Introducing the Babel Frame: Our New Brand Identity
The film frame
Some of our more observant students may have noticed that the letters “b” and “l” in our original logo form the edges of a film frame.
This was indeed our intent; while objects like the film camera 🎥, film strip 🎞, and clapperboard 🎬 are all quick to suggest “filmmaking,” they are ultimately not how our students relate to the cinema today, so we try to avoid using them in our representation of film.
The film frame, on the other hand, is as relevant today as it was in the early days of cinema, and will continue to be so well into the future—even as the ways we watch and make films change drastically.
Today, with the launch of our new blog, we are excited to share our refreshed brand identity with a logo that puts the film frame front and center.
Our new logo, called the Babel Frame, takes the capital letter “B” as a starting point, and uses the frame edges from our original logo to form two new frames on their own, which then combine to form a wider frame in the center.
A little bit of film history
The aspect ratios of these frames contain a little bit of film history: the two outer frames measure 4:3, while the center frame measures 16:9. These correspond respectively to the aspect ratios of the first films ever made, and to most of the footage we shoot on our mobile devices today.
“Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory” is one of the first films ever made, shot in France in 1895
A clip from our first film production by students at Renaissance College, Hong Kong in 2018
This use of two historical aspect ratios to form a recognizably modern one is in line with the design of our filmmaking programs: while we use the newest technologies to make filmmaking accessible to our students, our approach is largely informed by film history and theory.
Humanistic approach to technology
But more than this technical trivia, the Babel Frame emphasizes our company’s humanistic approach to technology. If you ask any of our students how they are taught to frame a shot, they will respond that it is their hands they use first, rather than the camera.
At Babel Film Workshop, we believe that the practice of filmmaking is uniquely positioned in between the humanities and technology, providing students with an unparalleled opportunity to approach technology by celebrating what makes them human.
Above all, the Babel Frame is designed to resemble the hands of our students as they frame their shots. This frame is among the first things we teach our students, and is not always as intuitive as it looks. With our new logo, we hope that it can serve an additional practical purpose, and give students a visual pointer on how to use their hands as a frame.
We can’t wait to share the Babel Frame with our students in the classroom!
Special thanks to Charmaine Da Costa for contributing to our logo design.