about updating her brand and website. I couldn’t wait to help display her gorgeous art in a minimalistic, authentic way.
Her photos are full of life, emotion and details. (And from the amount of images I’ve seen, it seems as though she never puts her camera down!) It’s very clear how passionate Ginny is about photography and capturing life’s most important moments. It’s been a true joy to work with her over these past several weeks.
I’m super excited to celebrate Ginny Filer Photography today as she launches an all new brand and website! Here are some of the details from our design process.
The first step of my branding process is client assignments. I invite every client to share in a google folder, which includes a few questionnaires and instructions for them to complete
In Ginny’s client assignment, she used these words to describe her business: Warm, natural, light, fun, genuine, timeless, simple
I knew I wanted to keep the main focus on Ginny’s photographs, and maintain a lot of white space on her website. I also knew I wanted to go with more muted colors, to keep the timeless, natural vibe.
Here’s a look at the inspiration board I put together, using images from Ginny’s portfolio and images we each pulled from Pinterest.
Next, I started sketching and brainstorming logo concepts.
Once I had several solid ideas, I hopped into Adobe Illustrator and started designing. I always start the design process in black and white, and then move into color.
Here are the black and white logo concepts I presented to Ginny.
She chose option 2, which I was secretly happy about.
This particular design left me with tons of options for secondary logos and submarks. I had a lot of fun coming up with the details and design elements of this brand. Here’s a look at the final brand style guide.
Next up was to create social media branding, an email signature and a social share template (a Photoshop template for Ginny to use across social media platforms). I put together banner images for Facebook and Twitter, as well as profile images and app icons.
Email signature
Social media share template
Once all the branding and social media pieces were complete, I started on the website design.
I begin the website design process by creating a sitemap and deciding which pages to place specific information. Next, I create a wireframe using InDesign to determine the general design direction. After that, I start sifting through all the different Squarespace templates. I compare features and capabilities of each template to decide which one will be the best fit for my client. I chose the Montauk template for Ginny’s site.
Here's a look at her final website! Be sure to check out her live site here and contact Ginny for any of your photography needs!
View www.ginnyfilerphotography.com live!
I asked Ginny a few questions after the process and here were a few of her responses:
What was your favorite part about working with me? Why?
"Um, pretty much everything. It was SO nice to have someone equally invested in thinking about my business, my brand, my clients, my image, etc...It’s been just me thinking about that for so long, it was a breath of fresh air to have another perspective. I love that you took the time to ask the right questions up front and really get to know my business and goals."
"Also the clear timelines and calendar and what you needed from me was so helpful. I also felt in the “know” of where we were in the process and what to expect."
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What was your biggest fear before hiring me? Did that fear come true—why or why not?
"Honestly it’s a big investment, so my fear was “is it really worth the cost and could I really just do this myself? Am I just being lazy?” And I learned that it is absolutely worth hiring the expert. 110%. I could have never dealt with the back and forth with Wordpress, setting up everything properly and just the professional design eye. I feel set up for success moving forward and saved me SO much time trying to figure it out on my own and it would have been so much worse had I tried to do it myself!"
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What surprised you the most throughout the process?
"How quickly you “got” my brand and what I was looking for. I felt like I really didn’t have any major edits or revisions or negative reaction to anything you presented. And the gift box at the end was a sweet and thoughtful surprise! :) "
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If you were to recommend Casi Long Design to a friend, what would you say?
"She’s invested in getting to know you and what you need, she’s efficient, thorough, creative, professional and on time!! Not to mention does beautiful design work!"
Do you have a business in need of a new brand or website? I’d love to work with you! Visit my services page to learn more about my packages, pricing or design process. To view more of my work, visit my portfolio, and if you’d like to chat or learn more, feel free to contact me here!