Courtney Shinaberry

Project Brief/Concept: Create a 15–20-second animation that graphically communicates the message appealingly and interestingly. The brand I chose to look at was Fischer Price, because I wanted to evoke a sense of childhood delight. I used their tagline: “A crayon sandwich for Mom” and decided to model it in cinema 4D. Audience: Children Insight: Adding slight movements to the crayons and bread jiggle was very important. This made it feel more life-like. I made an awareness campaign to show their brand messaging: let’s be kids. I also wanted to connect to consumers’ emotional feelings when they were playing with their toys as children. I realized that keeping it simple was the main goal of the project, I spent a lot of time getting the crayon sandwich just right. What I learned: Cinema 4d is an amazing 3d motion tool. I learned that adding slight movements to the 3d model gave me a better outcome because it was more visually interesting, less flat, and more engaging. Specs/tech: Motion Design; Cinema 4D, After Effects

Project Brief/Concept: Create an accessible brand system for Futures Foundation, and reflect the idea that they fill in the gap of essential care for disabled people. Futures Foundation makes life fun, and livable. They meet the individual at their needs. Essence - We transform challenges into opportunities Promises - We stand out, in a good way. We believe in differences, not divides. We break down bias, we transform hearts Audience: People with disabilities looking for resources Insight discovered during the process: I worked in a team with: Marie Gangloff, Andrea Fredericksen, and Kristina Webb to create this branding system. In our research, we discovered that they transform challenges into opportunities: by giving resources to people with disabilities. What I learned: My experience as a design and research intern, and my personal experience with having a disabled sister was influential in the success of this project. Marie and I spent multiple hours color matching to Pantone and making sure the colors were ADA-accessible for all. Role: Logo iterations, concept ideas, ADA accessibility Specs/tech: Branding; Illustrator, Photoshop, After Effects

The project brief: Was to create a system where electric vehicle information gets to the general people. We made the process of learning about EV’s a modular system. Instead of people searching out information, the content comes to the user more naturally and in bite-sized pieces. Audience: Anyone wanting to buy an EV or learn more about them Insight: We found through our research that people don’t know much about electric vehicles. So we designed a system for people to learn about electric vehicles in a modular way. What I learned: Interaction design can fall under many categories. It was important that the branding was simple and easy to understand. Role: I worked in a team with Grishma Vartak and Samantha Mantua, and my role was to do research on electric vehicles, create a persona, conduct user interviews, what-if games, concept ideation, quiz for car buying experience, branding Specs/tech: Interaction Design; XD, Illustrator

Project Brief/Concept: Present Paula Scher’s design career in an interesting way. Audience: Other designers Insight discovered during the process: I designed and printed a map featuring important works from her career since I could use the medium to reflect parts of Paula Scher’s career. Paula’s life story is shown by uniquely unfolding the map. Hiding and showing different content as the user navigates the map of her career is an interactive experience. Coordinates with numbers and letters are used when referencing source information. What I learned: Making mockups and printing test copies is essential to having a good outcome. I also learned about adding small elements that could be helpful to designers who wnt more information. For example: source information can be found using the numbers on the side and the letters on the top to find the coordinates. Specs/tech: Print; Illustrator

Project Brief/Concept: Create an immersive, physical installation experience with a found data set, that has over 50 data points. I featured prominent women in each state, and contrasted thier achievements against the grim truth that women are not paid the same as a man in any state. I designed, printed, and hung this data visualization to showcase that a woman on average does not make the same as compared to a man in any state. I hope this project can inspire some sort of change, even if it only leaves the viewer with insightful information. Audience: Men and women 20+ Insight discovered during the process: Through experimentation and research, I found that making a project bigger gets more attention. This project was installed on the 8th floor at the Taubam Center and was left up for most of the year due to its impact. What I learned: I learned that using a large physical space can lead to interesting results. This project was successful in visualizing the gap between what a man and a woman earn. I also learned a lot about influential women from every state, and that the percentage they make to a man is never equal. The wage gap is still a big issue in the United States. Specs/Tech: UX/UI; Illustrator, XD

Project Brief/Concept: Create one 30–45-second motion sequence using animated typography and images to tell the story of a song. I chose to do “White Walls” by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis. Audience: Twenty-somethings Insight discovered during the process: The song is about the freedom Macklemore feels in owning an old-school Cadillac. As seen in the original music video, the song has a very retro sentiment, and I wanted to stay true to that feeling. I used cooper black for its aesthetic longevity. What I learned: Adding slight movements to the type was essential in pacing and telling the story about the Cadillac: it was a step out of the ordinary. I also learned that simple imagery was imperative to the complex song. I contrasted city life against the videos of Cadillacs to help tell the story of the song. Specs/tech: Motion Design; After Effects

Project Brief/Concept: Re-design a large body of content into a digestible format, while understanding the grid, and defining reader relationships. Audience: Anyone interested in aliens. Insight discovered during the process: I designed a textbook-style publication, as I knew it was the way to go because the informative nature of the UFO content read like a textbook. The layout also helped the navigational elements stand out. Not only was this about designing a large body of content into a digestible format, but it also played a key role in helping to distinguish deadlines, and create to-do lists and schedules for project management. What I learned: This was a testament in learning InDesign. Designing this 300 + page document required the use of stylesheets for large bodies of text and also creating many table formats/designs within InDesign. I learned to trust my design intuition—as COVID quarantine made this project challenging because spreads were not as often looked at, and design choices became gut decisions. Specs/tech: Print; InDesign, French Paper, 300+ Pages

Project Brief/Concept: Map the origin and evolution of a wicked societal problem while addressing the needs of a given audience (human-centered design). I worked in a team with Brenna Potter, Andrea Fredricksen, and Brooklin Bekolay to create a project that indirectly addressed the pollution issue in Wayne County, Michigan. Audience: Population of Wayne County Insight discovered during the process: Detroit is the city of cars, but what-if we could change that? We have many bus stops in Detroit, and we saw it as an underutilized resource that could be put to better use. What if we could make energy generators powered by the people using the bus stops? We used this as the jumping-off point for our project. I was in charge of designing the bus stop at the Detroit Science Center. What I learned: Conducting interviews with organizations focusing on pollution helped us to see that public transportation is an underutilized and not well-maintained resource to tap into to combat pollution. Role (if group project): Concept iterations, air and water quality research, ideation sketching, science center bus stop design, mockups Specs/tech: Motion/Mockups; Illustrator, Photoshop, After Effects

Project Brief/Concept: The objective was to work as a team to create an augmented reality experience based on an article of our choosing. Audience: Students, We wanted the audience to walk away with the idea that being on zoom is not how people were meant to interact, as we are more often focused on our own appearance. Insight discovered during the process: I worked with Stephanie Hoff to develop this project, and it is based on an article from The Atlantic about the zoom world we live in today, and the deja vu it causes people. Our communication goal for this project evolved into exploring the ways that being on zoom lends a focus to more on yourself, than what is going on around you. What I learned: It was challenging figuring out what we wanted to do for our augmented reality experience. Ultimately, we had the hardest time choosing an article that aligned with creating an AR experience. We had to make many decisions on how we were gonna create the experience, and using a mirror was key in driving our design choices. I learned that trying new things helps lead to a strong design solutions. Role (if group project): Me and Stephanie both worked on design iteration and execution together Specs/tech: Experience design; Spark AR Studio, Illustrator

Project Brief/Concept: Develop and design a poster series for an event happening in Michigan. The goal was to allure, inform, and engage a particular audience group to the particular aspect of the Michigan tourism event we chose. I made a poster series for Tulip Time Festival in Holland, MI. I chose to focus on the craft that is involved in delft tiles, and the period before Dutch modernism. Audience: Michiganders Insight discovered during the process: I used a traditional delft tile blue to focus on the flowers. And I brought a contemporary spin on the early dutch arts and crafts period. Delft tiles were popular in dutch tradition. I put my own spin on the design to create something different and unique. A simple line pattern was also used, as it is traditional in dutch clothing. The biggest challenge for me was going from hand-drawn to digital sketches. I also struggled with finding the right imagery I wanted. But I was able to use photos I took when I visited the festival last year in my designs, and that also helps to make them unique. What I learned: This project helped me to see the details in my designs. I also learned a key aspect of my design process. The best way for me to iterate ideas is to draw things out first: starting hand-drawn helped me have a solid starting point which led me to success in the end. Specs/tech: Print; 18x24, Adobe Illustrator