Forge Features

FORGE Features is a (theoretical) independent film company that makes innovative and ground-breaking films. The goal of this project was to start with an idea of a film company, name it, and develop a solid identity for it including naming, logo development, animation and packaging..

Name Presentation

FORGE is an elegant name surprisingly not taken by any existing film companies. The name has no strong negative connotations, is easy to pronounce, very flexible for subsiduaries, and the positive connotations are many.

The double entendre serves to form a powerful name with an already aggressive sound: the literal "forge" requires force, and this word strikes a memory in the viewer. It's one syllable, it's memorable, and it's effective.

Thankfully, FORGE is a common word that's both easy to pronounce and impactful enough to remember. It really is surprising that it's not taken just yet–the only company that occupies the sole name FORGE is a feminist group. The combination of "Features" into the name applies the concept of alliteration to a name that may otherwise be too aggressive--changing a good (if not too extreme) concept into an even better one.

The name remains flexible as well: with one syllable the name is ripe for the formation of subsidiaries: Art Forge, Music Forge, could be two examples of independent subsidiaries focused on developing or publishing works of art.

FORGE FEATURES is an impactful and simple name that functions aggressively but remains somewhat friendly. It combats other film companies to get placement in someone's mind, and implies a robust company with robust works.

Logo Work

The vector logo for FORGE FEATURES is clean while remaining aggressive. Although the vector logo would ideally only be used in press kits and otherwise, it's impactful enough to stand out among a crowd.

The dramatic perspective of the logo lends itself easily to animation in addition to a uniqueness for the company. Especially in movies, cinematography is all about angles and editing--creativity in how you depict something. That sentiment carries over to the logo as well, and instead of looking down at a logo from a straight-on perspective it instead applies a more realistic (and voyeuristic, another important point in filming) approach to the artifact of the logo.

Animation

The core of the project was developing a "film bumper" reel. Every production company has a (typically) 20 second spot they play to introduce the movie. Mine was personally developed with an industrial feel in mind, taking sounds from Eric Brosius' design for the game "Thief: the Dark Project" mixed down with found sounds of my own. The video was originally created by masking two images in Flash, and then finalized in Motion, a part of the Final Cut Studio/ProTools package.