Footage Farm is an award-winning digital archive specialising in public domain footage. Their collection boasts over 25,000 historical video clips worldwide, serving documentary filmmakers, researchers, and historians who need high-quality, affordable archival material. When Footage Farm approached Bokaap Design, they faced two key challenges: their website was static and unintuitive, limiting customers’ ability to search for footage, and recent acquisitions had expanded their collection, requiring a more streamlined digital experience.
Footage Farm sought a complete brand and website overhaul to create a platform where customers could conduct research, download preview footage, and make enquiries effortlessly. Our objective was to modernise the user experience and technology while preserving a vintage look and feel that resonates with Footage Farm’s identity as a historical archive.
The online experience no longer represented where they were as an organization.
The website architecture was unstructured, and the footage was scattered and hard to find.
The back-end was difficult to manage their large archive.
To capture Footage Farm’s unique blend of history and modern accessibility, we developed a visual identity that feels both nostalgic and contemporary. We adopted a vintage design style paired with minimalist, modern web design principles, allowing the site to evoke the feel of a physical archive while meeting contemporary usability standards.
Footage Farm’s existing logo was a straightforward typographic mark. They envisioned a refreshed logo featuring a cow, symbolising the farm while alluding to global historical records. Inspired by ancient cave paintings, we designed a cow icon that conveys heritage and authenticity. The logo’s font draws from rustic, chiselled wooden signs seen on traditional barns, emphasising Footage Farm’s roots in archival preservation.
Building a brand new website from the ground up is a daunting task, particularly for a small business and especially during a global pandemic. We had been recommended Bokaap Design and were not disappointed. From the get go, we felt we were listened to and understood by Niraali and her team. Their expertise not only on the technical aspects of web building but also on branding and marketing were crucial in figuring out the right solutions for us. Communication at all stages of development was always clear and any question we had was answered promptly. In the end, Bokaap was the best partner we could have hoped for to deliver such an important project for our business. We simply cannot recommend them enough and will definitely turn to them again in the future.
Gonzalo Chacon, Gintare Kriauceliunaite & Mat Flasque, Founders, Footage Farm
Our design approach focused on breaking away from the standard stock footage aesthetic. From the homepage, the interface evokes a physical archive experience, with background textures mimicking the grain of old film footage. To enhance the archival feel, we incorporated thin SMPTE colour bars as a nod to the NTSC video, subtly reinforcing the vintage look throughout the site.
To help users navigate the extensive collection, we created an organised category structure, allowing users to browse and search through themes, sub-themes, and specific parameters. This system enhances the user experience and ensures Footage Farm can manage its growing collection efficiently. The categories are now the core of the website’s design and structure, supporting a streamlined and scalable archive experience.
Understanding that Footage Farm’s customers often require assistance with specialised footage, we designed a user journey that allows visitors to conduct research, save selections, and make tailored enquiries. Users can filter footage by themes, countries, years, and other attributes and save videos in personalised accounts. For ordering, we introduced an “enquiry cart” instead of a traditional shopping cart, allowing users to specify exact footage requirements (such as timecodes) and make notes for custom requests.
The project’s success relied on a robust, scalable database supporting advanced search functions. Our database design organises footage by theme, sub-theme, year, country, colour, and more. We collaborated closely with Footage Farm to tag, review, and manage over 25,000 videos, ensuring each clip is accurately searchable.
We embedded Vimeo-hosted clips directly onto the site to streamline previews, enhancing load times and avoiding redundant uploads. Midway through the project, Footage Farm requested a download function for preview clips. We integrated this seamlessly without disrupting project timelines by embedding a feature that pulls links from Vimeo in real-time.
We delivered a fully realized digital experience that met Footage Farm’s needs and captured their archival essence. The new website enables effortless research, enriched with customizable searches and streamlined enquiry options, and equips Footage Farm to effectively serve its growing user base.
