The Branding

The Lucid Nap Logo

 

    Bread, why bread? Why in all the world did I decide that the logo for my company should be a loaf of bread, with a heart and an N toasted on to the front? More importantly, why yellow of all colours?

    Well, the bread part is easy. The very first piece I had any kind of success with was my comic book series "Lost Bread". 

I'm the brunette.

 

    I've mentioned it before in other blog posts, but the name comes from the French term for French Toast or Pain Perdu (Lost Bread). I went with that odd title, because the stories in "Lost Bread" take place in the dream world of the lead character, Napoleon Doom. 

     In these dreams, Napoleon pieces together a past they have forgotten, and discovers there are strange creatures keeping watch over them in the dreamscape. One of these creatures, a spirit guide of sorts, appears in the form of Meg Ryan (since Napoleon is more invested in movies than in real life.) Meg and Napoleon, in the series, are always linked by the colour yellow. This even carried over to the Creeping Wave Radio audiodrama.

I'm the ginger now.

 The first story cycle in "Lost Bread" comes to an end when Napoleon is awoken for breakfast, which is of course, Pain Perdu.

    If you look in the right hand corner of this piece, you'll see my signature. It's an open heart, with an N inside. Together, the heart and the N form the initials of my nom de plume, Napoleon Doom, or ND.      

    The heart shape, especially the open heart, has always been a sort of obsession of mine. Hearts in general, be they sacred, anatomical, or the valentine's variety just have a very satisfying shape to my eye. I remember being chastised when I was younger for dotting my i's with hearts...maybe employing them as my signature is an act of rebellion! 💛

    More than that I love the symbology of the heart and the bread together. Bread is symbolic of sustenance for the body and heart is symbolic of the more mystical, unseen workings. The heart pumps blood, but has also been attributed to love (she's stolen my heart), intuition (my heart knows its true) and memory (I know it by heart!) 

    That last one is descended from the Ancient Egyptians, who believed it was the heart, not the brain that governed the body. They held the organ in such high esteem that it was the heart which was weighed by Anubis in order to gain entry into the afterlife. If your heart weighed more than a feather of Maat (the winged personification of truth) then you were not granted passage and would instead be devoured by Ammit (a goddess with the head of a crocodile, the forelimbs and torso of a lion and the legs and posterior of a hippopotamus.) 

    Catholicism also applies a great mysticism to the bread (the body of Christ) and the blood of Christ (wine) during the communion ceremony. Blood of course being what the heart pumps through the body.

    The colour yellow has always been significant to me in that it is so loud and garish, just like I am (without really trying.) I've always had a love for yellow and red, because they were the colours that simply could not be ignored! 

   In Lost Bread, Creeping Wave Radio and U Mind, yellow is symbolic of Napoleon and those connected to that character, and red is symbolic of Old Scratch, their boss. In my artwork for The U Mind Podcast, which now features heavily on my web page, I work in either stark black and white, or grayscale. The only colours invited are yellow and red. I think it gives a very crisp, graphic style to both the website and the short animations I've created for The U Mind.

    

    My artwork for Creeping Wave is more painterly, because it's done exclusively as cover art for each episode. Still, I kept with yellow and red for the logo.

    My business cards, promo materials, website and animations all keep with the black, white, yellow and red colour scheme. The art I use for the page header images is always very stark and graphic. I like the contrast it creates when people look at my more traditional prints.

    The three different series all have their own individual style as well. Lost Bread uses very bright colours. The stories begin in a crisp, retro comics style and slowly evolve to become more realistic as Napoleon comes closer to waking up.

    Creeping Wave episode art, which takes place in the conscious world done more like a traditional art piece. However, the animations that appear at the last season's U Mind Episodes, connecting the two shows, are done in the minimalist colour scheme previously described. This is how I plan to pitch the animated version of Creeping Wave Radio as well.

    The cover art for the U Mind, and any animated sequence that follows into the episode is always either a black and white linework sketch or black, white, yellow and red.

 

    That's my branding. It's easily recognizable, hard to ignore and holds a deeper symbolism that makes it meaningful to me!