While in college I took a course called Design Working Group which was basically a design firm made up of students with guidance from a professor. We had real clients, with real deadlines, presentations, order fulfillment (if needed), and even received compensation. Whatever funds were received were put back into the class fund. I ended up taking the course twice because I really enjoyed the collaborative atmosphere. The collection of images below are from the 2016 - 2017 Fall semester for the Theatre & Dance department on campus at SF State. Actually, all of these explorations were done within the hour leading up to the client meeting. I wasn't originally involved with this client but was pulled in at the last minute and told to do as many concepts as I could.
This first set is for the production of "In The Next Room, or The Vibrator Play".
Set in the 1880s, proper gentleman and scientist Dr. Givings has innocently invented an extraordinary new device for treating "hysteria" in women (and occasionally men): the vibrator.
This second set is for the production of "Sofa Sin Casa".
Eviction squads are moving through the city. A reporter chases a homeless sofa, but it's got four feet and it's out on the street so it just keeps moving moving through stories and songs of a world where only the privileged can find shelter. Sofa sin Casa (Couch With No Home) is a crowd sourced play with blues, directed by Roy Conboy that addresses the current housing situation in San Francisco.
The third and final set I did was for the production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream". The idea behind this particular set is that there are four individual posters that come together to make one larger poster. The smaller posters can be arranged as seen below or arranged in anyway the client likes. They could even set up the posters differently everywhere they appear.
A popular play by Shakespeare it is widely performed across the world. Written in simple prose, it portrays the strange events that take place in a forest inhabited by fairies who magically transform the romantic fate of two young couples and their interactions with the Duke and Duchess of Athens.
In the end, the client chose my direction for each production not necessarily because they were the absolute best but because they all had a cohesive theme. After this client meeting, I handed off the concepts to the other designers and jumped onto a different project.
21st Annual SF State Design and Industry Portfolio Nite Branding
From May 2015 - May 2016 I was the president of the student chapter of AIGA at SF State. Every year the department hosts a portfolio review night in which department alums are invited back to review the portfolios of design students. The entire night features guest speakers, food and drink, as well as Q&A, and finally the review. The AIGA student chapter is tasked with branding the entire event, which includes; posters, name tags, slide decks, table tents, and most importantly the overall theme. I think we chose collaboration or something like that as the theme and we also had a project where we had to create a still life with items from around our room for a different class. The below is what we came up with.