Out of Place
Out of Place | Visual identity for a documentary on Limerick's DIY music scene
The visual identity and motion design treatment for the film needed to communicate and reflect the DIY nature in which this film was created. The result was a raw, unpolished finish with easily recognisable and memorable elements that embodied the Limerick music scene and capitalise on the established visual lexicon of punk and underground music.
Created by the cultural collective, Féile Na Gréine, the film is a meditation on the role music plays in building community and explores the tensions that emerge when musicians struggle to carve out a space for themselves in their city.
A DIY approach
This film acted as a portrait of a community, a place, and a documentation of process. Throughout the multi-year filming process we built a large collection of still photography ranging from behind-the-scenes shots, portraiture, and urban landscape photography. These were captured on analog cameras and the development process was represented in the final film, mirroring the handmade, DIY nature of the film itself. These images juxtaposed the creativity of community and the privatisation of urban land, a central tension explored in the film.
These artefacts created while filming were the central backbone for the visual identity and motion identity of this project. Analog photography, and the flaws found on film emulsion, were scanned and used extensively in the credit sequence. We animated these elements in a manner that emphasises the development process of analog film, with images coming into focus and sharp transitions between images negatives and positives, with a heavy dose of dancing grain.
We developed a bespoke character set for the artist titles made from electrical tape. While filming we noticed that electrical tape is used extensively within live music spaces to tie cables down, create impromptu directional signage and it is even used on drum-kits to dampen sound. Using this material we created condensed letterforms that would tower above audiences in a cinema-context, thus giving maximum prominence to the stars of this film, the artists. The credit sequence was set to a thumping electro track by Limerick Artists Naive Ted and Citrus Fresh.
All the supportive motion elements were tied together with a dramatic colour palette of black, white and fluorescent green, green being the county colour. This created standout in the motion design but also fed into all other aspects of the film release, with venue RGB lights set to green, posters Xeroxed on fluro-green paper, and even the soundtrack, which was released on a glowing green cassette.
The film was accepted in film festivals in Ireland, England and the US, and was nominated for Best Documentary in Irish Film Festival London 2022, before setting out on a sold-out tour across Ireland in 2023.
