2021 Grad Show

Kim Claussen

VCD – Advertising & Graphic Design

kirbymedia.ca

As a graphic designer and creative writing enthusiast, my focus is on creating stories across different mediums. My interest lies in solving problems through engaging design and clear communication with great typography, bold color, and expressive storytelling.

I love simple design, retro vibes, color and words, and working through the design process to find the thing that fits the project. I am also a huge pop culture geek, who perpetually needs more puppy dogs in my life.

Cosmica - Cover & Table of Contents We wanted the cover of Cosmica to communicate our scifi + fantasy and out-of-this-world vibes at a glance. The table of contents helps set the stage for the spacious, galactic, calm feel of our entire magazine. The departments are divided into Writing (advice, tips, exercises), Reading (rec's, author interviews, story and poetry submissions from our community), Editing (tips and info), and Community (networking, conventions, etc.).

Nailing Page One This article, Nailing Page One, belongs to our "writing department", where writing advice is shared to our community of readers to help them grow in their writing skills. Since Cosmica is intended to be put out in quarterly editions and designed to be a keepsake, these articles are advice that our readers can refer back to at any time in their writing journey. I wrote and filled Nailing Page One with advice curated from writer's conferences I have personally attended in the past.

Author Profile & Submission One of our most important departments is the showcase of up-and-coming authors in our community. Illustration work accompanying these submissions created by Rachel Denbina. For this edition, we asked several writer friends for short interviews and a piece of their work. They gave us short stories, novel excerpts, or poetry. The submission was then paired with the interview, and separated from other authors by ads we designed ourselves. (Bottom right: for When Words Collide, created by me.)

Cosmica Feature: When The Night Is New For my feature piece in the magazine, I created a full page illustration to go with a short story I wrote on the theme of scifi and fantasy - in this case, a couple of space smugglers who happen to also be exes pulling a heist job together. The rest of the feature is spread over multiple pages, with plenty of space and galactic designs so while it is visually different from the rest of the magazine, it still fits the same voice and feel.

Cosmica

Cosmica Magazine was created by myself, and Designer/Illustrator Rachel Denbina. It was born out of a mutual love for fantasy and scifi, and most importantly, a love of stories. We wanted to create a space to fuel your love of stories, too, and be a place to explore out-of-this-world places (if only in your mind) and boost your creativity. Cosmica is all about writing and reading for scifi and fantasy fans. Fiction has the unique ability to let us explore worlds and situations we otherwise never could, it helps foster empathy, and give voices to those who may not otherwise have them. We want you to explore other universes, times and places, to write your own, and above: ignite your imagination.

Cosmica

BBC Hub: Made for YOU

BBC Hub BBC is a massive network, providing an incredible variety of content for a hugely broad audience. The Hub would work similar to Netflix or Spotify, where an algorithm keeps track of what you engage with to suggest things you might like. As well, the "Explore" section offers up items you might like, as well as completely brand new things to further the BBC's mission of having people discover more of its offerings.

Experiential Campaign: Ice Cream Truck At the beginning of summer, these branded ice cream food trucks would pop up outside of major "hubs" in London (ie. King's Cross Station) and busy pedestrian intersections. The trucks would give away free ice cream of any flavour and combination, with the emphasis that you get to choose whatever you like. The trucks are accompanied by an interactive sign where people are encouraged to take an ice cream selfie and tell us what you "like" and share the picture under the hashtag #whatsyourflavour.

Persona Posters The posters would utilize different "personas" based on the things people shared during the ice cream truck experience. It would also utilize various popular BBC personalities (both real and fictional, created in their "voice"). These posters would be placed physically in tube stations, malls, movie theaters, as well as digitally in the form of banners and ads on various relevant websites, and reflect the broad BBC audience.

AUArts Grad Show bbc_fictionalposter_compile-01

Persona Posters: Fictional/Celeb Editions

BBC Hub Social Media The #whatsyourflavour hashtag, videos, and selfies would be utilized across the BBC Hub's social platforms, as well as web versions of the posters (social posts, web banners, etc.). All together, it creates a unified campaign across multiple touchpoints. It utilizes a playful and memorable concept of ice cream to drive home the idea of individual taste, experience, and especially of individual choice. It reaches the very broad audience where they are, and remains visually connected.

BBC Hub + Campaign

What if you could have everything the BBC has to offer under one umbrella, personalized just for you? This project was based on a brief asking for a service that would unite BBC's wide-range of content in one, customizable, personalized place. I created the fictional BBC Hub, which would meet those needs, and then created the second part of the project, which was the campaign to promote the Hub, covering everything from experiential to digital to print.

BBC Hub + Campaign

BBC Hub: Made for YOU

BBC Hub + Campaign

Persona Posters: Fictional/Celeb Editions

BBC Hub + Campaign

Motion Graphics: Diversity in Hollywood

Diversity in Hollywood

In September 2020, the Academy released a set of new diversity and inclusion standards. While this is a great step in the right direction, it also had a lot of people calling for the Academy to do more and wondering why it has taken so long for such inclusion efforts to come out. In an effort to keep this conversation going, I wanted to dive deeper into this topic and center my semester-long Information Design piece on it. To show real data on the severe disparity of people of color vs white leading roles in the industry, and hit on the emotional core of it in an engaging way.

Mo. The design for our Mo. cans was driven partially by flavour - bright and delicious, fruity, citrus, and berry options - as well as our brand's entire vibe. We wanted the cans to be small "buddy" cans to help communicate the idea of "a moment." We opted for soothing gradients in bright, beachy colors that are unique so they stand out on the shelf. Each flavor is easy to see at a glance, and the palette evokes feelings of "Ahhh."

Experiential Campaign To help promote Mo, we would create an experiential event in the form of a mobile trailer. The trailer would be a mini airstream, colored to match the feeling of our cans. This would be set up in busy areas like downtown and post-secondary campuses. Inside, the atmosphere is spa-like - blocking out traffic noise, ultra soft spa music, cushy seats, and a cooler of Mo. Come in, sit down, and take a breath, take a break - take a Mo.

Our social media platforms, such as Instagram, would showcase Mo.'s personality (chill, wholesome, down to earth). As well as sharing self care tips, we would post "feed interrupters" to encourage idle scrollers or stress scrollers to pause for a moment.

Kiosk Lastly, our other physical touchpoint comes in the form of a drink kiosk, stationed in the mall or out on the street like a food truck. We wanted it to be eye catching and unique, while still evoking the feel of being calm, relaxing, and wholesome.

Mo.

Have you ever hit that point in the day when you're running low on energy and patience, but your project is due or the groceries still need to be bought? Maybe you need a break from endless Zoom calls, and you don't want to reach for sugar or coffee, or (heaven forbid) chemical-filled energy drinks. We wanted to create a beverage that is light, refreshing, and gives you just a little boost. Mo is lightly caffeinated tea to give you a little refresh without crashing and jitters. We want to normalize taking a break and promote self care. We're all way too used to being overworked, extra stressed, dealing with things we're not able to deal with - especially during the pandemic. We want you to take a moment. (Created with Jessica Gillam.)

New York State of Rind We're for the people that believe in finding the best in life and running with whatever is thrown at them. In the true spirit of the lemonade stand, we want to inspire you to take all the lemons life throws at you and make them into lemonade - while looking good and smelling awesome.

Friday I'm in Lime

Tom Sour

Packaging (3 Pack Box)

Packaging (Individual Scents)

Simply The Zest

Simply the Zest is a fictional gender neutral scent that is bright, refreshing, and energetic. It is created for Lemonade Stand, a unique fashion brand in NYC. It's for funky originals: quirky, bold young adults who believe in staying on your grind, and taking opportunities and punches as they come. (Created in collaboration with Jessica Gillam & Leanna Santucci.)