EmergentX aims to turn developing technologies such as blockchain and AI into functional solutions to practical problems. The company partners with startups and needed a visual identity that showed they were credible partners. They wanted to reflect their excitement for emerging tech but also show them to be transparent and responsible actors – an acknowledgement that new technologies are often sources of anxiety as well as promise.

adam&eveDDB identified a tension in the brief between the disruptive chaos of new and emerging technology and the order and functionality that these technologies enable when they are successfully applied. “Our solution was an identity based on a variable font that completely transforms from weird abstract forms into a highly legible and functional typeface,” explains the agency. “Working with Modern Type and Metis Foundry Typographic Alliance, we created a variable font called EX Abstract.

“Emergent technology is, almost by definition, weird and unfamiliar. It comes in many forms – mathematical, physical and biological – and is often a combination of these. Who knows what may emerge in the future. Our abstracted forms reflected this: an unexpected combination of the angular and organic. This needed to transform into a functional typeface that was legible and familiar. The legible version of the font does, however, include some techy-feeling details that give it a degree of distinctiveness.

“We used colour to dramatise the transformation between these two states. The abstract starting point is shown with unexpected colour combinations, whereas the endpoint is black and white, which is as legible as possible. The main touchpoint for the brand is its website, emergentx.org. The variable font allowed us to include interactive moments of transformation as transitions while ensuring that information was fully accessible.”

Credits:
Agency: adam&eveDDB
Creative Director/Designer: Chris Chapman
Type: Modern Type, Metis Foundry Typographic Alliance
Web Developer: Zachary Bishop
Animator: Jack Collis
Sound Design: Aaron Taffel