The Objective
Create and design a brand identity for our annual portfolio review at Tyler School of Art and Architecture, and produce the event for the graduating seniors in the graphic and interactive design program.
The Production Manager
As the Production Manager, I ensured the deliverables for the event were produced correctly. This will include getting pricing for the production of everything and working with the project manager on the budget. Another aspect of this job was to review all files for accuracy and keep the job files organized. For the Create team, I also organized the photoshoot of the graduating BFA and MFA students and collected all the information needed for the production of the deliverables.
Meet The Team
Our team was selected out of 20-30 students in Event Design. The six of us interviewed for positions on the Create team and were each selected for a specific position that our professors felt we would be a great fit for.
Having the opportunity to work with a team on a real-life event was not only insightful but also a huge learning experience. Being able to have such an important event put into the hands of our small team was an exciting challenge I looked forward to taking on.
The pandemic hit during my freshman year of college and cut off a lot of connections and friendships I was just beginning to form. I like to think that human beings are social creatures, who find a lot of joy in personal connections. Having classes shut down and transitioning to online was extremely lonely for everyone, but transitioning back was even more difficult. It was truly an amazing experience to not only be in a class with fellow creatives but get to work beside them on the same project. Working with this team gave me the opportunity to be more outgoing, and form close friendships with people I’d seen over a screen for most of college.
We were able to discuss our own ideas and bounce new ones off of each other. Having people around to ask questions and suggest different creative directions, taught me to look at my designs in a different way. We each took on our own responsibilities, from brand identity to sign-up sheets for the senior GAID students, and even finding portfolio reviewers for our event. Although we each took on our own set of tasks, we still had each other to suggest new ideas and help deal with creative roadblocks, along with working cohesively as a group. Having the motivation and extra support from a team, helped to bring to life an event that we were all extremely proud of.
The Event
Create is a virtual portfolio review event, held each spring semester. The event gives senior BFA and MFA GAID students valuable feedback on their work before they graduate and start their professional careers. This year, the event is being held on Wednesday, May 3rd, from 2:00 pm - 5:30 pm.
Each student is given the chance to review their portfolio with six reviewers. These reviewers signed up to look at the graphic design students work, who are graduating this spring, 2023. Each student will have their own virtual meeting room, where reviewers will meet with them during 30-minute slots, with a break from 3:30 pm-4:00 pm.
I’m excited to share this event with my classmates and reviewers, and I’m proud of the time and work my team put in these past four months. From branding to social media to share students’ work, we created a well-rounded, flushed-out event for our soon-to-be graduates to experience.
Concept & Logo
Creating a Logo
The first step as a team was to create a logo and concept for the 2023 Create event. We dove into research and looked at what this event could achieve and what it was trying to say.
After considering “design and conquer” “design in motion” and “branching out”, we found the third concept fit what we were trying to achieve through this event.
We created multiple secondary logos, including horizontal and vertical, along with an icon to represent the brand.
Concept
The bursts and other icons used in the responsive logos, along with the open box outline, were a way to show movement through the logo concept.
Branching out was a way to express what the graduating designers are looking to do after graduation. The opportunity to meet portfolio reviewers and learn from outside experience is a way to grow and improve as a designer.
Social Media
The team was responsible for posting on the Tyler GAID Instagram account, to raise awareness for the create event. We accomplished this by posting on our feed, along with using reels and stories for more engagement. We were also responsible for posting each graduating BFA and MFA GAID student, to show some of their work and personality to the viewers.
Each team member took on responsibilities for social media, while still creating cohesive work that fit under our branding for CREATE.
Reminders for Portfolio Review
Reminders were created as posts on the GAID Instagram feed, along with stories to spread the word about the event, and let people know they could sign up for the annual portfolio review. These included countdowns and last-call posts as final reminders.
Social Media Engagement
Story posts were designed to fit the branding of the CREATE teams concept and logo. We used Instagram features such as asking questions and using polls to reach more users.
This or That
Alumni Advice
Portfolio Photohshoot
A photoshoot for BFA and MFA students graduating from the GAID department was organized. This included a signup spreadsheet designed in Excel, with organized slots and times for students.
As the Production Manager, I took responsibility for setting up the photo shoot and making sure everyone showed up for their required time slot. I also monitored the photoshoot as well, students were required to sign up for the CREATE event when they showed up for their picture. This way our team could make sure we had their information for the portfolio reviews, along with their LinkedIn and social media links.
The headshots were photoshopped to fit our designed branding for the CREATE event. Each student was posted on our GAID Instagram, with their social media handles and work posted, along with a small paragraph to introduce themselves.
This was all made available to the graduating students through our Google sign-up sheets, and Excel sheets. They were required to fill out the information about how to reach them, 6 square jpegs of their work, along with a short bio about themselves. This gave my classmates the opportunity to express themselves in our feed and receive more engagement as designers.
Reels
Reels were created using adobe illustrator and Photoshop. The chunky type and dramatic colors were used to follow our branding. This way we could create bold videos to catch the viewer’s attention as they scrolled.
Once the GAID graduating students had their photos taken, and submitted their work, we were able to include them in reels that represent their work. For example, the reel “WE ARE PRINT DESIGNERS” was made to show some of my classmate’s print design work.
We used organized one-drive folders to keep their work separated from each person and were able to pull from these folders for each reel. Once a student’s work was used, it was documented on a google doc that laid out each student and where their work was shown in each reel. This way we could keep the posts organized, know their social media handle to tag them, along with making sure every student’s work could be included at least once.
Check out four of the reels for our GAID students work.
Instructor: Abby Guido / Spring 2023 / Event Design