Poster Design
Poster design plays a large role in my position and my department. If a poster isn't advertising an event, then it's recruiting students. In the academic environment, each make an important contribution.
Published on:
2011
Graphic Design
- Poster Design
Communicating to potential students and visitors - Poster design plays a large role in my position and my department. If a poster isn't advertising an event, then it's recruiting students. In the academic environment, each make an important contribution.
This 81/2x14 poster was created to announce a new speaker series for the Spring, 2012 semester.
These posters were created to hang in the first-floor stairwells in my building at Penn State. There is no signage to tell a person where it is they are visiting, so these posters were created to do so.
These posters were created to hang in the first-floor stairwells in my building at Penn State. I created the captions "MATERIALS REDEFINED" and "EDUCATION ADVANCED" because this is literally what our department does - redefine materials and advance education.
Over the years I've spoken to quite a few faculty who said they were told by their academic and industrial peers (about their research), "You can't do that. That's impossible." Each faculty member discovered that was wrong - its is not impossible and they CAN do that. That was my inspiration for the message of this poster. For one account of this inspiration, please see my video of Professor Digby MacDonald.
It was truly an honor for me to create this poster. Dr. Robert E. Newnham pioneered the development of composite piezoelectric transducers for use in medical imaging, underwater sonar systems and ultrasonic nondestructive testing. His contributions to the well being of society and homeland defense were shadowed only by his gentle nature. Dr. Newnham passed away in April, 2009.
This series of three posters was created for display on a tri-panel kiosk in the Museum of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, Penn State.
An iPod was chosen as the subject of this poster because of it's appeal to a young generation of potential students. I deconstructed the iPod, photographed the parts, and consulted with a faculty member to ensure accuracy of written content. Content that I did not write was rewritten from various sources, with those sources cited on the poster.
For this poster, I chose music, communication, and movies as subjects of advancement due to materials research. This was a very fun poster to create, as it shows the progression of each over the past decades. I can't tell you if these posters actually recruited new students, but I can tell you a lot of people stop to read them.
The Richard E. Tressler Distinguished Lecturers in Materials Series was created to honor the memory of of Dr. Richard E. Tressler. I adapted a set of 20-year old hand-painted graphics (an old college project) into a modern poster to show that Dr. Tressler was a stand-out from his peers. The poster was printed for distribution across campus as well as sent to alumni via email as a PDF.
This poster was created for our Student Services office to distribute to high-schools. High school sophomores, juniors and seniors are a primary recruiting target, so I tried my best to create a poster with an active visual feeling that would also spur the thought process of becoming a materials scientist.
Each Taylor Lecture has a different theme, so I choose imagery and base my designs on those changing themes. For this poster, Adobe Photoshop was used to create the image of clouds in the background, and Adobe Illustrator was used to design the poster.
The Nelson W. Taylor Lecture Series in Materials Science and Engineering honors the memory of Professor Nelson W. Taylor (1869 - 1965) who was head of Penn State’s Department of Ceramics from 1933 - 1943. Fast-forward to 2004; it became my responsibility to design all collateral for the annual event, as well as photograph the speakers to document the event. Collateral includes a poster and a brochure, as well as material for the MatSE website.
I learned a lesson after I designed this poster - be careful with the use of concentric circles in a design. After this poster was distributed, I got an email from a gentleman complaining because he has a condition and the design gave him a debilitating headache. I did apologize, but I still like the design, though!
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These videos were created to introduce our faculty and their research to the world. Our faculty videos discuss students, research, our department, and Penn State. Faculty members converse about these topics in a relaxed, documentary-style format where their personality and philosophies may influence potential students.
I handle every aspect of video production on my own. I schedule shoot dates with faculty, staff and students; I shoot all A-roll and B-roll footage; I edit video to create a story line, then upon approval of the story line, I add B-roll and sound, and finalize for approval from the Office of Marketing at Penn State. After final approval, I distribute...primarily via YouTube.Multimedia, Production, Video Arts2011 -
Watch this video and you'll understand why I took it upon myself to produce it and get it out there for the world to see. This video went live on YouTube in February, 2011. As of November 2011, it had garnered nearly 11,000 views on two different YouTube channels. Within two weeks of this video being posted, Dr. Paul Painter (you can find him in my Faculty Video section) had been contacted by companies in Canada, India, and across the United States.
On December 1, 2011, I asked Dr. Painter what benefits he's seen in the past ten months that have come as a direct result of the video; his response, "Nearly everything." This includes being contacted by: 1 U.S. oil and gas company; 1 Utah oil sands company; 2 Canadian companies; various companies whose work creates drill cuttings; 1 company willing to offer supplies, and 5 companies willing to give money to further research. (Due to non-disclosure agreements, these companies cannot be named.).Production, Storytelling, Video Arts2011 -
In 2007 Materials Science and Engineering began the effort of creating a new culture of safety within the department. A group of faculty, staff, and students were brought together to create the Materials Safety Awareness Organization (MSAO). One goal of the MSAO was to create a video about laboratory safety. Generally these types of instructional videos can be pretty dry, so we wanted to make our video educational and fun. Since it was posted to YouTube in September, 2011, the video has been a hit with researchers in the department, across the University, and in industry.Documentary, Multimedia, Video Arts2011 -
Otto's Pub and Brewery is a microbrewery in State College, PA that is growing...quickly. This growth created interest to distribute their product state-wide within five years, so a re-design of their bottle labels was in order. After the new label designs were rolled out and new six-packs created, their state-wide distribution began...within three years. The re-design helped them achieve their goal two years ahead of schedule.Graphic Design, Package Design2011 -
My approach to logo development is very calculated. I administer creative briefs and gather a lot of information before putting pencil to paper. I tend to create clean, practical logos while adhering to an original, creative direction to maximize quick brand recognition.Branding, Graphic Design2011 -
While creating an illustration two years ago, a graduate student told me, "You understand this better than most grad students!". My reply, "I have to...I do this for a living." That graduate student's advisor asked me to create an illustration for inclusion in a journal. When I asked for some direction, he sent me the graduate student. To illustrate difficult scientific concepts, one must have a near intimate understanding of the concept in order to correctly illustrate it. This has become one of my favorite parts of my job, because I am constantly learning something new.Drawing, Illustration, Multimedia2011 -
One of my art school professors has vehemently stated, "If you can't draw with your hands, you can't draw with a computer." Throughout my creative career, truer words haven't been spoken. These sketches of prominent scientists were created for biographies for an online course. Pulling images from the Internet to display in an original online project was not an option, so I used the images as reference to draw my own portraits. Over fifty of these sketches were created, so they had to be quick, taking from two minutes to five minutes each.Drawing, Illustration, Multimedia2011 -
The image of our department depends highly on the image of our faculty - literally and figuratively. Our faculty are international experts in many areas of science and engineering, so it is important our faculty are seen by the world as the great scientists and engineers they are. It has been a proud task of mine to photograph these great people in their environment where they think, work, and change the face of technology and society.Digital Photography, Graphic Design, Photography2011
