visual identity · spec v1 · 2026
third kindfilm

A Munich studio working in three kinds of film — narrative, documentary, and commissioned work for cultural institutions.

status · design locked direction · 03 taxonomy for · Nicole, Nikolai, Michele
01

The studio

Three founders. Three roles. Three geographies on a real München–Bolzano–Rome axis. The studio is the sum of three crafts — direction, image, production — working across three kinds of film.
Regie · direction

Nicole Humiński

München

Director with a museum-hybrid practice. Tallinn Black Nights, Pinakothek der Moderne installations, NS-Dokumentationszentrum München. Works at the edge of cinema and exhibition space.

Kamera · cinematography

Nikolai Huber

München

Cinematographer. Credits with Werner Herzog and Abel Ferrara. Camerimage, Cannes, TIFF, IDFA, MoMA Doc Fortnight. Deutscher Kamerapreis.

Produktion · production

Michele Cherchi Palmieri

Rome / München

Producer with cinematography heritage. Brings international coproduction experience from productions across Italy, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, and Brazil, with festival credits at Cannes. Leads production at third kind film with a focus on European coproduction.

02

The three kinds

The taxonomy is the business model. Not a classification imposed on the work — a reflection of three actual practices the studio runs in parallel, each with its own discipline, each feeding the others.
narrative

Fiction features and shorts. Authorship cinema. Currently in development — the founders bring individual festival credits from Cannes and TIFF into the new studio.

fiction · feature · short · in development
documentary

Documentary features, series, and hybrid forms. Observation, testimony, reckoning. The studio's first documentary, The True Type, is directed by Nicole Humiński and Victor Muñoz Sanz.

documentary · series · hybrid · witness
commissioned

Authored moving-image work for museums, architectural practices, and cultural institutions. Films for exhibitions, architect portraits, interview series. The economic foundation that sustains the auteur work — and a distinct practice most European studios do not pursue with this discipline.

pinakothek · nickl und partner · mcml · exhibition film
03

Wordmark

Two lockups, two jobs. The primary does the everyday work. The ceremonial three-weight form shows up on press kits, catalogue covers, and editorial moments where the taxonomy idea has room to breathe.
third kindfilm
primary — Inter 800 + 700, baseline-aligned, −0.045em tracking, 0.18em gap
third kind film
ceremonial — Inter 300 / 800 / 400, stacked, left-aligned, the taxonomy in the wordmark
primary lockup · scale behavior
hero · 96 px
third kindfilm
header · 32 px
third kindfilm
nav · 20 px
third kindfilm
body · 16 px
third kindfilm
footer · 12 px
third kindfilm
04

Type system

Two typefaces, not three. Inter does everything that is content. IBM Plex Mono does everything that is metadata. No serif.
primary
Inter

Wordmark, headings, body copy, film titles, biographies, running text. Four weights carry the whole hierarchy. Italic reserved for film titles in running text.

display / 800 third kind
heading / 700 A studio in three parts
subhead / 500 Narrative, documentary, commissioned
body / 400 The studio opens its first documentary.
caption / 400 dir. Nicole Humiński & Victor Muñoz Sanz
secondary
IBM Plex Mono

Tags, kind labels, numbering, timestamps, technical metadata, navigation labels. The quiet "system voice" — it tells you where you are, not what you're reading.

kind tag documentary
numbering iii.ii / 2024
metadata 97 min · italy · 2021
nav label works · about · contact
credit © third kind film 2024
05

Color system

Six values total. Three neutrals, three kind accents. Color is functional, never decorative — the kind accents appear only as small dots prefixing tag labels, never as backgrounds or body text.
neutrals
ink
#111111
paper
#FBFBF7
muted
#8A8A85
Ink is near-black with a hair of warmth. Paper is slightly warm off-white — printed page, not screen white. Muted is for captions, credits, and secondary metadata.
three kinds
narrative
#7A2E2E
documentary
#5A6B3B
commissioned
#3C4A6B
Narrative — restrained brick, cinema red without the neon. Documentary — quiet olive, earth and field. Commissioned — ink-blue, architectural drawings and museum labels. Desaturated to equal weight so they read as one system.
06

Voice

Terse, factual, specific. Third person for the studio. Film notes are two to three sentences, never more. Specificity is the entire credibility strategy — name collaborators, festivals, institutions, and years.

register

Third person for the studio. First person plural sparingly, for statements of position. Never "I".

length

Studio descriptions: one to two sentences. Film notes: two to three sentences, never more. Bios: three sentences.

what to name

Specific collaborators, specific festivals, specific institutions, specific years. Pinakothek, Nickl und Partner, mcml, Cannes, 2024.

avoid

Passionate, crafted, curated, bespoke, storytellers, video, creative content, vision, journey, boutique, premium. No exclamation marks.

01 · studio one-liner
A Munich studio working in three kinds of film — narrative, documentary, and commissioned work for cultural institutions.
02 · studio about · first paragraph
Third kind film is a Munich-based production studio founded by Nicole Humiński, Nikolai Huber, and Michele Cherchi Palmieri. The studio works across three kinds of film: narrative fiction, documentary, and commissioned work for museums, architects, and cultural institutions. It collaborates with directors and commissioning editors across Europe, with a particular affinity for projects that sit at the edge of cinema and exhibition space.
03 · film note · documentary
The True Type. A documentary by Nicole Humiński and Victor Muñoz Sanz, currently in production. [Film note to be drafted by the founders closer to release.]
04 · film note · commissioned
A short portrait of a building, made for the homepage of the architects who made it. The camera walks the rooms the way a first visitor would, and finds the stillness that usually only the architects see.
07

Information architecture

Five routes. Intentional shallowness — most studio sites are overbuilt and under-maintained. A smaller site is easier to keep honest.
/
Home. Wordmark, the one-liner, three to five recent works, link to full catalogue. Nothing else. The front page is a door, not a room.
/works
Works. Every film the studio has produced, filterable by kind. Newest first.
/works/[slug]
Single work. Title, kind tag, metadata (year, duration, country), a still or two, the two-sentence film note, full credits, festival awards. Previous / next navigation at the bottom.
/about
About. The studio paragraph. Three founder bios. Optional: a short statement of position — why three kinds? No photos of founders.
/contact
Contact. Email, Munich address, phone (optional), Vimeo / Instagram. No contact form — commissioners prefer email.

intentionally not included

  • blog / news / journal — studios that start a blog never maintain it. The works list is the news.
  • team page separate from about — three founders, one page.
  • services / what we do — the taxonomy says what you do.
  • testimonials — credits are better than quotes.
  • newsletter signup — not a publication.
  • case studies with metrics — not an agency.
08

Applications

The identity in six real contexts. Business card, email signature, opening title card, end credit card, press kit cover, and the small marks (favicon, avatar).
01 · business card — 85 × 55 mm · recto carries the studio, verso carries the person
third kindfilm
münchen
international coproduction
www.thirdkindfilm.com
michele cherchi palmieri
producer
michele@thirdkindfilm.com
+39 XXX XXX XXXX
02 · email signature — text only, no image logo, copies cleanly on reply
03 · opening title card — silent, wordmark alone, 3-second hold before the film
third kindfilm
04 · end credit card — last frame of the credit roll · the taxonomy reads as a signature line
third kindfilm
© 2024 · narrative · documentary · commissioned
05 · press kit cover — ceremonial three-weight wordmark · also catalogue spines, festival booklet covers
press kit volume one · 2024
third kind film
münchen iii.i – iii.v
06 · small marks — stacked wordmark inside a circle for avatars · 3K for favicons and browser tabs
third kind film
third kind film
avatar · 130 px · light + dark
3K
3K
3K
3K
favicon · 64 / 48 / 32 / 16 px