Metis Brand Standards for Proposal PDFs

Applied brand standards as used in the Citi CRS Proposal. These are the values you use in the build script — no guessing, no approximation.

Colors

from reportlab.lib.colors import HexColor, Color

DARK_NAVY   = HexColor('#20216f')  # Primary headings, section dividers, metric numbers on dark
MED_BLUE    = HexColor('#256ba2')  # Secondary accents, colored bands, 2x2 matrix cells
MINT        = HexColor('#3cdbc0')  # Highlights, accent bars, eyebrow labels, small arrows
GRAY        = HexColor('#7b8692')  # Body supporting text, captions, footer text
DARK_GRAY   = HexColor('#333333')  # Primary body text
LIGHT_BG    = HexColor('#f4f6fa')  # Card backgrounds, metric card backgrounds
TEAL_LIGHT  = HexColor('#e8f8f5')  # Callout box backgrounds
WHITE_CLR   = HexColor('#ffffff')

Supplementary colors used in 2x2 matrices and pillar bands:

• Light cool gray: #e8eef5
• Light mint: #dff0ee
• Deep teal: #1a8a7a
• Near-black navy: #1a2040

Color role assignments

Typography

Primary font: Calibri (Windows fallback, matches Metis PowerPoint brand) Ideal font: Open Sans from Google Fonts (matches whitepaper standard) — only if Playwright is in the stack; ReportLab uses registered TTF fonts, so Calibri is cleaner on Windows builds

Register fonts at the top of the build script

from reportlab.pdfbase import pdfmetrics
from reportlab.pdfbase.ttfonts import TTFont

pdfmetrics.registerFont(TTFont('Calibri',         'C:/Windows/Fonts/calibri.ttf'))
pdfmetrics.registerFont(TTFont('Calibri-Bold',    'C:/Windows/Fonts/calibrib.ttf'))
pdfmetrics.registerFont(TTFont('Calibri-Italic',  'C:/Windows/Fonts/calibrii.ttf'))
pdfmetrics.registerFont(TTFont('Calibri-Light',   'C:/Windows/Fonts/calibril.ttf'))

Size hierarchy

Type rules

• No italics in body text. Italic is reserved for pull quotes, figure captions, and purpose statements in pillar cards.
• No color besides the palette. Never introduce red, orange, yellow — those would break the visual language.
• No more than 3 type sizes in a single layout (title, body, caption is the typical triad). Metric cards and callouts can add a 4th.

Logos

All three logo variants are at G:\Shared drives\Knowledge Management\New Brand Assets\Metis Strategy Logo\:

LOGO_DIR = 'G:/Shared drives/Knowledge Management/New Brand Assets/Metis Strategy Logo/'
LOGO_BM  = LOGO_DIR + 'Metis Strategy Black-Mint RGB Logo.png'   # Black wordmark + mint M
LOGO_WM  = LOGO_DIR + 'Metis Strategy White-Mint RGB logo.png'   # White wordmark + mint M (FOR DARK PAGES)
LOGO_W   = LOGO_DIR + 'Metis Strategy White RGB logo.png'        # All-white (rarely used)

Placement rules

Critical helper function

Use this place_image pattern — plain drawImage with width only and preserveAspectRatio=True is unreliable across ReportLab versions:

def place_image(path, x, y, w=None, h=None, mask='auto'):
    """Place an image. Specify w or h (or both). y is bottom edge.
    Computes the missing dimension from aspect ratio for consistent rendering."""
    try:
        if w is not None and h is None:
            img = PILImage.open(path)
            aspect = img.size[0] / img.size[1]
            h = w / aspect
        elif h is not None and w is None:
            img = PILImage.open(path)
            aspect = img.size[0] / img.size[1]
            w = h * aspect
        c.drawImage(path, x, y, width=w, height=h, mask=mask, preserveAspectRatio=True)
    except Exception as e:
        print(f'  WARNING: Could not place image {os.path.basename(path)}: {e}')

This uses PIL to read the image's aspect ratio, then passes explicit width AND height to drawImage. Without this, logos rendered as 0-height on some pages in the Citi build.

Graphic Devices

At G:\Shared drives\Knowledge Management\New Brand Assets\Graphic Devices\:

GD         = 'G:/Shared drives/Knowledge Management/New Brand Assets/Graphic Devices/'
TRAJECTORY = GD + 'Metis Trajectory Device RGB.png'
NEXUS      = GD + 'Metis Nexus Device Opaque RGB.png'
ENERGY     = GD + 'Metis Energy Device RGB.png'
ARROW_DEV  = GD + 'Metis Arrow Device Opaque RGB.png'
SNGL_ARROW = GD + 'Metis SnglArrow Device RGB.png'  # Small, 9pt accent next to eyebrows

Device application rules

Opacity rules

These matter. The wrong opacity makes the device either invisible (too low) or competes with content (too high). Tested values:

• Trajectory on cover: 0.20
• Trajectory on divider: 0.15
• Trajectory on closing: 0.12
• Nexus on divider: 0.15
• Energy as background texture: 0.04
• Arrow opaque as corner feature: 0.04

Common mistake: forgetting the single arrow next to eyebrows

Every eyebrow label on every content page should have the single-arrow device 9pt × 9pt to its left. It's a small detail that distinguishes a Metis document from generic PDF output.

def eyebrow(text, y, x=48):
    c.setFont('Calibri-Bold', 8.5)
    c.setFillColor(MINT)
    try:
        c.drawImage(SNGL_ARROW, x, y - 1, width=9, height=9,
                    mask='auto', preserveAspectRatio=True)
    except: pass
    c.drawString(x + 14, y, text.upper())

Stock Photography

B&W photo library at G:\Shared drives\Knowledge Management\New Brand Assets\PPT Assets\Metis PPT Images\. Use these on photo-left problem pages and case study pages.

Selection guidelines:

Photo overlay requirement

B&W photos must always have a dark overlay to ensure text legibility:

photo_w = W * 0.40
c.drawImage(PHOTO_BW, 0, 0, width=photo_w, height=H, mask=None)
c.setFillColor(Color(0, 0, 0, 0.50))  # 50% black overlay
c.rect(0, 0, photo_w, H, fill=1, stroke=0)

Overlay opacity 0.45–0.50 is the sweet spot. Below 0.40, text is hard to read. Above 0.55, photos look muddy.

Brand Line

"Driving change. Elevating leaders."

Usage:

• Closing page, bottom-left, mint, 9pt Calibri (not bold)
• Optional inclusion in cover page footer

Never use in body text, callouts, or page titles.

What You Do Not Use

Even though these are brand-adjacent, they are out of scope for proposal PDFs:

• Purple (#762cb3) — reserved for spoke/domain accents in hub-spoke diagrams built in PPTX
• Light blue background (#cbe1f3) — reserved for tag pills
• Tier gradient colors (#D1E3F1 / #A3C7E3 / #75ABD5) — only for pricing tables
• "METIS" without the M logo mark

Stick to the palette and devices above. The proposal should feel like a consistent artifact in a family of Metis materials, not a one-off design.