Photography and illustration

Sourcing rules, treatment, and the abstract illustration style.

Sources#

Preferred: Unsplash and Pexels — royalty-free, no attribution required for commercial use. Commission custom photography where possible, from local European photographers.

Never use: watermarked Shutterstock or Getty imagery, or AI-generated imagery.

Every photograph must pass the test: “would a developer trust this?” Stock imagery of handshakes in glass lobbies fails it. A real desk, real hardware, or real people working passes it.

Treatment#

• Photography is not the default and is never full-bleed by default. Prefer a diagram when the subject is a system, relationship, or process.
• Use candid, real workspaces with a warm, desaturated grade. Avoid cool casts, tropical saturation, and high-contrast black and white. If grain is useful, keep it subtle at 4–6%.
• Photographs in dark mode receive a subtle black overlay so they do not punch a hole in the page.
• The logo never sits directly on an unmodified photograph — see Logo usage.
• Never place text over a busy region. Add a scrim or crop to a quiet area.

Illustration#

The illustration style is abstract system diagrams — nodes, flows, and pipelines drawn in the brand palette.

Do not use hand-drawn illustration, texture, or decorative imagery. The one approved decorative motif is a top-right orange circular glow at 6% opacity on a dark hero panel.

• Midnight for structure, slate for supporting lines, accent for the single element that matters.
• Dashed strokes indicate inferred or optional relationships.
• Labels use Source Sans 3; never letter-space diagram labels.
• Diagrams are line-based, not filled — the system reads as engineering drawing, not infographic.