Archives

Symposium Fall 2022

PRIVATE CLIENT

SYMPOSIUM FALL 2022

ART DIRECITON / BRANDING / EVENT DESIGN

Symposium is a semiannual, multi-day event that celebrates the work accolades of a private company specializing in tech/communication. For Fall 2022, Affirma Consulting developed the core branding and art direction, while collaborating with several event planning organizations to provide full event design support. The event required everything from digital collateral to share on social media, to in-person event support—and everything in between!

My team met the initial standards and elevated the quality of work to create an atmosphere that was unmatched by previous iterations of the event.

This brand system, titled ‘Fall Deco’ is elegant, dazzling, and sophisticated. Art Deco-inspired gold patterns frame the classic Symposium logo and contrast against the dark velveteen background to create this elevated look/feel. The brand system is complimented by a delicate smoke motif, adding an organic touch to the sleek geometry. With this being the organization’s first in-person Fall Symposium after COVID-19, this brand system welcomes attendees back with celebration.

DIGITAL EVENT ASSETS

The client requested my team support on a digital asset package for use on social media, including a profile image, banner, and several event images. We also created PowerPoint templates for presenters.

LARGE-FORMAT SIGNAGE

The event required meterboard, easel, and banner signage. These pieces are crucial to placemaking and wayfinding, as large signage adds atmosphere and corrals large groups of people.

EVENT BADGES

This season, we opted for a dynamic badge styling. The metallic Fall 2022 logo is placed atop a velvety pine background, with smoke wafting in the foreground creating a marbled effect.

EVENT AGENDA

Our team was provided a long list of activities that take place over the course of the multi-day event. That information was synthesized into a clear/concise document with high-level overviews and scheduling.

STICKERS

Stickers are a common swag item for each Symposium. Our team typically provides a few simple options with the seasonal logo, and then branches out to more complex illustrative designs that lean more into the theme—in this case, it was Art Deco!

SOCKS

Symposium socks are a staple of each event and are highly coveted amongst attendees. With only a limited number ordered, and such a large fan-base, the design team has big shoes to fill each season! In Fall 2022, we dazzled with a delicate golden, scallop pattern.

Our team offers A/V for the support as well. While collaborating with an external A/V vendor for show running, our team develops looping stage animations, lower thirds, and live-stream assets to ensure each moment of event touchpoint collateral feels branded and considered. Our aim is always full design cohesion in the space, it’s online presence, and the lead-up marketing.

Our team created a design system that was so versatile, it covered over 80 individual assets, while still maintaining a sense of purpose and intrigue.

This project displayed the amazing skills our team is capable of. We created a design system that was so versatile, it covered over 80 individual assets, while still maintaining a sense of purpose and intrigue. We worked closely with event planners and A/V specialists to deliver full design coverage, and day-of support—ensuring our client’s event ran smoothly and looked beautiful simultaneously. From start to finish, project management maintained a steady timeline, with room to spare.

One of the major challenges of this regular engagement is that our team isn’t able to go on-site to ensure quality. Due to Affirma’s global nature, our design team has to create and deliver all assets while working remotely—both from the client and each other. Our consistent caliber of work has built strong relationships with stakeholders, vendors, and print/production contacts, allowing for better collaboration to ensure all items meet our high-quality standards, despite the distance we have to overcome.

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If you have a vision, let’s pair it with my flair for design! Feel free to send me an email to learn more about my experience, freelance rates, and availability.

Anniversary Series

PRIVATE CLIENT

ANNIVERSARY SERIES

ILLUSTRATION / ANIMATION

The Happy Anniversary Series is a collection of looping animations designed for a private client. The initial scope of work was to create a looping GIF celebrating work anniversaries for each month the company’s employees were assigned to work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the course of nine months, our team developed 24 concepts and 10 final looping animations spanning March through December of 2021.

Our team had a few points to keep in mind starting out. The client’s brand standards dictated the shape of the cake and the allowed colors to use in the illustrations. Fortunately, their color palette was expansive, and their design direction was minimal for the series. However, it was vital to the client that each month portrayed the seasons as accurately as humanly possible for their specific region.

In the initial stages, we spent days researching seasonal fruits, vegetables, and flora in the Farmer’s Almanac until we had a total of 24 concept sketches to pitch. Each concept featured a real cake made from seasonal fruits, and the background featured seasonal blooms. Once our concepts were fully fleshed out, the client narrowed the scope until each month had a single course of action.

Each month, I challenged myself to learn a new skill in Adobe After Effects. My favorite part of the final reel is seeing how far the production quality has come from its humble beginnings in March.

This series was particularly personal because it helped me develop as a motion graphics designer. Each month, I challenged myself to learn a new skill in Adobe After Effects. From learning a basic April rain effect to manipulating different warp and light settings to create a dramatic June heatwave, I was able to expand my toolkit along the way. My favorite part of the final reel is seeing how far the production quality has come from its humble beginnings in March.

LET'S CONNECT

If you have a vision, let’s pair it with my flair for design! Feel free to send me an email to learn more about my experience, freelance rates, and availability.

Yellowbird Hot Dip

YELLOWBIRD FOODS

HOT DIP

BRANDING / PACKAGING / ILLUSTRATION / WEB & ANIMATION

In the summer of 2020, Yellowbird Foods made its dip debut at Whole Foods Market nationwide. Made with 100% organic ingredients, Hot Dip’s visual identity took a lot of cues from the Yellowbird’s Whole30-approved organic sauce line that launched early 2019. With illustrations of fresh garden veggies and vibrant colors that pop right off the shelf, Hot Dip is the perfect addition to the nest.

To learn more about the process of this project, access my blog entry here: Branding a Product Line.

My team focused heavily on the journey our condiments take: from the pepper farm, to our kitchen in beautiful San Marcos, straight to your Friday night feast. Hot Dip’s illustrative direction is primarily inspired by floral prints found on oilcloth. We champion anything that encourages us to play with our food — no matter how messy we get.

Our illustrations are brought to life by a key component of our brand identity: color. Much like our other sauces, color acts to differentiate different flavors of dip. Hot Dip utilizes a mostly-monochromatic, surrealist approach to color. The ingredient illustrations harmonize with the background’s overarching color; however, the radiant leaves interrupt the monotonous monochrome with sparks of unexpected contrasting hues inspired by Sandy Skoglund’s A Breeze at Work (1987). This adds a visual interest that would be lacking otherwise.

We complimented our lush illustrations and unexpected color palette typographically with heavier letter forms as a reference to the thick, rich consistency of the dip.

Compositionally, we were driven by the cyclical form of our dip container and used it as a method of story-telling. The lid has a border of fiery ingredients arranged in a circle to reflect on our commitment to holistic and clean nutrition. The Bird peaks out from his garden of fiery produce to challenge our Flock to think beyond the chip. Hot Dip is a journey. Once you buy it, you embark on an experience that’s hotter than a pedicab seat on a summer day. When you open your first tub of Hot Dip, the inside lid surprises you with a literal wave of flavor. It encourages you to dip, dunk, and drench any food to make it infinitely yummier. Make sure to put down an oilcloth — things are going to get messy.

LET'S CONNECT

If you have a vision, let’s pair it with my flair for design! Feel free to send me an email to learn more about my experience, freelance rates, and availability.

Power BI e-Books

MICROSOFT POWER BI

E-BOOK SERIES

PUBLICATION / WEB & ANIMATION

Microsoft approached Affirma Consulting looking for a series of five eBooks advertising different unique selling points of Power BI—each speaking to independent user experiences. One of the main goals was to develop final InDesign and PDF files that offered an interactive experience that was certified as entirely accessible.


10 Reasons Customers Choose Power BI

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It’s a privilege to go through Microsoft’s Power Platform standards and create this series building an innovative design system for these eBooks off of Microsoft’s established regulations. Because my team isn’t internal to Microsoft, gathering resources was an interesting process. A large part of design was sourcing existing imagery from Microsoft’s website. I found myself pulling iconography and illustrations from the Power BI website and generating my own—mimicking the different styles.

What couldn’t be pulled from Microsoft, we sourced from licensed stock photography that was Photoshopped to match the predetermined look and feel. By the end of the project, the team had our own asset library of different photography, iconography, and illustrations. It was important to have variety and not lean on one form of visual because the stakeholders were looking for something new, exciting, and inclusive—all while following brand standards.

Microsoft’s heavy emphasis on accessible content ensures everyone can interact with their brand. This practice opened my eyes to new ways of communicating with a broader audience, and I found new marketing opportunities I hadn’t previously considered as a designer.


Drive Your Data Culture

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Designing in an interactive space that must be 100% accessible presents several challenges when it comes to layout and type design. Across all eBooks, type contrast, legibility, and flow were a key priority to cater towards individuals that live with some sort of visual impairment. I spent additional time and care to provide alt. text describing images and infographics, as well.

This practice opened my eyes to new ways of communicating with a broader audience. Additionally, I wanted a beautiful layout that could easily translate to a plain-reader view for those with cognitive impairments that have difficulty determining reading order. Microsoft’s heavy emphasis on accessible content ensures everyone can interact with their brand, not just a select few.


Power BI + Azure Synapse

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Build Unique Experiences with Power BI Embedded

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Data culture maturity roadmap: Five steps to build a data culture

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LET'S CONNECT

If you have a vision, let’s pair it with my flair for design! Feel free to send me an email to learn more about my experience, freelance rates, and availability.