Visual Identity Direction
Strategic direction for Naluma’s visual identity. Every decision traces back to a position on the Brand Personality Spectrum. This is a brief for design execution, not a design system — no hex codes, no font names, no pixel specs. See Brand Narrative for the verbal identity this visual language must express, and Colors for the implemented palette.
The Visual Territory
Section titled “The Visual Territory”No competitor in the tinnitus space owns a visual identity built around sound becoming something other than threat. The category defaults to two aesthetics: clinical-white (medical device apps) and soft-blue/teal (meditation-adjacent wellness). Neither reflects the Naluma positioning.
Naluma’s visual territory is the experience of sound and light in transition — informed by the name itself (nada: primordial sound; luma: settling, luminance). The visual language should feel like a sound finding its place: present but no longer in front of everything.
Color Philosophy
Section titled “Color Philosophy”Traced to: Clinical — Warm (70% warm), Serious — Light (75% serious), Minimal — Expressive (65% minimal)
Temperature and Register
Section titled “Temperature and Register”Warm, not cool. The tinnitus app category is saturated with clinical blues and meditation teals. Naluma’s warmth is deliberate — it communicates that this is a human experience being met by a human response, not a medical condition being managed by software.
The palette should live in the warm-neutral to warm-muted range. Think dusk rather than midday — the quality of light when intensity subsides but warmth remains. This maps directly to the brand promise: the sound isn’t gone, but the day isn’t governed by it anymore.
Saturation Direction
Section titled “Saturation Direction”Low-to-moderate saturation throughout. High saturation creates visual urgency, which contradicts the Still position on the personality spectrum. The palette should feel settled — colors that have arrived somewhere rather than colors that are demanding attention.
Exception: A single accent color with slightly higher saturation to carry forward-motion energy. This is the “neither are you” in “the sound isn’t going anywhere, but neither are you” — a visual signal that there is movement and direction within the calm. Used sparingly: progress indicators, key CTAs, moments of earned recognition.
Role of Color by Context
Section titled “Role of Color by Context”- Onboarding / acute crisis content: Warmer, slightly deeper tones. The user is frightened; the environment should feel like being held, not like entering a medical facility. Grounding, not stimulating.
- Session and habituation content: The core neutral palette. Unobtrusive. The content is doing the work; the interface steps back.
- Progress and recognition moments: The accent color appears. Subtle, earned, not celebratory — a quiet signal that something has shifted.
- Sleep / nocturnal context: Darker values of the same warm palette. No blue-light-heavy whites. The transition from day to night mode should feel like dimming a warm lamp, not switching to a different app.
What to Avoid
Section titled “What to Avoid”- Clinical white as a dominant surface color — reads as medical device
- Blue-teal as a primary color — reads as meditation app, already owned by Calm/Headspace/every wellness startup
- High-contrast color pairings — create visual tension incompatible with the Still personality position
- Black as a dominant dark-mode color — too stark; warm dark tones (deep charcoal with warm undertones) serve better
Typography Direction
Section titled “Typography Direction”Traced to: Clinical — Warm (70% warm), Authoritative — Peer (60% authoritative), Minimal — Expressive (65% minimal)
Type Character
Section titled “Type Character”The typography must hold two registers simultaneously: warm enough to feel human, structured enough to feel credible. This rules out both the geometric sans-serifs of tech products (too cold) and the humanist scripts of lifestyle brands (too casual for the subject matter).
The right territory is a humanist sans-serif or a restrained serif — typefaces with warmth baked into their letterforms (open counters, gentle curves, optical adjustments) rather than warmth applied through styling (italics, light weights, decorative elements).
Weight Philosophy
Section titled “Weight Philosophy”Medium weights as the workhorse. Light weights carry elegance but sacrifice legibility, and many tinnitus patients are 40+ with potential visual accommodation needs. Heavy weights carry authority but create visual density that conflicts with the Minimal personality position.
Headings can go lighter or bolder for hierarchy, but the default reading weight should feel effortless — the user is already under cognitive load from their condition. Typography should reduce that load, not add to it.
Hierarchy and Spacing
Section titled “Hierarchy and Spacing”Generous line heights and spacing throughout. The app should feel like it breathes. This serves the Minimal — Expressive position (65% minimal) and directly addresses the emotional state of the target user: anxious people need visual breathing room. Cramped layouts amplify the feeling that there is too much to deal with.
The information hierarchy should be clear and steep — the user should never have to scan to find what matters. This serves the Authoritative position: a guide who knows what is important and organises accordingly.
What to Avoid
Section titled “What to Avoid”- Geometric sans-serifs (Futura, Avenir territory) — too cold, too tech
- Display or decorative typefaces — too expressive, undermines credibility
- Very light weights as body text — accessibility issue for 40+ demographic
- Monospaced or technical type — clinical device territory
Imagery and Illustration Style
Section titled “Imagery and Illustration Style”Traced to: Abstract — Specific (80% specific), Serious — Light (75% serious), Institutional — Personal (70% personal)
The Core Visual Metaphor
Section titled “The Core Visual Metaphor”Sound and light in transition. Not sound being silenced. Not light breaking through darkness. The transition itself — the quality of a sound finding its place, the quality of light when it has settled into a space. Waveforms that smooth and open. Frequencies that spread. Luminance that is present but not intense.
This is the visual white space no competitor occupies: representing the acoustic experience as a journey rather than a problem to be solved.
Photography vs. Illustration
Section titled “Photography vs. Illustration”Illustration-forward, with photography used sparingly and only for credibility (team, clinical partners, editorial). The tinnitus experience is internal — there is no photograph that captures what it feels like. Illustration can express the subjective experience of sound, attention, and habituation in ways photography cannot.
Illustration Register
Section titled “Illustration Register”Abstract-organic. Not geometric precision (too clinical), not figurative illustration (too narrative), not flat vector (too generic-startup). The illustrations should feel like they were made by a hand, with the imperfections and organic qualities that convey warmth — but with enough structure and intention to maintain the Authoritative personality position.
Think: visualisations of acoustic phenomena rendered with artistic sensitivity. Sound waves as natural forms. Frequency spectrums as landscapes. The overlap of sound and light treated as a visual material.
People in Imagery
Section titled “People in Imagery”Used carefully and infrequently. When people appear, they should feel real — not stock-photo diverse, not yoga-pose aspirational, not clinical-trial anonymous. The 80% Specific personality position demands that any depiction of people feels like it was chosen because it represents something true, not because the brand guidelines required a human face.
Situations to depict (if depicting people at all): ordinary life moments that tinnitus interrupts — a meal, a conversation, a walk, lying awake. Not “person meditating” or “person looking serene.” The power is in the ordinariness.
What to Avoid
Section titled “What to Avoid”- Stock wellness photography (person on mountain, sunrise, calm water) — the target segment has seen this imagery on every app that disappointed them
- Sound waves depicted as threatening/aggressive (jagged, red, intense) — reinforces the threat narrative Naluma is specifically trying to defuse
- Ear imagery or hearing-aid-adjacent visual language — medicalises the experience
- Abstract geometric patterns without acoustic or light reference — generic, doesn’t own the territory
Spatial and Layout Philosophy
Section titled “Spatial and Layout Philosophy”Traced to: Minimal — Expressive (65% minimal), Urgent — Still (60% still), Directive — Companion (65% companion)
Density and Breathing Room
Section titled “Density and Breathing Room”The app should feel spacious without feeling empty. Every screen should have enough white space that an anxious user’s eye can rest. This is not aesthetic minimalism — it is functional: the target user’s attentional resources are depleted by their condition, and the interface must not compete for what little remains.
Content-to-space ratio should skew toward space. One idea per view. One action per moment. The user is never confronted with a wall of options or a dashboard of metrics.
Navigation Philosophy
Section titled “Navigation Philosophy”The companion personality (65% companion) implies that the app adapts to where the user is rather than presenting a fixed structure the user must navigate. The IA should feel like being guided rather than browsing — the next relevant thing is always clear, and the path is obvious.
This doesn’t mean removing user agency — the habituating user who knows what they want should be able to find it immediately. But the default experience is structured and guided, especially for acute users who don’t yet know what they need.
Motion and Transition
Section titled “Motion and Transition”Slow, eased transitions. No abrupt cuts. No bouncy animations. The motion language should feel like settling — elements arrive where they belong with the gentle deceleration of something finding its place. This directly mirrors the brand promise: sound finding its right position.
Loading and waiting states should feel intentional rather than broken. A moment of stillness before content appears is not a UX failure in this context — it is consistent with the Still personality position.
Mood Direction
Section titled “Mood Direction”Three reference moods for a designer to work against:
Mood 1: Dusk Arrival
Section titled “Mood 1: Dusk Arrival”The quality of light and warmth when you arrive home as the day is ending. Not dark — warm and settling. The intensity of the day subsiding but life still present. This is the primary mood for the app’s default state: habituating users in the long middle, where the work is about the sound finding its place in an ordinary life.
Mood 2: Steady Hands
Section titled “Mood 2: Steady Hands”The feeling of a consultation with someone who genuinely knows what they’re talking about and isn’t rushing. Warm office light. A voice that explains clearly. The combination of knowledge and patience. This is the mood for educational and psychoeducation content, particularly in the acute phase: the user needs to understand what is happening, and the environment should feel like a space where understanding is possible.
Mood 3: First Light After a Hard Night
Section titled “Mood 3: First Light After a Hard Night”The specific quality of early morning after a night of poor sleep — but specifically the moment when the light changes and the night is definitively over. Relief that is real but exhausted. Not triumph. Not celebration. Just: “I made it through, and there is a day ahead.” This is the mood for progress moments and the sleep-to-wake transition: understated recognition that something was survived.