Brand book and how everything works

Everything M4 is and how we make it, in one place: the idea and the voice, the logo, colour and type, every Instagram format with its measurements, the templates and how to use them, video and motion, the rubrics, and how the team works. It is the reference for everyone who makes M4, inside and outside the studio.

Each chapter gives the idea first and the rules after. When a rule here and a habit disagree, the rule wins; when the rule doesn’t fit a real case, ask the creative director and we update the book.

1. Armenian first. English follows as a second, smaller line.

2. White leads, deep green speaks. White backgrounds; deep green for titles and the logo; road-sign green for the road, the forest and the English line.

3. Use the files. Never retype the logo; start every post from a template.

M4-ի գաղափարը զարկերակն է, շարժումը։

The idea of M4 is the pulse: movement. Everyone in Armenia knows the M4, the road to Dilijan. The journal is the journey.

Everyday life in Yerevan's traffic jams needs a rethink. Life, from culture and raves to specialty coffee, politics and what to cook tonight, doesn't begin and end in Yerevan, much as we love it. M4 is the pulse: every road that takes us to something new. We go as far as we can, meet people who live closer to real life than to Yerevan, hear their stories, and watch closely (and take part in) how every town in the country grows and is kept. Maybe one day the whole country will be as alive as Yerevan, and better kept.

1. 01Ճանաչող, տեսնող և ուրիշների համար բացահայտողKnows, sees, and finds things for others
2. 02Հետաքրքրասեր, ոչ տուրիստիկCurious, not touristy
3. 03Ջերմ, ոչ քաղցր ու ջրիկWarm, not sweet or soppy
4. 04Լոկալ, մերոնքական, ոչ թե էլիտիստLocal, one of us, never elitist

1. Go where the locals go. The bakery, the bus stop, the garage, not the viewpoint everyone posts.

2. Let people speak. Their words, their dialect, their story. We ask and listen.

3. No postcards. No clichés, no “hidden gems”. The place as it is, honestly.

4. Eyes open, heart open. Respect for everyone, never looking down, never romanticising.

1. Հիմնական լեզուն՝ հայերեն (անգլերեն ենթագրեր, այս դեպքում լեզուն կորոշվի նյութի կոնտեքստից և նպատակից)

2. Դիմելաձև՝ Դուք

3. 80% դեպքերում պատմողական, անշտապ, փաստահեն, նկարագրողական և ավելի storytelling-ի վրա հիմնված կոնտենտ, ոչ թե clickbait։ Պահպանենք քաղաքի ռիթմն ու շունչը։

4. Սլենգ՝ հազվադեպ, բարբառ՝ հաճախ, հումորը՝ սարկաստիկ և նրբանկատ

5. Էմոջիներ՝ ոչ

1. Armenian first. The caption, the title, the subtitle: Armenian leads. English is the second line, shorter.

2. Դուք, always. The polite “you”, in posts and in replies.

3. No emoji. Not in captions, not in titles, not in stories.

4. No Russian. Armenian with English subtitles, nothing else.

5. Dialect yes, when it is the person’s own. Slang rarely. Humour dry and tactful.

6. Quotation marks: «…» in Armenian, “…” in English. Numbers as digits: 27, 100 km, 15 Nov.

7. Unhurried. Storytelling, fact-based, descriptive. Never clickbait.

Ամեն ինչի մասին խոսում ենք մեծ հարգանքով, ոչ մի դեպքում չպետք է զգացվի «քաղաքից եկածների» վերաբերմունքը, ոչնչին վերևից չենք նայում, որևէ դեպքում չենք տարանջատում գյուղ-քաղաք-մայրաքաղաք կոնտեքստը։

Չենք ռոմանտիզացնում, բայց չենք էլ անվանում ռեգիոնալ, գավառական և այլն։

Մեդիան դիտարկում է երևույթները բաց աչքերով ու բաց սրտով, տալով ազնիվ գնահատականներ։

An example, not a real post. The hashtags are our proposal.

Click a colour to copy its HEX.

Roughly, across a month of posts: white leads and gives the air; deep green carries the type and the logo; road-sign green draws the road and the forest; mint is rare.

1. No other greens. The photos bring every other colour.

2. White leads. A post is photo and white; deep green is the type, not the background.

3. Mint, rarely, on deep green only. On white, the second colour is road-sign green.

4. Flat colour only: no gradients, no dashed lines, no shadows, no see-through boxes. Hard edges.

5. Print: ask the studio for CMYK and Pantone values made from these on the printer’s profile.

1. One family for both scripts. Armenian and English always in Noto, so they match.

2. English one step down: smaller, in road-sign green on white (mint only on deep green).

3. No capitals for Armenian text. Latin labels may be capitals (+8 % spacing).

4. Titles: three lines at most. Break lines by meaning, not by width.

5. Left aligned. Centred only for subtitles, highlight covers and the end card.

6. Email and apps that can’t load fonts: Arial or Helvetica, the same sizes.

M4 is drawn the Bauhaus way: a strict grid, flat colour, a few plain shapes and big type. Nothing is decoration; every mark carries the number, the place or the road. No gradients, no dashed lines, no shadows, no see-through boxes.

1. №: the post’s running number since the launch, three digits (№ 001 on 16 November). It never restarts.

2. The rubric in Armenian, then the date as 16.11.2026; on a carousel the counter (01 / 08) takes the date’s place.

3. NSA SemiBold 26 px, the number in road-sign green, the rest in deep green; a 2 px deep green hairline 30 px under it.

1. The grid first. Everything sits on the 12 columns and the 80 px margins.

2. The meta line and the dot are on every post; besides them, one device at most: the circles, a big number, the M4 pattern, the road or the forest.

3. Devices on white, never over a photo; the dot is the one shape that sits on a photo’s edge.

4. Shapes stay pure: circles round, lines parallel, gaps even. Don’t stretch, add or recolour parts.

5. Type over a photo sits on a solid strip or panel (Km 11), never on a tint or a fade.

6. Downloads are in Km 15.

1. People and places, never one without the other for long. A road with a driver, a market with a seller.

2. Eye level. We stand where the person stands. Drones only to show the road, briefly.

3. Natural light. Morning and late afternoon; fog and rain are welcome.

4. The road returns. Windows, signs, kilometre posts, the M4 itself: our recurring image.

5. Honest. No staged “Armenian Switzerland” postcards. The place as it is today.

6. No generated images. Everything we post is shot by us or credited.

1. True greens, skin warm and natural, shadows soft, highlights kept.

2. One M4 grade for every post in a month, made by the studio; no app filters on top.

3. Black and white only for archive photos (Dilijan in 1910, for example).

1. 9:16 first, 1080 × 1920, 25 fps. Shoot wide enough to crop a 4:5 photo from it.

2. Steady, slow moves; handheld when we walk with someone.

3. Record the place’s sound: the road, the market, the rain. It carries the story under the music.

The name and bio are our proposal; Sona and the PM confirm the final wording. Highlight covers: one shape per rubric (an arch, a triangle, a circle, a ring, a square); Instagram prints the name under it.

How the profile grid shows posts: the middle 3:4 of every post and reel cover.

1. Every day, one post: 27–31 a month. Reels and photo posts alternate; a quote now and then.

2. 7 in 10 are the journal’s own stories, 3 in 10 Green Rock’s, told in the same voice and the same templates.

3. The grid reads as one page: photos above, white below, the dot on every edge, the meta line counting the days; now and then a poster.

4. Stories every day from the road; the best go to a highlight.

1. Cover: the photo post, with the counter (01 / 08) in the meta line instead of the date.

2. Inside: white, the meta line with the counter, the slide’s number big in road-sign green, a heading and up to six short lines; one thought per slide.

3. Last slide: the three circles (Yerevan, Sevan, Dilijan), one line, the big logo and @m4.mag. No arrows, no “swipe”.

1. For openings and news: the launch, a new rubric, an event, Green Rock news. A few a month, never two in a row.

2. Three kinds: the M4 pattern (the logo set tight in rows), the road, or the forest; all on white in road-sign green. No photo on a poster.

3. The title top left (NSA Black at 75 % width, 104 px), two or three short lines of text under it.

4. The meta line on top, as on every post. The logo bottom right; with the forest, top right under the meta line.

1. The app posts a reel without a separate cover, so Instagram takes the reel’s first frame as its cover.

2. Until the app can send a cover: make the first frame of the reel the finished cover (one frame, 0.04 s at 25 fps, from the reel-cover template), then the hook starts. Or the admin sets the cover by hand in Instagram right after posting.

3. Either way the grid shows a proper cover, and the reel itself still opens on the story, not the logo.

1. Install the two fonts from Km 15 (Noto Sans Armenian, Noto Serif Armenian). Restart Figma.

2. Drag the SVG into Figma. It opens at its real size with the text editable.

3. Place the photo: select the grey PHOTO frame, Fill → Image, choose your photo, Crop to taste.

4. Edit the words: the meta line (number, rubric, date), the Armenian title (up to three lines), the English line. Keep sizes and positions.

5. Titles: in Figma’s type settings set Noto Sans Armenian to Black, and Width to 75.

6. Check against the measured page in Km 9: margins 80 px, nothing outside the 3:4 middle.

7. Export JPG at 1× (1080 px wide), sRGB, quality 90. The PM app posts JPG only. Name it as below.

date_rubric_title, all lower case in Latin letters, words joined by underscores; videos add a version: _v01, _v02.

2026-11-16_avtostop_samvel.jpg · 2026-11-18_mardik_ani_v02.mp4

The video templates (title, lower third, subtitles, the route, the end card) follow the rules in Km 11. The producers build and keep them in the studio’s video system; they appear here as they are ready.

1. Armenian first, English second, no emoji.

2. The meta line filled in (number, rubric, date); one title, one English line.

3. The photo has people or a place at eye level; the grade is the M4 grade.

4. Nothing important in the 34 px the grid cuts, or under Instagram’s bars.

5. JPG, sRGB, 1080 px wide, named date_rubric_title.

6. The PM has the approval for anything about a Green Rock brand.

1. The story first. The first 2 seconds hook with a question or a face; no logo at the start.

2. Calm, like a good drive. Straight cuts; motion only where it explains something.

3. One transition, the road: its lanes sweep across the frame together in 0.5 s and clear it. Everything else is a straight cut; no cross-fades between shots.

4. Armenian first on screen too; English as the second line, in road-sign green.

1. Always on. Most people watch without sound.

2. Armenian on top (NSA SemiBold 46 px, deep green), English below (NSA 36 px, road-sign green).

3. Two lines at most, about 32 characters a line, centred.

4. Always in the same place: a solid white box from 1310 to 1460 px of 1920, above the reel’s caption zone.

5. With a lower third, the subtitles stay put; the lower third sits above them (1066–1280 px).

1. 1080 × 1920, 25 fps, H.264, high bitrate. Reels 30–90 s; a rubric may run to 2 minutes.

2. Music under the place’s own sound: calm, organic, licensed (Artlist).

3. Loudness about −14 LUFS; voices always above the music.

4. End card on every reel; covers made from the reel-cover template.

5. The cover as the first frame (one frame, 0.04 s) while the app can’t send a cover: see Km 9.

1. @m4.mag, the home of M4. Every post, every day.

2. Everything in Km 9 to 12 is for Instagram first.

1. A connected page that carries the same posts as Instagram, automatically.

2. Nothing made for it on its own. The same avatar and cover.