Reframing the Arts
Sobrato Foundation for the Arts
Setting the Scene
The Sobrato Arts Foundation for the Arts (SAFFE) was a non-profit organization providing training and mentorship opportunities to high school students interested in developing careers in the performance and production arts. I teamed up with two of the organization's directors, Sean and Stephen, to organize and brand their ideas for updates to the program for presentation to investors after a re-organization.
After sitting down with the directors to establish objectives and brainstorm ideas, they presented the idea of reflecting their foundation's flagship film industry ties. We played on iterations using different cinema references and arrived at using film wheel boxes in different colors to thematically represent the different levels of the mentorship program.
Sliding Scale
After pairing the new symbol with the screen-friendly Brandon Text font, I expanded on that visual identity to include various icons and used photos from one of their on-site programs to build out a responsive parallax website.
The Process Premiere
The last step was to tie all of the elements together and transform their future ideas for the program into a concise and inviting presentation deck for the pitch to investors. I put the previous icons to use and organized their bullet points down into brief statements for each slide, working with Sean and Stephen to create companion talking points for each of them to highlight their more lengthy contributions and goals. Happy with the new style and direction, I also took the leaner text into InDesign and whipped up a matching print-out as a leave-behind.
Unexpected Results
The branding experience itself was a whirlwind of excitement under an intense deadline. While the founders did ultimately close the doors on this initiative, they noted that it was unrelated to its' performance or popularity. Regardless of circumstance, the clients' own dedication to their cause and their open flexibility enabled me to exceed their initial expectations and actually teach them about the design process along the way.