Tools used: Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, Lightroom
2020-2021
Goal: Assist the ACC Art & Design center with their graphic design needs, including the creation of event posters, social media assets, and other promotional materials. This was a fully remote work-study position for the 2020-2021 school year.
Process:
While completing my AA in Communications at Arapahoe Community College, I applied for the newly created Graphic Design Specialist position within the Art & Design Center. After submitting a portfolio, I was interviewed and hired on. In this position, I worked with two other work-study students as a small, completely remote team.
As a brand new role, much of the Fall semester was spent planning the formation of these roles and creating a cohesive social media plan for the A&D Center. My first project was to complete a poster for an upcoming event, using provided information and photos:
Aside from weekly planning, the rest of the Fall semester focused on building templates for future work-study students in the Graphic Design Specialist role. Many of these templates started with promoting the Arapahoe Ceramics Guild’s winter pottery sale. These images were posted on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
I prepared the posts by removing/blending backgrounds and editing the images for clarity and texture. After applying brand marks and text, all completed images were then shared in a Dropbox folder, to be published by our team’s Social Media Specialist.
One of the more challenging aspects of this team-based role was waiting for the third member of our team to complete onboarding. Since we were down a Content Creator (responsible for capturing on-campus media), I offered to complete a six-minute film that aimed to promote every department within the Art & Design Center. This was a college-wide event, where each department was supposed to provide their own short video.
With a two-week deadline, I filmed, recorded a voice over, edited, and produced this short video for all seven departments within the Art & Design Center:
I’ve never attempted to produce a video of any length, so it was a great challenge for me to tackle. Although I had a cold at the time (evidenced by my nasally voiceover), it was received well and was published on the ACC website for their ‘Pathways’ event.
The Spring semester required much of the same type of work, featuring the Ceramics Guild and creating event posters. We also started focusing on more generalized content to promote the different departments within the A&D Center. These images were created in Photoshop, using provided images, brand marks, and text. Most of my time was spent editing ceramics photos for clarity and texture.
Everything from the Spring semester utilized the Photoshop templates created during the previous semester, with the goal of improving and streamlining the process for the next person in this Graphic Design Specialist role.
Other projects completed during my work-study include a revamped orientation presentation for the Interior Design department, the beginnings of an A&D Center newsletter (which I presented to the director and department heads), and documenting the end-of-year student showcase exhibit through low light photography (a personal hobby of mine).
Conclusion:
I’m proud of my work in this role because it utilized my management background, relied on the tools I was actively learning as a Communications student, and helped to grow my skills as a self-taught graphic designer.
Jen Coe | Artist & Instructor 