Don’t Ruin My Brand: Instagram Bio or Lifestyle
Many would argue that personal and business branding is more important now than ever before. It is simply the way in which you show off who you are and what you stand for; almost as if you are setting the scene of your own personal or professional story. Having a background in filmmaking allowed me, over time, to understand exactly how to set my own stage in life.
Mise en Scène: The arrangement of everything that appears in the framing – actors, lighting, décor, props, costume – is called mise-en-scène, a French term that means “placing on stage.”
In every performance, there is a reason why the lighting and set look the way it does. It is creating an environment of purpose. At a young age, I struggled with finding my voice as a creator. I didn’t have a proper outlet for my creativity or ideas. I didn’t know how to create an environment around me. In college, I was assigned a research project on a director of my choice. I chose Wes Anderson, a filmmaker that excels in creating intricate and thematic worlds in his films. This project forced me to analyze why he used certain lighting, why a character’s room was a certain color, the significance of the small details – his mise en scène. The more I learned about his process, the more I started asking myself those same questions. Why was my room the color it was? What small intricate details in my life had a purpose?
I began thinking about the mise en scène I was creating for my life. As I reflected on the elements that made me who I am, it was easy to correlate my “stage” to my personal “brand”. Building my mise en scène made me feel more authentic in the way I presented myself to those around me. Moving ahead and jumping into the creative world of agency work, I began asking myself these same questions when introduced to a new client.
Why these colors? What details make their brand stand out?
Expanding this knowledge and experience into a work environment is one of the benefits I bring to the table for our clients. I find joy in helping people create a visual aesthetic and brand for the things they love and the message they wish to portray. Helping them create a world for their product or service, just like I watched Wes Anderson do in his movies. I have such an appreciation for the amount of detail and time that goes into understanding a client in order to create something that truly represents them. And at the end of the day, that’s what branding is, isn’t it?
So the next time you view a company’s brand or an individual’s Instagram bio, remember – it is a reflection of them. A reflection of their lifestyle. It is what they wish to portray to the world and how they wish their followers to view them. Take your time in developing your own mise en scène – it is important.
