Tasha Dreadon
Vibrant brands are my jam.
Vibrant brands for creatives? There’s nothing I’d rather do.
Tasha’s work already spoke for itself –
Our job, was ensuring her brand did too.
“I had been following Brie for a long time, because in one of my many newborn photographer groups somebody had talked about Pixel & Ink. I started following her on Facebook®, and I kind of had her in the back of my mind for probably a solid year and a half before I was really ready to take the leap and hire somebody to build me a website. I had been trying to do so on my own, and it really wasn’t going where I wanted it to, and it wasn’t reaching the clients that I wanted it to. So I finally took the jump and met with Brie. I had spoken to a couple of other web designers, but Brie was the only one that offered to do a video chat, which is great, because like five minutes into it I could tell that we were vibing, and I was pretty confident that she was going to do what I needed her to do. As soon as we started the design process, she asked me to send her all of my favorite pictures that I’d ever taken, and then she got to work on creating the color scheme. Right away she got me exactly what I wanted. Very very few tweaks. I actually sent her a picture of my wallpaper that I put up in my house, as some inspiration, and what she came up with was like, perfect. It was very evocative of what my brand is all about really, which is like, freezing time, because children grow so fast. It was perfect for what I wanted my brand to convey, and the point that I was trying to get across to clients. And she also included all of these gorgeous hand-drawn elements that I can use for branding across all of my platforms, and a bunch of IG® templates that were really great. She really just helped me to sort of elevate my brand, but also helped me to see the beauty in my work, and that my work was elevated after she created what she calls the little ecosystem for my work on the internet, which was great. She answers all the questions I have, and was really responsive the entire time, and great to work with.”
Building Tasha’s presence:
We started with her branding.
Of course, starting with her branding meant going through the first stages of my Embodied Brand © process. We identified that the feelings Tasha wanted her clients to have when they were engaging with her work, were both tones of comfort, and welcoming openness, while still establishing her work as a luxury service.
As our first step together, we had a quick video call, just to kind of start ourselves off. The absolute FIRST thing I noticed about Tasha, was how incredibly fun she was. So along with that welcoming, comfortable, luxury… I wanted to make sure that her fun, energetic mood came across clearly in her brand content as well.
For photographers and creatives, I always start with your work as the basis for sourcing your colour palette. That’s how we ensure that your branding makes your work feel natural, like it’s in an ecosystem all its own, since that’s what we’re really building: an ecosystem. So, for Tasha, my process looked exactly like that! I curated a folder of her work that exemplified her skill, and worked those into a mood board that I could pull predominant colours from, so that when we implemented things on her site, it would feel like her images made sense there.
This was also one of the inspirations behind the florals used in her presence! Believe it or not, Tasha’s brand didn’t begin as a floral based brand. It started with the image of a crystal trapped in a jar – representing the crystalization and stoppage of time when you snap an image. But throughout the branding process, I communicate with my clients actively, so that we can ensure what I’m building lines up with what you’re envisioning. And the jar concept didn’t make it to the final drafts!
Instead, we moved toward delicate, but energetic floral components, that pair incredibly elegantly with the tiny details of the newborn imagery that is Tasha’s focus as a photographer.
For Tasha’s presence specifically, I knew from the beginning I wanted to include hand drawn elements that she could use anywhere online. So I created a set of illustrations that toed the line between delicate, and energetic, once we’d transitioned to using the floral concept as a base for the branded imagery!
One of my favorite elements of the brand for Dreadon Studios, is the fact that her palette is so wide. It spans all the way from a rich mustard, to a deep magenta pulled directly from gorgeous maternity imagery. I absolutely LOVE getting to work with gem tones like these, especially when they’re also used in subtle textures to add to presences. These wide palettes break the rules in a sense. They feel like they shouldn’t be specific enough. They feel like they shouldn’t work. They feel like they should create cognitive dissonance for those looking at the presence, because there’s just so much going on – but this couldn’t be further from the case, especially for photographers and creatives.
This comes down to the style of your work. If you work with a wide range of colours, but your brand doesn’t mirror that… THAT’S where you start to cause cognitive dissonance.
The Marketing Tools:
We got INTEGRATIVE with Instagram® –
I’m absolutely obsessed with Instagram, and creating tools that make maintaining a social media presence easy. And when it comes to Instagram, one of the most difficult elements of maintaining a presence that doesn’t take hours and hours of your time… is having a starting point for your visual content. So, we built that for Tasha!
She came away with not only IG® post templates, but also Story templates, and Story Highlight templates! This means that no matter what she wants to post, she has tools to speed up her process.
But that wasn’t all:
Tasha did some badass shit –
Once I’d created her social media marketing tools, Tasha actually took things one step further! This is something I absolutely, 110% LOVE to see from my clients. When you take the thing I’ve created, and repurpose it into something new, fun, and helpful for your business. What Tasha did, was took her IG® Highlight images, as well as some of her social templates, and TURNED THOSE INTO STICKERS AND PRINTABLES!!
Seriously, I cannot emphasize enough to you how super fucking cool it is to get images like this from my clients:
Our final task was Tasha’s Website
And I’m thrilled with the outcome!
I wish I had a full before and after,
But I got too excited to build the new one and forgot to take “before” shots!
Our priority when we put together the new site, was ensuring that it creates an ecosystem for her work. No matter what image is placed on the page, from what session, it will look natural, and effective in the context of the page. I personally think we did an impeccable job – but go ahead and take a peek at the live site, to see for yourself!
Branding Design
Your brand should create an ecosystem for your work, no matter what you do. Your business should settle into the expanse of your branding - naturally, like magic. Making client conversion, EASY.
WEB DESIGN
Your website should be a lead generation powerhouse. Your ideal clients? They should feel at home there. This is where we put your brand to work for you.
Information about 1:1 support
Sometimes accountability is key, and having someone over your shoulder, making sure you're taking the steps you need to take is what makes the difference!
