The research presented here is just a summary of a broader and more detailed analysis, developed for a Master Thesis in Communication Design at Polytechnic University of Milan, titled Fictional Brand Design. The book is now available for purchase.

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The practice of branding can be traced back to ancient times when pottery fragments and inscriptions were found inside tombs bearing traces of identifying signs and symbols belonging to various populations in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. Over time, these symbols began to be used as indicators of quality and ownership. During the Middle Ages, ranchers branded their livestock and soldiers were branded with the monogram or emblem of their lord. Monograms, which were originally a single letter decorated with special designs, were used by rulers in the Holy Roman Empire to mark written messages and other forms of communication. Heraldry brought the use of images of animals and birds associated with objects of power to represent various noble houses, castles, and cities.

In Japan during the same time period, stylized monochrome representations of plants or animals enclosed in a circle called "mon" began to be used. With the onset of the colonial era, the first examples of corporate identity were developed. The first joint-stock companies were born, allowing a range of private investors to share in the risk and profits of these trading missions. The Dutch East India Company was one of the first in history to develop a corporate identity, which was stamped on all ships, arms, flags, colonial settlements, maps, coins, and even slaves.

In the 18th century, as businesses expanded their trading boundaries and new classes of consumers entered the market, it became more important than ever for each supplier to distinguish itself from the competition. The coat of arms of business owners often became their first logo. However, more abstract aesthetic choices were scarce until the red triangle of English brewer William Bass, dating from 1875, which is one of the earliest examples of a purely abstract logo. At the beginning of the 20th century, Peter Behrens was hired as the art director of the Allgemeine Elektricitäts Gesellschaft (AEG), a Berlin-based company operating in electromechanics and electrical engineering. He is considered the father of corporate identity, the graphic expression of a company's vision and values, and was one of the founding members of the Deutsche Werkbund, an association whose aim was to combine the development of industry with the applied arts to make German companies competitive in the international market.

The arrival of many German designers in the United States helped to spread early twentieth-century European ideas into the American corporate market. The Swiss Style of typography established itself successfully beginning in the 1950s, in part due to the founding of the first design studios that were responsible for designing the first coordinated identity systems in the modern sense of the term, for the multinational corporations of the time. These studios redefined the concept of corporate identity, giving it the meaning it still refers to today, with the use of a set of rules and principles such as the use of grids, simple layouts, strict typographic choices and geometric logos. By the late 1960s, the development of a corporate image had become the norm for any company that wanted to give an up-to-date self-image. The ideas and personal tastes of individual designers were gradually replaced by systematic and rational approaches, managed by increasingly large studios and teams. The introduction of identity manuals helped create order and consistency in the application of the logo in all its manifestations.

Today, branding is an intricate discipline that brings together numerous interconnected elements, each of which needs to be carefully regulated to create a cohesive brand image. To understand the mechanics governing branding, it is useful to analyze its constituent elements.

Each branding project has the primary objective of developing a brand design language, which is the visual expression of the brand. This is the fundamental means for consumers to recognize and remember the brand and must be codified down to the smallest detail, including the name, logo, colors, typography, and use of images.

The development of joint-stock companies in England, which were primarily associated with the exploitation of overseas colonies, made the British public one of the first to develop a growing skepticism of private enterprises, after numerous scandals, war crimes, and tax frauds associated with companies such as the East India Company and the South Sea Company. This sentiment was reflected in works of fiction such as Charles Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewit and Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now, which criticized the deceptive and fraudulent practices of businesses during the Railway Mania period.

A growing criticism of private corporations that emerged again in the 1960s, as intellectuals warned of their increasing influence and power. Works such as William Whyte's The Organization Man and Sloan Wilson's The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit reflected this sentiment, highlighting the conformity and lack of individualism encouraged by corporate culture. Ian Fleming's Operation Thunder depicts a criminal organization known as SPECTRE, organized along corporate lines and driven solely by profit. This depiction reflected a growing concern about the unethical practices of corporations and their potential to act with impunity.
The 1980s marked a significant shift in the relationship between private companies and the state, with the rise of neoliberalism and the ideologies of politicians such as Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. This era saw a push towards deregulation and privatization, with the emphasis on free market ideals, individual freedom, and limited government intervention. One of the leading proponents of this thinking was the economist Milton Friedman, who famously argued in his book Capitalism and Freedom, that the only social responsibility of a business is to increase the profits for its shareholders.
This worldview has had a profound impact on popular culture, particularly in science fiction. Films like Soylent Green and the Alien franchise depict corporations as faceless, heartless entities that prioritize profits over people. In these movies, corporate interests often result in dystopian futures, where the Earth is overpopulated, overheated, and undernourished, and where resources are controlled by a powerful few. Even in children's animated films like WALL•E, we see the theme of unbounded corporate greed causing catastrophes. In the movie, a corporation called Buy n Large controls all sectors of business and infiltrates the political system, rendering the Earth uninhabitable.

This depiction of corporations as villains has become so common that it is now a cliche. However, it is not without merit. Real-world examples like the Enron scandal and the 2008 financial crisis caused by the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers have further exacerbated the public's mistrust of big business. The rise of IT companies and their unchecked access to consumer data in the digital age has only heightened these concerns. Television shows like Black Mirror take this concept to its logical extreme, depicting a near-future in which startups exploit data and technology unscrupulously and unrestrictedly. In this world, companies prioritize profits over ethics and morality, resulting in a society that is in chaos.

The history of graphic design in film can be traced back to the early 20th century, when films were silent, and intertitles were used to provide additional information to the viewer. D.W. Griffith was a pioneer in using intertitles to establish narrative continuity in his films, and he used different fonts, backgrounds, and visual compositions to distinguish between opening credits, dialogue, and narration.

The introduction of sound in the mid-1930s changed the language of film and the relationship between films and viewers. Expository intertitles continued to be used, but their function became more selective and creative. Graphic designs in films can be divided into three main categories: opening and closing credits, expository intertitles, and diegetic graphic objects. The European film industry dominated the international market before World War I, but the war destabilized it, and Hollywood saw this as an opportunity to establish its worldwide hegemony. The Hollywood system controlled all aspects of the film industry, including production and distribution, and gave rise to the Golden Age of Hollywood. Art directors played an important role in film production, managing the work of other art directors and members of various departments. European film movements, such as German expressionism, Italian neorealism, and the French nouvelle-vague, challenged the dominance of Hollywood, but it was in the United States that an important milestone was reached regarding the role of design and designers in cinema. William Cameron Menzies was awarded the title of production designer for his work on Gone with the Wind, which expanded the function of the art director beyond the creation of sets and scenery to include the responsibility for visualizing a motion picture.

The concept of world-building in media studies refers to the process of creating and developing detailed and coherent fictional worlds within narrative media texts, such as films, video games, or novels. This process involves the creation of a fictional setting rich in culture, history, and geography, often including its own rules, laws, and technologies. Mark J. P. Wolf, a professor at Concordia University, wrote the book Building Imaginary Worlds: The Theory and History of Subcreation (2012) to investigate the practice of world-building. Wolf traces the practice back to Homer's Odyssey, where the islands visited by Ulysses during his travels constitute one of the first fictional narrative worlds in history. Some scholars even believe that the ability to devise imaginary worlds is innate to humans and derives from the evolutionary process. Before this subject became of interest in academia, authors such as J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis had already discussed and theorized about the creation of fictional worlds. Tolkien used the term "subcreation" to refer to this process, where the prefix "sub" differentiates it from divine creation, which originates from nothing and on which everything else depends.

In the field of video games, the technique of environmental storytelling has become increasingly important over the years. This level design approach deals with creating game environments that can tell a story to the player passing through them, without relying on direct exposition like character dialogues or cutscenes. Instead, the story is conveyed through the elements that characterize and populate the scenario.

Transmedia storytelling has become a popular topic of discussion in the research world over the past two decades. The concept was first introduced by Henry Jenkins, who defined it as a story that unfolds across multiple media platforms, with each new text making a distinctive and valuable contribution to the whole.

Whenever a real brand appears in entertainment products, specifically in film, television series, and video games, there are two possible scenarios: product placement and creative choice.

Visual identity redesign is an important process that every company or institution goes through at some point in their lifespan. Whether big or small, this process has an impact on the coordinated identity of the brand. The reasons for a visual identity redesign can vary, from keeping up with the times and staying competitive in a constantly evolving market to responding to a crisis in the company, redefining values, or embarking on new business directions.

There are many examples of fictional brands that have transcended their original narratives and have appeared across multiple works that are not connected in any way. These fictional brands can be divided into two groups: those that are created by a particular author and those that are created by prop houses.

In recent years, marketing strategies for movies, TV shows, and video games have shifted to actively engaging the fictional brands present in the narratives. These highly articulated operations integrate multiple touchpoints, from digital such as websites and apps, to billboards, installations, and even dedicated events. The campaigns leverage the communicative power of graphic design elements within the stories to create user engagement by bringing users into the narrative world. By exploring the parallel story of the fictional brand, users can expand their horizons and explore aspects of the brand that may not be explored in the original work. Sometimes these interventions take cues from the work and develop them further. The advertising campaign must be coordinated with the production to ensure that it doesn't present a misleading and different image of the fictional brand than the original authors intended. There are many different types of approaches to these campaigns, from the most minimal to the most elaborate and complex.

Defictionalization, also known as reverse product placement, is the process of transforming a fictitious brand into a real one that exists outside of the fiction that originated it. Scholars Muzellec, Lynn, and Lambkin identified four different types of brand types, including product placement, Proto-Brands, conventional brands, and reverse product placement.

In today's entertainment industry, cultivating a community of loyal fans has become increasingly important for large companies. This involves developing editorial and engagement plans that can engage fans of the product as much as possible, bringing them together via online channels, mainly through social networks, and beyond. The production of merchandise can also prove to be a great revenue opportunity, particularly in the presence of a loyal audience that wants to own something physical related to the audiovisual product. A fictional brand within the narrative can facilitate this process, as it can be an extremely versatile means of attracting the interests of fans of the film, series, or video game in question. Having a logo and a coordinated identity that refers to a given audiovisual product gives the possibility to generate numerous series of content and applications, imitating the practices found in real branding projects.