After a couple redesigns of their branding over the years, ReAnimator Coffee lost some of the charm that made it unique, at least in my opinion. When I started redesigning ReAnimator Coffee's logos I immediately knew that my main priority would be to bring the fun back. I wanted the logo to communicate that this was a cool place to hang out that wasn't afraid of going against the grain. Ultimately I landed on having the skeletal hand rising out of the coffee and embellishing the cup with a lightning bolt coffee bean, driving home the idea of being "reanimated" by the coffee.
I was able to apply what I've learned in my animation classes about rigging to make animating the hand significantly easier. Going back to basics and using Disney's 12 principles of animation I was able to make the animation feel smooth, snappy, and satisfying.
This is the business card I created. The coffee mug and skull logos gave a similar vibe to tattoo flash sheets to me, so I decided to use stippling to fill the background. Had this been an advertisement I would have eliminated the dots around the name and contact information, but seeing as this is a business card, I decided to prioritize the visual appeal over the quick readability.
Though I was tempted to use a standard coffee brown, I wanted the colors to reflect the playful and quirky qualities of the brand and the logo I had designed, but I also needed to make sure that the hand still read as a skeleton and the bean still read as a coffee bean. I ultimately landed on this orange/green combo which still feels energetic, but also still would be easy to incorporate into the decor of the brands various locations and feel welcoming.
These were the other two concepts I had for the pictorial base of the logo. Though I brought back the logo on the left for the business card, these designs ultimately didn't feel as connected to the coffee element of the brand. That said though, I'm still quite happy with how they turned out.
This is a sampling of some of the sketches from early in the design process. Because I knew I wanted to incorporate the skeleton into the final design, a lot of my sketches were focused on exploring different styles. Though I do have experience in illustration, I typically tend to stay more on the representational and realistic side of the style spectrum, so this was a good challenge to get me out of my comfort zone.
