The first strategic priority of DataCite’s vision 2021 is “Building on the DataCite identity. With the publication of the DataCite design manual, we are now taking the first step in our journey to create a consistent visual identity for our organization. In the past couple of months, together with designers, we worked on a variety of aspects of our design. In an iterative feedback process including the input from the Community Engagement Steering Group, we sought to update and harmonize existing design elements such as logos and colors and at the same time introduce a scalable sub-brand system as well as our new DataCite community badges.
Logos
Starting with the question of the exact shade of DataCite blue, we redefined our primary logo to include dark blue and a light blue, because one blue simply was not enough. In addition to this redefinition of colors, we updated the claim to match our vision of “Connecting Research, Identifying Knowledge”.
For occasions where the primary logo might not fit in (e.g. due to lack of space) we now offer a palette of alternate DataCite logos.
The secondary logo without the claim:
The stacked logo if there is not enough horizontal space:
And finally the Schwoop, our icon that represents DataCite’s initials D and C:
In case the original DataCite blue logos do not fit the background colors we provide grayscale, b&w, and bi-color versions of each logo on our support pages.
DataCite sub-brands
To have a consistent visual user experience across our services, we created a scalable sub-brand system bringing the new design to our services Fabrica and Commons. Currently we are developing a design system that translates the guidelines of the design manual into our services. You can expect to see the new design guidelines trickle down to our systems throughout 2022.
DataCite community badges
Being a member-driven organization, we respond to requests of our members to be able to display their DataCite membership with the introduction of the DataCite community badges. Direct members, Consortium Leads and Consortium Organizations are now able to integrate their respective badge into their website (either in a standard or grayscale version). We updated the existing badge for our registered Service Providers and aligned it with the other community badges. The DataCite community badges are meant for use by registered Service Providers, Members, and Consortium Organizations to announce their status.
Design transition roadmap
We are excited to apply the new design step by step to DataCite’s resources, communication channels, and services in the upcoming weeks and months. DataCite Members, Consortium Organizations, and registered Service Providers may use DataCite’s name, logo, and the relevant community badge to announce their status and their activities. The design manual, logos and badges can be embedded into your websites following the documentation on our support page.
If you have questions about the new design and how to (re-) use it, feel free to contact us at info@datacite.org
Now let’s all apply the new logos and badges to the world, and paint it DataCite blue.
