by Setting out to reject fintech stereotypes, Studio Morfar designed an identity featuring illustrations by Liam Cobb to set True Altitude apart.
Global creative agency Studio Morfar has rebranded startup consultancy True Altitude with a “psychedelic, surrealist” identity featuring a minimal, stamp-like logotype and “Japanese woodblock style” artwork.
True Altitude invests in technology startups to help them grow and upgrade their businesses. According to Torsten Power, founder and creative director of Studio Morfar, he describes his customer approach as “skin in the game” that is hands-on and an essential part of his brand identity.
While True Altitude primarily works with tech and finance startups, Power says the studio wants to move away from “the clichéd blue and green web pages with a 3D rocket launch graphic or stock photos of businessmen shaking hands” often associated with fintech. brands. Instead, the identity was bolstered by a drawing of a mountain scene that “represents the uphill battle building a start-up,” according to the studio created by British illustrator Liam Cobb.
Cobb is behind the illustrations for the American Netflix animated series Midnight Gospel, which features a “space wheel” like a podcaster traveling through strange universes he has created to interview his guests. Power says he called Cobb after watching the show because he thought his “psychedelic, surrealist style” would help set True Altitude different on the market.
Power says Studio Morfar should think most viewers will be “older users with more corporate backgrounds,” so the team is conscious that it won’t alienate anyone by “pushing it in a very crazy direction.” He adds that while Cobb’s style is “beautifully unique” and somewhat futuristic, it also “strangesly resembles the old Japanese woodblock style”, lending a “nostalgic” familiarity to the identity of True Altitude.
Power says the new logo mark refers loosely to Cobb’s drawings with a “minimal, flake-like depiction” of a mountain. Studio Morfar realized that the existing logo sign he had designed earlier was too abstract. Feedback showed that some people didn’t understand what it was, so the redesign took a more real route.
According to Power, the studio prioritized warmth when it came to True Altitude’s color palette, choosing off-white instead of bright white for the background color. Other colors used in the ID are black for readability and the “warm red tone” that Cobb uses as an “emphasis shade” in the illustrations.
For the titles and primary text, Studio Morfar chose Colophon Foundry’s Grenette Pro. Produced by the Indian Type Foundry, Poppins was chosen for its readability for paragraphs, buttons, and annotations.
Power says Studio Morfar also designed True Altitude’s website with a focus on keeping everything “super clear, simple and effective.” He adds that there are occasional “pleasure elements”, such as “a beautifully animated parallax effect in the hero mountains” that moves with the cursor. For corporate users accustomed to Word documents, email, and spreadsheets, Power describes its website as “a visual breather designed for fun.”
Power says agencies and freelancers are “often not interested in working with more corporate companies,” because they see less opportunity for creativity. Rather, he thinks, “constraints and a good challenge always produce better creators in the end.”
True Altitude’s new identity is made available on its website, stationery, apparel, social media and ads.
