Balanced Impact - Brand Illustrations

Balanced Impact
Brand Illustrations

Balanced Impact, a digital marketing training and advisory firm, contacted me in 2024. They were in the process of a comprehensive rebrand, and were looking for an illustrator to develop visually compelling brand assets to support their new brand vision.

Getting to know the brand & the brief

The rebrand was to be rooted in the adventurous concept of ‘The Digital Marketing Navigator’, to symbolise the company as a trusted sherpa, guiding clients toward their digital marketing goals. The rebrand would hinge on creativity, strategy, and collaboration, ensuring Balanced Impact's messaging is as effective as their services.

Key considerations:

Important visual elements for the illustrations included:

A unified colour palette: shades of Balanced Impact Blue, Jungle Green, and Lifeboat Orange, symbolising trust, growth, and vibrancy.

‘Ligne claire’ style illustrations: inspired by Tintin comics, these illustrations use clear, strong lines and vibrant colours to evoke a sense of clarity and adventure. Luckily, this is already a style I mirror in my own way.
Diverse characters: representing inclusivity through varied genders, races, and abilities, reinforcing the brand’s collaborative ethos.

I took the elements above into account during the creation of 10 bespoke icons, 13 small illustrations, and 20 larger comic illustrations. Each of these assets was to be suitable for use in print, on web, social channels, training materials, and internal and external documents.

Comic Illustration in linge clare style. A bearded man measuring space on a paper map, demonstrating something to a younger guy next to him. The backdrop is the inside of a bright red tent. Professional illustrator Oldmangrey aka Graeme Clark.

Comic Illustration in linge clare style. Four people inside a deep brown cave, with one bent down opening a treasure chest. All dressed in different bright colours, light coming in from the cave entrance. Professional illustrator Oldmangrey aka Graem

Comic Illustration in linge clare style. A bearded man abseiling down the side of a white mountain with more in the background beneath a deep blue sky and red orange sun. Professional illustrator Oldmangrey aka Graeme Clark.

The Process

Following initial discussions, I drew up concept illustrations for the main staff characters who were to feature throughout the rebrand drawings. It’s important to get this stage right, as the characters are integrated into every part of the user journey. The team were able to review and amend to ensure we were aligned on the foundations of colours, illustration structures, style and priorities, before beginning the project in full.

We also agreed a structured timeline to ensure we were aligned on deliverables, a period for review and amends, and ultimately ensure that the overall project concluded in line with the company’s website relaunch.

Each illustration was drawn on the iPad Pro , allowing me to build the compositions in layers, so that I could supply the clients with components as individual assets, to be easily used across a range of materials. It’s important to create assets that can outlive the initial project scope, so I kept key contact to ensure that assets were as versatile as possible. You never know if an asset designed for a webpage will one day live on a billboard.

The iconography also had an added element, whereby the 10 icons needed to be supplied as vectors, so that they could be scaled up or down to meet any print spec or digital solution. All other illustrations were large format raster illustrations, to allow the same versatility but keep hand drawn cues.

Final Illustrations

One of the great things about being an illustrator is building worlds, that encompass characters, locations, objects, and humour. This project was a perfect example of world building, and allowed me to become familiar with the set of characters building out their personalities in line with conversations with the client about those people. This allows the illustrations to feel more connected to the client, and more believable to theirs.

The role of illustration is often to soften corporate communications, and this was very true for this project. Balancing creativity with functionality to translate complex marketing strategies into simple, visual concepts, was achieved through the use of the ligne claire style. I also had to ensure brand consistency across a diverse range of materials, and did this using a unified colour palette and consistent line weight to provide uniformity. Meeting these challenges through illustration has allowed Balanced Impact to more powerfully communicate their dynamic offering.

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. A blue Land Rover driving away from us down a dirt track toward a white mountain range. Professional illustrator Graeme Clark aka Oldmangrey.

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. A lady in a turquoise jacket looking surprised & waving her left hand in the air. She's on a white mountain range with deep blue sky in the background. Professional illustrator Graeme Clark aka Oldmang

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. Three people making their way up a white mountain range with deep blue sky in the background. Professional illustrator Graeme Clark aka Oldmangrey.

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. A bearded man in a blue jacket looking through binoculars He's on a white mountain range with deep blue sky in the background. Professional illustrator Graeme Clark aka Oldmangrey.

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. Four people on a plateau of a white mountain range, sitting around a fire, with deep blue night sky in the background. Professional illustrator Graeme Clark aka Oldmangrey.

Digital comic illustration in linge clare style. A bearded man in a blue jacket standing on the peak of a white mountain with a deep blue sky with clouds in the background. He's holding a large red flag in his right hand, his left hand raised in a tr

"It was a pleasure working with Graeme. He truly brought our brand vision to life with his creative and imaginative illustrations. His work will be the star of our website and marketing materials, giving our brand a strong, memorable identity. From start to finish, Graeme was professional, attentive, and reliable. His years of experience in design and illustration were evident in his work. We look forward to collaborating with him again in the future and would happily recommend him to others."