The Concept Behind KCD Spain Design

Starting a design from scratch is always challenging, but it is even more difficult when you work against the clock.

A month ago, I became part of the KCDSpain organization. A global event for Kubernetes and cloud native lovers, part of the CNCF. But, what is the CNCF?

The Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) is an open source software foundation that promotes the adoption of cloud-native computing. It aims to establish a vendor-agnostic community to collaborate on open source projects.

Among a group of engineers and with so little time left it was difficult not to take the lead in Marketing. So, I picked up my 4 years as an art director and creative advertiser and tried to do magic with my Adobe package.

In these cases, when the event is only two months away, one might think that it would be faster to take a random design, pick a few colors that make the cut, and go for it. Nothing further from the truth. It is better to start from the ground up with a solid concept.

But don’t get me wrong, the concept does not have to be complex or inspirational. In my case I started from two simple premises:

1. The design has to be aligned with the CNCF’s corporate identity. At first glance, it should be clear that though different, both groups are related and belong to the same world, like the latest films in the Disney franchise.
2. The purpose of the KCDSpain is to create an open and inclusive community. The brand has to be able to express that.

Posters of the Disney franchise with the same color palette.

Posters of the Disney franchise with the same symmetry and the use of geometric figures.

2. The purpose of the KCDSpain is to create an open and inclusive community. The brand has to be able to express that.

In advertising agencies they usually say “Bring these concepts down from the clouds”, which means that you have to use tangible examples that represent what you want to communicate.

In this case, after evaluating the CNCF and several cloud native projects for a while, I realized that the nautical and marine theme was a recurring pattern, so I came up with several ideas:

• Ropes: represent the ties that bind the community.
• Seagulls: free birds, which accompany the sailors and show them the proximity of the shore.
• Anchors: would represent contact with the land. The depiction of home and belonging to a place.

The truth is that all the concepts were valid and I discarded them just because when I started designing there was one that I liked the most:

The mermaid

The mermaid has several representations in the collective imagination. Both as a protection and guide of a ship as well as a mythological being whose voice calls the lost sailors. As a brand icon, the mermaid represents a call to the community, a place for people to gather around and share their experiences.

Among several versions I ended up with these two, finally choosing the second one.

Option 01

Option 02

Why?

• The circle is a balanced geometric shape that symbolizes union, calmness and represents the Earth.
• Gradients are very versatile when making posters with graphic resources.
• A figurative style is more attractive to our target audience. Perhaps because it reminds them of what futuristic and sci-fi movies have shown them what cutting-edge technology looks like.

For the typography I decided to keep it simple. It had to be compatible with online and offline media, simple, legible and free. I settled on Ubuntu from Google fonts. As a ground rule, the design should favor the message and not the other way around.

The choice of the color palette was also based on the CNCF. They recently changed their corporate identity and have the following main colors:

Part of the CNCF Website.

I chose pink as a starting point because it seemed to have a lot of identity and presence and I worked from there. I used Adobe Color explore to see which colors fit best the identity I was creating. I decided to use the complementary separation and the colors that turned out were #003dff, #ff00ab, #040051 and #d2ff0d.

Adobe Color Explore tool. The image shows the complementary separation palette.

This striking range of colors symbolize the energy that exists in this community, because it is alive. It also represents the innovation of its content and the strength of the organization to create a group in which to grow as a professional and as a person.

In the end, being part of KCDSpain has been quite an experience and I am very happy to have brought this design forward. I hope to continue finding interesting projects like this to work on.