165 design references

Pacôme Pertant · project names as navigation

Reel by Andrew Chornyy

A column of project titles is a menu. If those titles do not say what the studio does, a new visitor has nothing solid to click.

Visit website · Pacôme Pertant

What to look at

A dark page holds one centered column of white titles: Paths of life, The disease spread on Tiktok, Ah, Psychedelics, Thought, Jupiter, Chromatik, Digital Travel, Mercedes AMG, The purity revealed. No job line sits with them. A small picture lands on one title at a time and moves down the column, covering part of the words. Then the titles leave and the pictures float loose on the grid, tilted, with no names. A white caption stays: "Beautiful. But nobody gets it." The yellow line ends on "understand what this is."

A small picture sits on Jupiter and covers the title, while the rest of the column stays as words only.
A small picture sits on Jupiter and covers the title, while the rest of the column stays as words only.
The titles are gone. The pictures float on the grid with no names left to read.
The titles are gone. The pictures float on the grid with no names left to read.

Why it works

Those titles are the navigation. Nielsen Norman Group says a menu also tells people the scope of the place, and it is not where you get cute with words that do not describe the work. Jakob Nielsen's line, quoted there, is that "life is too short to click on things you don't understand." Jupiter and Thought have weak information scent for a stranger: the words do not say motion, sound, or client. A picture can add scent beside a label, but it should not replace the label. A picture that depends on a pointer is also missing on a phone, because hover is not there. Andrew says a new visitor will not understand what this is. The page source today does say he is a motion and sound designer in Paris. That line is not on the list in the reel.

Try it

  1. Put one plain line above the project list, such as "Motion and sound, Paris," so the titles are not the only clue.
  2. Keep each project name, and add three or four words of what it is, such as "short film" or "Mercedes film," in the list itself.
  3. Show the preview beside the name, not on top of the words, and show a still preview on a phone without waiting for a pointer.
  4. Leave the name on the picture view. A floating card with no title makes the visitor start over.
  5. Keep a way in that does not depend on sound. The live gate already offers enter without sound.

What it costs

Writing a sentence on every project turns a short poster list into a page, and people who already know the work can scan Jupiter faster than a description. A preview that only appears on hover also fails for anyone without a pointer. Nielsen Norman Group flags menus that open only on hover for that reason.

Words worth knowing

Sources