Elgato Brand Guidelines:
From Gaming Mark to Creator Brand
Repositioning Elgato's identity away from "gaming" and building the design system that kept it consistent as the brand scaled across a growing hardware and software portfolio.
In 2016, Elgato's brand identity was built around "elgato gaming": a blue, isometric mark aimed squarely at the gaming category. As the product portfolio grew into a broader creator, streaming, and content-creation space, that identity no longer matched where the brand, or its audience, actually lived. The old guidelines were also explicitly confidential and static: a document, not a system built for teams to actually use day to day.
I led the redevelopment of Elgato's brand identity and guidelines from the ground up: simplifying the mark, dropping "gaming" from the brand's visual and verbal identity, and repositioning Elgato around content creators specifically rather than a broader gaming audience. I then built the guidelines as a living, structured system, not a static PDF, organized around how teams actually work: who we are, brand identity, voice direction, photography and film, art and graphics, and applied direction, so any designer, marketer, or agency partner could find what they needed and execute with confidence.
System Components
Brand positioning & attitude
The shift from "a gaming brand" to "the brand for content creators," and the attitude principles (creativity first, authentic, original) that guide every downstream decision
Misuse guardrails
A clear "you're doing it wrong if..." reference showing exactly where past or incorrect usage broke the system
Logo & clearspace
The simplified mark, usage across dark and light backgrounds, and product-logo pairing rules (including co-branded partner lock-ups)
Typography
A defined spacing and hierarchy system (preheader, headline, subheader, body) built to be applied consistently across formats
Voice, photography, and applied direction
Extending the same repositioning into tone of voice and visual style, so the shift away from "gaming" held up everywhere, not just in the logo
The system became the shared reference for Elgato's design and marketing teams and every external agency partner briefed into the brand, replacing a static, confidential document with something built to actually be used. It's the foundation that later campaigns, product launches and al consumer facing communications were built on
Impact
Repositioned Elgato's identity from a gaming-first brand to a creator-first one, reflected in the mark, the language, and the guidelines themselves.
Gave design and marketing teams, and outside agencies, a single, confident reference instead of an outdated, confidential document.
Built a system durable enough to still be the foundation for the brand's next evolution today.