cahan’s pix

STOCK: YRC WORLDWIDE, ANNUAL REPORT
This annual report, a STEP Design 100 winner (see page 69 for more), featured a theme of “Going Places,” which led the designers to feature a series of images of places where YRC, one of the world’s largest transportation services providers, goes. Showing the complexity and diversity of each location was important. Cahan & Associates felt that black-and-white images worked better with YRC’s brand color palette. “Stock photography was a perfect solution for this job,” says designer Sharrie Brooks. “There was no budget to fly all over the world, rent helicopters, hope that [good] weather prevails and get a perfect shot each time … [especially] with the tight schedule we had. We did a lot of searching to find the best images, and it paid off.”

ORIGINAL: HERMAN MILLER’S SEE
This is a spread from “Building Balance” in Herman Miller’s See magazine. The article examines four architectural case studies that present thoughts on balance—Past/Future, Natural/Artificial, Old/New, Temporary/ Permanent. Cahan & Associates used the ancient art form of rock balancing as a metaphor for the theme. “Many stock photographs exist of this kind of art form. To get away from the spiritual cliché of rocks piled in nature, we decided to bring the rocks into the photography studio,” notes senior designer Todd Richards. “Through this more studied approach and lighting, you begin to appreciate the expression of gravity from one rock to the other. In hindsight it would have been helpful to introduce another element of scale, as these sculptures varied in height between four and six feet.”
Design firm: Cahan & Associates, www.cahanassociates.com

bynder’s pix

STOCK: UNISOURCE SOLUTIONS BRANDING COLLATERAL
This is a suite of marketing materials—including a website, presentation folder and trade magazine ad—for Unisource Solutions, an office furniture dealer. As part of a complete rebranding, Robert Bynder Design redefined the client’s positioning platform within their industry and introduced the tagline “Welcome to Simple,” a concept based on simplicity in the workplace, using the motifs of meditation, relaxation and focus. “We used stock photography for this part of the project,” says creative director Rob Bynder. “We found this great royalty-free photo of a guy meditating on top of a file cabinet, but we retouched the photo and replaced the original file cabinet with one made by Haworth, which Unisource Solutions is a Preferred Dealer for.” The composite image adheres to the premise of simplicity and reinforces the brand messaging.

ORIGINAL: DREIDEL PARTY KIT
Conceived as a holiday self-promotional piece, the Dreidel Party Kit is being developed into a commercial product by Robert Bynder Design. The kit consists of a deck of cards, each card featuring a different humorous version of how to play the classic Hanukkah game and a dreidel (the little wooden top used in these games). “We pretty much had to do custom photography for this promotion due to the subject matter,” notes Bynder. “The images are intended to be reminiscent of a game and not too stylized. We wanted to the let the props quietly speak for themselves. What else do you need to say when you combine a bottle of whiskey or a pair of thong panties with dreidels?”
Design Firm: Robert Bynder Design, www.bynder.com