Brand design and AI storyboarding

Section 10.5.6 : Brand design and AI storyboarding

🎯 Learning objective

Use AI to create a brand's visual identity (logo, style guide, templates) and produce professional storyboards for creative projects. You'll master the complete AI-assisted branding workflow and know when to bring in a professional.

AI branding: from idea to visual identity

AI lets entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams create a professional visual identity without a designer — or more precisely, massively accelerate the exploration phase to reach the final version faster.

What AI does well in branding:

• →Explore 50 creative directions in 1 hour (instead of 2 weeks with a designer)
• →Generate visual moodboards instantly
• →Test color palettes and typefaces on mockups
• →Produce presentation visuals for client validation

What AI does NOT do well (yet):

• →Create a final vector logo (AI logos aren't in SVG, not properly vectorized)
• →Guarantee uniqueness (no prior art search)
• →Think through overall brand consistency across all touchpoints
• →Understand technical constraints (responsive, print, embroidery)

Visual identity creation workflow in 5 steps

Step 1 — Creative brief with ChatGPT (30 min):

This is the most important step. A good brief = a good result.

I'm launching a [type of business] in the [specific] sector.

My ideal customer: [demographic and psychographic profile]
My core values: [3 values with explanation]
My positioning: [premium / accessible / innovative / traditional / disruptive]
My 3 direct competitors: [names and what I like/dislike about their branding]
My communication tone: [professional / friendly / expert / quirky / luxury]

Propose:
1. 5 brand names (verifiable on trademark databases, memorable, pronounceable in FR and EN, available as .com/.fr)
2. For each name: 
   - Tagline (5-8 words)
   - Palette of 4 colors (primary, secondary, accent, neutral) with hex codes and psychological justification
   - Recommended font pair (heading + body) available on Google Fonts
   - 3 adjectives describing the visual universe
3. Recommendation of the best option with justification

Step 2 — Visual exploration with Midjourney/DALL-E (1h):

Generate 20-30 logo variations to explore directions:

Logo design for [brand name], [sector].
Concept: [symbol or distinctive letter].
Style: modern, minimal, geometric, clean lines.
Colors: [hex codes from step 1].
White background, vector-like quality, no text beneath.
Professional logo design, award-winning.

Variants to test:

• →Icon logo alone (symbol without text)
• →Typographic logo (the name in distinctive typeface)
• →Combined logo (icon + text)
• →Monochrome versions (black on white, white on black)

With Midjourney, use --sref from your favorite logo to generate consistent variations.

Step 3 — Style guide with ChatGPT (45 min):

Create a complete style guide for the brand [name]:

1. COLOR PALETTE:
   - Primary: [hex] — usage: buttons, links, action elements
   - Secondary: [hex] — usage: headers, section backgrounds
   - Accent: [hex] — usage: highlights, badges, notifications
   - Neutrals: [3 hex] — background, text, borders
   - Proportion rule: 60% neutral / 30% primary / 10% accent

2. TYPOGRAPHY:
   - Heading: [font] — Bold/SemiBold — sizes H1-H4
   - Body: [font] — Regular/Light — sizes p, small
   - Code/data: [monospace font]

3. UI COMPONENTS:
   - Buttons: styles (primary, secondary, ghost), sizes (S/M/L), border-radius
   - Cards: shadow, padding, border-radius
   - Inputs: styles, states (focus, error, success)

4. TONE AND VOICE:
   - Writing examples: headline, paragraph, CTA, email, error message
   - Words to use vs words to avoid

5. DO'S AND DON'TS:
   - 5 examples of good brand usage
   - 5 examples of bad brand usage

Step 4 — Visual template generation (1h):

With Canva + AI, create the base templates:

• →Business card (front and back)
• →HTML email signature
• →LinkedIn post template (square + carousel)
• →Instagram story template
• →Document header / business proposal
• →Favicon and app icon

For each template, generate the illustration image using the established style guide.

Step 5 — Documentation and packaging (30 min):

Create a "Brand Kit" document with ChatGPT that compiles:

• →Logo in all versions (color, monochrome, icon only)
• →Complete style guide
• →Ready-to-use templates
• →Usage guidelines
• →Figma or Canva file with all components

AI storyboarding

Storyboarding is essential for videos, ads, and visual presentations. AI transforms a process that takes days into hours.

AI storyboard workflow in 4 steps:

1. Structured script (ChatGPT):

Create an 8-shot storyboard for a 30-second ad video 
about [product/service].

Target: [audience]
Objective: [desired action: purchase, signup, awareness]
Tone: [emotional / informational / humorous]

For each shot, detail:
- Shot number and duration (e.g., Shot 1 — 4s)
- Detailed visual description (what do we see?)
- On-screen text (if applicable)
- Exact voiceover (the spoken text)
- Camera movement (zoom in, pan, static...)
- Sound/music (sound ambiance)
- Transition to next shot (cut, fade, swipe...)

2. Key images (DALL-E 3 / Midjourney): For each storyboard shot, generate the corresponding image with a consistent prompt (use --sref on Midjourney for visual series consistency).

3. Assembly: Place images in a document with voiceover annotations, duration, and transitions. Canva, Google Slides, or even a simple Google Doc work perfectly.

4. Animation (optional): If you want an animated mockup, use Runway or Sora 2 to animate each key image into a short clip, then assemble with CapCut.

AI design tools

Practical exercise: create a mini brand identity

Choose a fictional (or real) project and follow the workflow in 2 hours:

1. →Brief (20 min): use the Step 1 prompt with ChatGPT → get name, palette, typeface
2. →Logos (30 min): generate 10 variations with DALL-E 3 or Midjourney → select the best 3
3. →Style guide (20 min): use the Step 3 prompt → get the complete style guide
4. →Templates (30 min): create 3 templates in Canva (LinkedIn post, business card, email signature)
5. →Packaging (20 min): compile everything into a clean "Brand Kit" Google Doc