Client

Rayka Zehtabchi
Year

2023

Role

Design Direction

Design

Animation

“A love letter to small businesses everywhere, ‘They Came From All Over’ follows grocery store owner Tom Mulholland as he fights to save his family business.”

I contributed design and animation to this short documentary directed by Academy Award winning director, Rayka Zehtabchi.

The opening of the film. The full documentary can be seen here.
    • A selection of lower thirds and subtitles. The typography throughout the film was designed with subtle texture, noise and blur, so that it could compliment and feel at home with the beautiful film footage, shot by Sam Davis.

The end credits

Rayka envisioned the film's typography to have a sense of nostalgia and small town charm, to represent the place and setting of the film. This first concept was inspired by old-school signs and labels. It combined a bold type, derived from vintage signage with a handwritten script.

The second concept, which we ultimately went with, paired an italic and bold weight of the same font family to create an interesting clash. The chosen font family has a subtle retro vibe, yet still feels modern and elegant.

The third concept brought a bigger juxtaposition between typefaces – one ornate vintage script font, with a modern serif font. Pairing the ornate with something more simple created a nice balance of elements, which helped made sure the overall design didn't skew too old-fashioned.