My Name Is Smith

For the independent documentary My Name Is Smith, filmmaker James Allen Smith chronicles the lives of his aging parents, capturing the fragile beauty of ritual, resilience, and enduring partnership within their New England home. The film functions as an intimate cinematic archive—part observational portrait, part unconventional love story—revealing the quiet emotional architecture of family life.

Our design objective was to translate that intimacy into a visual identity system that felt personal, handcrafted, and emotionally resonant. Rather than relying on traditional film stills, we developed an illustrated cover treatment that foregrounded the Smith family as characters—rendered with warmth and subtle imperfection to echo the documentary’s tone. The illustration created a timeless quality, positioning the film less as reportage and more as a living family album.

The title was given clear visual primacy, anchoring the composition and reinforcing name-as-identity as a conceptual thread. Typography was intentionally restrained—clean, tightly set, and contemporary—providing contrast to the expressive illustration and ensuring legibility across festival and promotional applications.

For supporting collateral, including festival postcards, we introduced rounded-edge cropping as a tactile and visual differentiator. This subtle structural detail softened the format and allowed the piece to stand apart within high-density festival environments. The distinctive shape enhanced memorability while aligning with the film’s themes of intimacy and humanity.

The design system was deployed across festival materials, including screenings at events such as Austin Film Festival and Big Sky Documentary Film Festival. The result was a cohesive visual platform that honored the authenticity of the film while elevating its presence within competitive documentary circuits—balancing emotional storytelling with strategic brand clarity.