VISC 405 – Conference – Alex Anderson Teaching

VISC 405
Conference Branding

Conferences are an excellent opportunity for people to learn, collaborate and engage.

Every great conference needs a theme. What’s the unifying message that your speakers will deliver and what’s the key takeaway for conference attendees? The best themes are catchy, relatable, and trigger an emotional response. You want the conference to inspire and stimulate conversation. Your theme has to enable that. For instance, “Stronger as a team” is probably a better theme than “Achieving improved efficiencies through increased cross-functional collaboration.” The theme is more than just a rallying cry for all participants; it will also guide your branding and promotion, from designing a logo to coming up with social media hashtags, promotion material, brochures, websites, app, speaker bumpers….

Questions you should be able to address:

What is the big idea behind the conference?

Why would people want to attend?

Who would be the speakers?

Who would attend it?

When and where would it be held.

Your challenge is to imagine, design and produce the materials for a 2-day conference on a topic based on any Ted.com/topics. Your visual solution should be an organic/kinetic series.

To give your conference line-up some seriousness you will use TED.com to identify your speakers.

You will first choose two Ideas from the following list of words to help inform the theme of your conference. You can then use the two Ideas/words along with another word of idea of your choosing. Don’t think about what you want it to look like yet and avoid looking at other conferences and events. Your concept will inform your design not the other way around.

At least 6 of the 8 speakers in your speaker line-up. You need 8 speakers total. At least 6 from ted.com

NOTE: All Imagery (excluding speaker photos) must be created by you or come from fair use sources.

Word Lists

List 1:

RISK

NEGLECT

FORGET

DENY

AVOID

STOP

QUIT

FEAR

CELEBRATE

ENDRURE

LOVE

TOLERATE

RECOLLECT

KEEP

CONFESS

EXPAND

EXTEND

DISJOIN

COMBINE

List 2:

DATA

SYSTEMS

BIOLOGY

PHYSICS

INVENTION

ECONOMICS

ROBOTICS

AI

CLIMATE

POLITICS

PHILOSOHPY

MEDICINE

FINAL DELIVERABLES:

— Conference = Logo/logotype + tag line + toolkit
— Instagram Campaign.. to announce conference, date, speaker (animated or not animated) (6 Posts Minimum)
— 2 pieces of swag (be thoughtful -- what makes sense for your conference goers?
— Billboard Horizontal or Bus Graphic (horizontal)
— Web Banner Ads at least 3 different sizes
— Speaker Badge / Volunteer Badge / Attendee Badge
— Poster (24 x 36) (Front and Back )
— Speaker Bumpers (Animated) (2 Minimum) / One Overall Conference Bumper (Animated)
— Sample spreads for Attendee Schedule / Booklet (One spread for intro / Speaker Bio / schedule / Etc) Think about this as a template another designer would build out the full book with.
— (Optional) Poster Wall / Wheatpaste, T-Shirt, Etc.

— Process Book: PDF Process Book (Under 150 MB) on Server
— Digital PDF of deliverables. Think about this editorially and how you can design an interesting visual presentation that compliments your work. (Under 150 MB) on Server

SCHEDULE:

8 / 23 / 22

IN CLASS

Class Sllyabus

Introduce Project

HOMEWORK

Using the lists compile your concept. Watch some TED talks and start to get a sense of who your speakers might be. Remember that they don’t need to feel like they initially go together. How do the ideas build on one another? How can they be related to one another. For example if your conference is about Sports / Data. Could a speaker focused on the genetics of athletes also be interesting?

Have a list of 10-12 potential speakers / talks. What is the connecting thread here?

Make sure your speaker line-up is diverse in topic, perspective…

Think simple elevator pitch you can present to your classmates.

How do you address the following questions:

What is the big idea(s) behind the conference?

Why would people want to attend?

Who would be the speakers?

Who would attend it?

When and where would it be held.

Read 3-4 Articles about your theme/subject. Capture key words, phrases, and ideas.

8 / 25 / 22

IN CLASS

Review Conference Ideas

HOMEWORK

Prepare a brief/presentation for your conference it should contain the following:

Present (4) different and distinct ideas

Name

Tagline

Three words (words that help find visuals)

Develop 4 distinct moodboards for your concept. Look for interesting connections between your speakers and topics. Think outside the box. Looks of undesigned imagery and things that are not already designed. The individual building blocks of your concepts not the finished structure.

Then at the end of the presentation put all 4 titles and 4 taglines on one page so we can discuss them easily

____

Research for Yourself Below
____

AUDIENCE PERSONA
Write an audience persona. Be specific. Think of a person that would go to your conference. Try not to think about a peer but a person out there in the world. What is their name, how old are they, what level of education do they have, where do they live, who do they live with, do they have a pet (name the pet), do they binge watch -- what is it? do they read -- what do they read? what is the last movie they have watched? where do they shop? Walmart vs Target, Dillons vs the Merc? etc. Write it in a narrative.

___

SPEAKER INFO
Gather all the speaker info into one place (maybe a google doc). This info should be handy when you are talking about your speakers on Instagram, website, brochure make sure you have all this info... gather it now if you don't have it... Speaker Name, (do they have a title?), (Instagram or website link), bio of the speaker, title of the talk, short description of the talk, quote from the talk, AND what DAY and Time would be the talk ...

___

CONFERENCE SCHEUDULE
Create a conference schedule. Is it 2 days? 3 days. 1 day. Start one evening and move to the next day? What about breaks? Lunch? Happy Hour.... etc.

8 / 30 / 22

IN CLASS

Present Conference Ideas / Concepts

HOMEWORK

Choose final Concept

Begin sketching and exploration for your concepts. Start with pencil sketching and move into the computer. Explore logos and traditional marks but also pattern, image treatment, illustration, etc. How does your concept translate from your idea into visual form? What visual cues help you're show your concept? Think outside the box.

9 / 1 / 22

IN CLASS

Review Exploration

HOMEWORK

Continue exploration for your concepts. Explore logos and traditional marks but also pattern, image treatment, illustration, etc. How does your concept translate from your idea into visual form? What visual cues help you're show your concept? Think outside the box.

How do these visual elemetnts show your concept in a visual way?

Kinetic Systems Reading

9 / 6 / 22

IN CLASS

Review Exploration

HOMEWORK

Focus on your strongest ideas and begin to build them out into 3 distinct kinetic systems. Focus on concept. Think about logo, typography, layout, photo treatments and illustration. How does your concept inform your visuals?

Use the template and focus on how to use your elements in different ways.

Template

A kinetic system is not a cookie cutter solution. It means you are not just scaling things to fit into the next format. How can you change the proportions of the items to make a system? Pay attention to typographic scale and how you can break down elements or use them in different ways.

9 / 8 / 22

IN CLASS

Class Canceled

HOMEWORK

Continue to refine your kinetic systems as well as more exploration of your concepts as a whole given the extra time.

Feel free to send me small size PDFs if you want feedback or have questions.

9 / 13 / 22

IN CLASS

Review Concept Refinements

HOMEWORK

Explorations for Posters (Minimum 5)

(Poster should contain, speakers, bios, titles, dates, schedule, etc)

Explorations for Badges (Minimum 5)

Explorations for Billboards (Minimum 5) (14 IN x 48 IN / Scaled form 14 FT X 48 FT)

Pay attention to hierarchy / type size. Remember when you are designing these small on your screen. Remember that kinetic systems moves and changes from application to application and is not static. Think back to your explorations for your toolkit.