Hip Hop Backstage

Client
Conceptual

Year
2019, 2023

Hip Hop Backstage (HHB) is a conceptual YouTube channel/show that analyzes and covers news in the underground Hip Hop community. While most of today’s popular Hip Hop brands focus solely on mainstream rap, HHB does the opposite and focuses in more on the underground scene, which is the true heartbeat of the art form.

With today’s style of mainstream ‘hip hop‘ or rap dominating the psyche of many, HHB is dedicated to making underground rap primary, while still having space to recognize some of the good happening in the mainstream as well.

This Project is ongoing.

Art Direction
Hi-Tone Images

In addition to covering news, HHB aims to keep true ‘Hip-Hop Heads’ in the know, through interviews with artists, producers, managers etc., as well as regular album reviews & previews.

Hip Hop Backstage graphics gackage

Producer, Editor
Hi-Tone Images

Trademark/Title + Identity Brief

Origin sketches

From the jump, I knew I wanted to weave Hip Hop’s foundational roots into the title & branding as much as possible. My starting point would be color [crazy enough] this time ‘round. The concept in my head was Hip-Hop’s beginning, being built out of the need to escape the daily trials of 1970s South Bronx, NY poverty and authoritative oppression. Visually, this made me consider shades of blue to represent such. Meanwhile, I also began thinking of the classic elements (MCing, DJing, B-boying, Graffiti, Knowledge). I figured I could feature at least a couple of them, and allow the rest to exist organically.

Below, you can see where my sketches lean in the direction of graffiti.

Typography

With most classical graffiti worldwide, there’s usually two components: 1) the mural and 2) the ‘Tag.‘ I figured I could echo that look in the title, if only I could find a legible, eye-easy script typeface! After searching through some options, Dead Stock seemed to be a nice cross between scribble and cursive, to which I was a huge fan. Meanwhile, Arena Black would serve as a strong, legible ‘mural‘ font.

Primary

Secondary

Color Palette

As mentioned earlier, I began by exploring shades of blue [based on my theme], but it later led me to open things up and make the color palette more dynamic. By doing so, I could represent the vibrant ascension of Hip-Hop.

Logo/Style Explorations

Building off the graffiti sketches from earlier, I decided to take a stab at some vector shapes and type lockups, later arriving at what we see below.

After refining things a few times, I’d almost committed to iteration 3 [below] because it was fresh, new and ballsy. But in the end, I thought against going too left-field and committed to the final result we see. The Arena Black and Dead Stock fonts worked well together to represent a graffiti mural in this sense, so the decision was easy.

Iteration 1

Iteration 2

Iteration 3

Final Result (white)

Final Result (black)

Style Explorations

Once I’d had the Hip Hop Backstage trademark/title established, I decided to reuse the Arena Black font in the below style frames, to help convey the show’s segments. The embedded grunge texture on the trademark/title differentiates the two.

Lastly, continuing off the color scheme discussed above, it helped me place the segments in their proper codes: News & information > Blue; Interviews & live events > Green; Reviews & analysis > Grey

Style frame 1

Style frame 2

Style frame 3

Style frame 4

Broadcast Modules

Rounding out the Hip Hop Backstage Identity system would be looping TV-monitor backgrounds, social media idents and exclusive segment full screens.

Repurposing the trademark/title [with it’s cooperative geometry] as shown below reminded me that I’d made the right choice earlier in going to the Arena Black, rather than the customized graffiti font.

Hip Hop Backstage looping background 1

Hip Hop Backstage looping background 2

Hip Hop Backstage Ident 1

Hip Hop Backstage Ident 2

Hip Hop Backstage ‘Lyric Analytics’ full-screen

Hip Hop Backstage ‘Album Review‘ full-screen

Animated Modules

Once the static component of Hip Hop Backstage’s system was set, it made putting together the motion-based assets below much easier. If the show does eventually launch, we have a plethora of options to explore, in regards to updates or new concepts within the established brand parameters.

Hip Hop Backstage Show Open