Regent Street, London

It was a very early start for Paul recently to get down to the capital for the photo-shoot at the recently opened GAP store on Regent Street in London. His task was to art direct the shoot (post bacon sandwich & coffee of course!) for our client Macdonald Joinery & Construction, who were responsible for the entire ‘fit out’ of the new flagship store.

London’s a beautiful place when there’s no one around, well Regent Street anyway (Catford aint so nice)… get there at 5am on a Tuesday to appreciate it’s charm! A good day was had by all, and the shots have come out a treat.

To view the on-going Macdonald project click here.

Gap 1

Gap 2

Gap 3

Gap 4

…D4 make a dentist smile!

We recently completed the shop front of the Stephen Godfrey Dental Care Practice in Dronfield, Derbyshire. Everyone’s happy with the outcome - especially the main man Mr Godfrey.

See the Stephen Godfrey branding project by D4 here, or visit their website (www.sgdc55.com) we did for more info.

Stephen Godfrey 1

Stephen Godfrey 2

A4e Branding Workshops

As a wise American said:

‘If brands exist in people’s heads, as I believe they do, then shouldn’t you be able to ask a whole bunch of people what they think of a brand?’

A4E 1

So we did, last week… on behalf of A4e to be exact. We organised and developed a brand research project - working alongside the A4e marketing department we held focus groups with A4e staff and some of the people who use A4e to get back in to work and/or train in new skills. The objective was to find out exactly what the current A4e brand and communication style meant to them. After all, a brand is defined not by what the company says it is, but what the audience say it is.

A whirlwind of a day ensued, and we visited three A4e offices that best represented the three main areas of practice within the A4e group. We literally bombarded the chosen participants with visuals of lifestyle shots, people, brands, typography, graphic styles, as well as hands-on tasks to get to the bottom of how and what they perceived the brand to be. Obviously, we used the tried and tested method of Penguin biscuits and coffee to coax them along - just a little trick of the trade!

We had amazing and surprising feedback, but invaluable to say the least. We collated the information together for presentation and feedback to the A4e board of directors. Our work has contributed to the development of the rebranding project for the company.

A4E 2

If you want to find out more about D4’s branding workshops and how it will be of benefit to your organisation contact Marianne Lamb, she has lots of Penguin biscuits and coffee she’d love to share!

Richard Wilkinson

D4’s designer and colour guru Anna, recently shared Richard’s website with us, and now he’s officially our favourite illustrator with a brilliant looking website to show it all off.

http://www.richard-wilkinson.com/

Giraffe

We’re delighted to announce the appointment of Clare (Wonder-Woman) Williams

Wonder Woman

Clare has recently moved up from (that) London to join D4 in a business development and account management role. Having previously held various marketing communications and PR roles in London, she comes to D4 with both a freelance and corporate background across a number of industry sectors, in both B2B and B2C environments. We believe Clare’s proven track record, natural ability and love for the job will add real strength in depth to the D4 team and our service offering.

Clare’s a newbie to Sheffield, but has already settled in well, despite originally being a Dorset girl, then London for most of her adult life, she’s also lived and worked in Spain and Brighton.

Clare loves books (to a ridiculous degree), music, dancing and theatre. Clare would ‘Room 101′ cheese & onion crisps, velour tracksuits and wind… of the weather variety.

Little known facts: A part Armenian girl racer with a cheese addiction above and beyond chocolate.
Favourite expression: Mad as a balloon
Favourite thing to do: cook and eat
Most likely to: laugh or cause laughter often at her own expense!

To get in touch with Clare, click here.

D4 Go-Karting Crown lost…

Basically… we were robbed!

After qualifying on pole-position, leading from the front and setting the fastest lap of the race… D4 (the defending champions) were disqualified!

Paul was less than impressed with the controversial decisions “I don’t know why we were disqualified, something about overtaking too many slower karts!”

With 4 unfair penalties, we lost our crown, without them we were on for a guaranteed top spot finish… and some cheap bubbly to spray on the lesser / slower mortals!

We’ve never seen so many sour grapes in the studio.

Go Kart

Latest 3D Imaging Project

Ultracell is the latest innovation to be launched by Fernco Environmental (sister company to Flexseal, the market leader in flexible couplings). The new product forms part of an Underground Stormwater Management System which prevents flooding and harmful effects on the environment. Preparing for the IFAT exhibition (International Trade Fair for the Environmental sector) in Munich last month, our brief was simple - to adopt a creative approach which will illustrate and bring to life the Ultracell system - not an easy task as it consists of black, plastic blocks and pipes connected to each other underground (a tricky subject to photograph!).

We worked closely with the Fernco team to create a 3D computer generated visual of Ultracell to show its application in context and also produced an animation illustrating how the underground system works. We’ll hope you agree the final results have been fantastic - a world apart from the original brief! Both the product and the promotion went down a treat at the exhibition.

We’re delighted to be working with Fernco on promoting their new and existing products. We’re currently developing the new Flexseal website which should be online later this year.

Client Brief

Happy birthday to us!

Here’s a picture of how we’d like our dream birthday cake to look (check out the fella’s fancy tie).
Paul has promised to splash the cash for our significant birthday next year. So with that in mind,
please send in your favourite cake images and/or cake suppliers to Anna. If they’re local, even
better - we’ve got the old carbon footprint to think of !

Happy Birthday!

NEXT Store Photoshoot

We were recently commissioned to photograph the new NEXT store in Middlesex that was built by our client Macdonald Joinery & Construction. This is part of the ongoing branding work we’re doing for them. It’s a job well done by Macdonald’s, so here’s a couple of shots we thought were worth sharing. See more here…

Macdonald 1

Macdonald 2