Photography
Overview
Select images with ample white space to accommodate overlaid typography and maintain seamless, balanced layouts. Every photograph must align with the accompanying written content, ensuring relevance and consistency while reinforcing our visual identity. Images should also emphasize clarity and professionalism, avoiding cluttered or overly staged visuals. This approach enhances readability, draws focus to key messages, and ensures a cohesive visual experience that reflects Foxit’s standards.
Principals
Photography plays a vital role in all Foxit branded communications, shaping how our audiences perceive and connect with us. Our photographic style captures authentic, dynamic moments of people coming together—whether physically or digitally—to reach agreements that drive their businesses and lives forward. It reflects the essence of our brand: bold, clean, and full of life. All imagery should also incorporate devices such as phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, or screens to showcase the technology that enables these connections.
These are expressed through three guiding principles: Relatability, Connection, and Candid.
Relatability
Images should reflect moments and experiences that feel familiar and achievable for our audience. Whether it's a workspace, a shared conversation, or a digital interaction, every scene should resonate with their daily lives and aspirations, helping them see themselves in the narrative.
Connection
Photography should illustrate the ways PDFs bring people together—facilitating collaboration and enhancing productivity. Images can showcase teamwork, problem-solving, or moments of agreement, whether through physical meetings or virtual interactions. These visuals should emphasize how our solutions foster meaningful connections.
Candid
The people and places featured in our photography must feel authentic and approachable. Avoid overly polished or staged settings. Instead, opt for natural environments and spontaneous moments that never feel out of reach for our audience. This approach reinforces a sense of trust and accessibility in our brand.
Portraits
Authentic, human, warm.
Foxit’s portrait photography emphasizes authenticity, clarity, and focus. Each portrait showcases the individual as the central subject, with clean, uncluttered backgrounds and a shallow depth of field to ensure the person stands out prominently.
We adopt an editorial-style, lifestyle photography approach. Portraits feature minimal styling to highlight real people in natural contexts, creating a candid, unposed, and approachable feel. This reinforces the relatability and authenticity of our brand.
Bright, natural lighting is integral to our portraits, avoiding the artificiality of studio-lit setups. This creates a lifestyle aesthetic that aligns with our campaign imagery. When selecting or creating images, always consider ample space for headlines or graphic overlays, ensuring seamless integration into our layouts.
Photography Checklist
Show natural movement: Capture candid, fluid moments with relaxed, natural poses that feel unforced and genuine.
Reflect our global reach: Feature a diverse community that represents our audience and values. Include people of different ages, abilities, body types, genders, races, ethnicities, industries, and nationalities. Always consider the communication’s target audience.
Choose clean environments: Use settings that are simple and uncluttered, allowing the subject to stand out and avoiding visual distractions.
Prioritize natural lighting: Use natural or natural-appearing light with soft shadows and a balanced, warm tone. Avoid harsh lighting that creates deep shadows or artificial-looking effects.
Avoid external branding: Do not include other brand logos unless explicitly approved, such as in cases of partnerships or integrations.
Keep compositions simple: Select photos with a clear focal point and ample negative space, ensuring they can be easily cropped and accommodate typography or graphic overlays.
Emphasize authenticity: Avoid effects such as lens flares, flashes, or harsh studio lighting. Images should feel real, relatable, and aligned with our brand’s candid and natural aesthetic.
Highlight connection: Incorporate elements like devices (e.g., phones, tablets, or screens) to represent collaboration and the tools that facilitate it.
Best Practice
This is a quick guide of common mistakes to avoid when choosing colors to create Foxit branded communications and materials. Avoiding these color misuses helps ensure legibility and maintain brand consistency.
Use high saturation and warm, rich grading.
Natural, candid shots that feel authentic and relatable.
Ensure modern-day attire and working environments.
Be inclusive of professionals ranging from young to older, individual smaller businesses to larger teams.
Avoid low saturation and cold, washed grading.
Avoid cliché images with over-staged or unnaturally-posed people or scenarios.
Avoid flash photography or harshly lit photos.
Avoid outdated work fashion, environments and circumstances.
Containers
Tail: Our visual identity system incorporates the iconic tail from the "X" in the Foxit logo as a dynamic graphic device. This container is primarily used to creatively mask photography, often featuring subjects like people cut out from their original backgrounds and placed within the tail shape. To add depth and visual intrigue, parts of the subject—such as hands, arms, or devices—may extend beyond the container, creating a dimensional and engaging effect.
The orientation of the tail container must always stay true to its original form in the logo, starting at the bottom left and sweeping upward to the top right. This ensures brand consistency and maintains the visual flow that makes the shape instantly recognizable as part of the Foxit identity.
The tail container works best when placed against simple, uncluttered backgrounds, allowing the dynamic shape and masked photography to take center stage without competing with other design elements. Proper use ensures the composition remains bold and modern while aligning with Foxit's brand identity.
Square: As a complementary graphic device, square containers offer a simpler, more structured alternative for incorporating photography. These shapes are versatile, accommodating both cut-out photography and full, uncut visuals seamlessly placed within the square.
Square containers are especially effective for designs requiring balance and simplicity. They work well when paired with minimal or less busy backgrounds, allowing the photography to shine without overwhelming the composition.
Unlike the tail container, square containers can feature full, intact images, providing flexibility for different creative needs while maintaining a clean and professional look.