Animade unveil their latest collaboration with brand new Dropbox

Award-winning animation studio Animade rolled up their sleeves and got back to basics with a host of hand-drawn creations for Dropbox’s new brand identity released earlier this month. Here the team shares their creative process.
We were over the moon when Dropbox approached us to help pressure-test their illustration strategy, and later to work together on creating some of the final assets for their exciting new brand identity.
As well as illustrations, ultimately Dropbox were looking to bring the concepts to life through animation. We were only too happy to help with both elements!
Working in tandem with Dropbox’s team of illustrators, the back-and-forth process of sharing ideas and inspiring one another was at the core of this truly awesome project.

We helped create 40 of the final illustrations as well as four animated vignettes, which now live happily across Dropbox on desktop and mobile. Check out some of the illustrations in situ.
The collaborative process started right from the early experimental phase. We were invited to work with Dropbox and other selected illustrators for the pressure-testing week to experiment with their newly-formed visual system, which kick-started an amazing creative journey together with Dropbox’s team of artists.

With a brand philosophy to ‘make the everyday extraordinary’, Dropbox aim to make the creative work process smoother, more delightful and full of possibilities in everyday life.

As part of their new visual identity, Dropbox wanted to evolve their existing use of illustration as a tool for communicating with users imaginatively, in ways that go beyond words. Inspired by the immediacy of sketching out raw ideas, the concept was to represent a space where creative work-in-progress happens.
Once the design style had been established by Dropbox’s illustration team following the pressure-testing phase, we collaborated closely on creating 40 of the final illustrations and a set of four animations. This process involved lots of iterations and pinging ideas between teams to ensure the finished pieces were absolutely on the button.
In line with the visual system devised by the Dropbox team, the illustrations had to capture the brand philosophy, carrying that sense of surprise, delight and possibility.
The imagery also needed to show the process that went behind making it, providing insight into the hand and mind of the maker. This was achieved by starting with a ‘base layer’ of collage, which was added to with characterful hand-drawn detail.

The animations are shown as part of the onboarding process for mobile, while the illustrations are sprinkled throughout the Dropbox site.