Print & DigitalCraftswoman

Courtney Hendricks

Queer Film Festival

About the Project The Queer Film Festival is a three day, annual event

hosted by the University of Oregon’s Cultural Forum.

QFF showcases work by the LGBTQ community’s actors,

writers, and directors.

My Role With a logo already established from the previous year,

it was my task to create a visual identity for this year’s

event. I wanted it to be unique and recognizable, but not

clash with the overall branding that our audience had

become accustomed to. Essentially, my job was to get

the word out about the festival (which, on campus, is

usually best achieved via print materials), and to provide

schedule information at the festival itself, which I decided

would be best achieved with printed programs.

What I Learned Things change. A lot. I had a tough time adjusting my

work to keep up with the client’s ever-changing schedule

information. I learned that I probably should have allowed

more negative space in the designs for those inevitable

last-minute changes. And while this job sounded like a

pretty straightforward one, it was difficult to decide on

esthetics because my options seemed so wide open.

I knew I wanted something colorful, but certainly no

gender-specific colors. I also considered using a photo

from one of the previous years’ movies, but choosing just

one photo to represent an event that was so diverse just

didn’t seem right. The pattern I finally chose started out

as a fun side project, (which coincidentally met all of the

needs for this project), so I chose it for the background

of the designs.

Tabloid Poster

PROJECT Queer Film Festival

ROLE Graphic Designer

DELIVERABLES Tabloid Posters, Handbills,

Tri-Fold Programs, Newspaper

Advertisement

PROGRAMS / TOOLS InDesign for general designs,

Illustrator for pattern graphics

DATE February 2013

Handbill

Programs given out at the event

About the Project The Erb Memorial Union is the student union building at

the University of Oregon. My office is currently rebranding

the union to accompany its renovation happening this

winter. Part of our rebranding is the redesigning and

restructuring of its current website (designed in flash,

circa 1990s). The EMU Website project is huge and still

ongoing, but I thought I’d feature some of my higher-

fidelity mockups and explain my process.

My Role Since the site is still being built it’s difficult to talk about

my role, but I can at least describe what I’ve done so far.

I sent out a survey to stakeholders via email and social

media to get us started. The results weren’t too bad, as

we received a few hundred responses. This data gave

us a solid direction towards what our users absolutely

needed from the website, as well as what was (and

wasn’t) working on the current site. From there, I began

wireframing and making general decisions informed by

our data. Because of a tight deadline, we’re currently

tackling testing and creating higher-fidelity designs at

the same time (which, I’m learning, is a mistake). Our

testing specifically includes some card sorting exercises

to determine our information architecture, and one-

on-one, interactive wireframe testing to determine

generally what isn’t working.

Erb Memorial UnionWebsite

Higher-fidelity homepage

PROJECT EMU Website

ROLE Web Designer, UX Designer

DELIVERABLES Responsive Website

PROGRAMS / TOOLS Photoshop for mockups, Axure for

UX wireframes, pencil & paper for

wireframes

DATE August 2013

What I Learned I was fortunate enough to work with a UX professional

on campus who taught me a bunch of tricks and tips

on usability testing. At the time, I was also reading

Steve Krug’s books on testing (Don’t Make Me Think

and Rocket Surgery Made Easy) which were also a huge

help. Aside from learning the basics of user experience,

I also learned more about my workflow for designing

responsively. There are so many considerations that

must be made when designing for mobile devices, and

it wasn’t until I had worked on such a big project that I

realized how complicated that process could get.Interactive Axure wireframes

Detail of a directory page

About the Project The Erb Memorial Union is the student union building

at the University of Oregon. In an effort to increase

awareness about the great programs & activities offered

there, our office decided to make student academic

planners for the 2013-2014 school year. The planners

have advertisements for various EMU Programs placed

at the beginning of every month to inform students that

these programs exist and what they do. Our primary

audience for this project was incoming freshman who

are new to campus and looking for ways to get involved.

The planners were handed out for free to freshman

during Summer Orientation, a time when they’re usually

figuring out their class schedules and what student

groups they might want to join.

My Role I collaborated with another designer in this project, with

the work split pretty evenly. First, we came up with the

general organization and the content we wanted to

include. Intuition and personal experience told us that

the EMU is an extremely confusing place to navigate

(even for upperclassmen). This is why I designed a room

directory and QR code link to a mobile-friendly map

of the building. The planners also included: a monthly

calendar view, ample room for notes, an EMU Ad before

Erb Memorial UnionPlanner

PROJECT EMU Planner

ROLE Graphic Designer

DELIVERABLES Student Academic Planners

PROGRAMS / TOOLS InDesign

DATE July 2013

every month, a place to fill in your class schedule before

every term, and of course the weekly spreads with lots

of room to write in homework info, etc. The weekly

spreads included basic information like holidays, but

also events happening in the EMU that freshman might

not necessarily hear about. Our designs stayed within

the EMU style guidelines that our office had agreed

upon before this project began.

What I Learned I learned a great deal about printing and designing for

print with this project. Our measurements had to be

exact, taking into account where the binding and bleeds

would be. For cost reasons, we chose to do a two color

print job (black/grey and a pantone green) on an offset

printer, which actually freed up some money in our

budget to spend on a nice card stock for the cover. We

were also very lucky to get to work with the people at

UO Printing & Mailing Services ( those guys have a tough

job, so I’ll openly suck up to them).

Glidden Paint

About the Project Every year, the American Advertising Federation

has a competition (the National Student Advertising

Competition)between colleges to see who can create

the most effective ad campaign. This work was not

published, but rather presented to judges as a sort of

mock campaign. I was a part of the University of Oregon’s

chapter, where we placed third at regionals. Last year,

our client was Glidden Paint and as the designer of the

group, my main task was creating a campaign book that

displayed our creative executions, research, strategy,

media plan, and budget.

My Role My role was primarily book design, but as a member

of the group, I also designed and helped come up with

creative executions, and I contributed to conversations

about the direction of our campaign and strategy. I also

designed a Keynote presentation and posters which we

used at the regional competition.

What I Learned I have never received more experience with working in

a group in my life. That’s the best way I can explain it. I

was able to work with sixteen talented teammates which

was empowering and instructive, but also chaotic and

at times incredibly unproductive. But we learned. After

working as a whole in a somewhat democratic system,

we split up into small groups (creative, strategy, media)

which proved to be far more powerful and effective.

PROJECT Glidden Paint

ROLE Graphic Designer

DELIVERABLES Glidden campaign book,

Keynote presentation

PROGRAMS / TOOLS InDesign for the book,

Keynote for the presentation,

and countless paper & pencil

sketches

DATE March 2013

PNW Art Annual

About the Project The Pacific Northwest Art Annual is an annual, juried

art competition that is organized by the University of

Oregon’s Cultural Forum. The winner of the competition

has their work purchased by the University who then

adds it to their permanent collection.

My Role My initial role was to design handbills with a call to action

to get artists to submit their work to the competition.

Then I created tabloid posters for the show itself and

the reception where they announce the winner. For

esthetics, my options were pretty open, although the

client did want me to emphasize the local, “Pacific

Northwest” theme of the competition.

What I LearnedThis project had a very fast turnaround, so what I

struggled with most was making a quick, definitive

decision on strategy. I finally chose the headline,

“Showcase Your Art at UO!” (on the other side of the

handbill) as my way of targeting Art Students to get

involved. I thought emphasizing that their work would

be in a show would be a good way to peak interest.

As for the photos, I frequently shoot film photography

as a hobby so I had a bunch of forest shots on hand.

The client liked the direction (very PNW), especially since

they were trying to get more photography submissions

that year.

Handbill

PROJECT PNW Art Annual

ROLE Graphic Designer,

Photographer

DELIVERABLES Handbills, Tabloid Posters

PROGRAMS / TOOLS InDesign for the designs,

Photoshop for a few image

edits

DATE November 2012

Tabloid Poster

About the ProjectOR Magazine is the first student-run iPad magazine at

the University of Oregon (and in the country). This “digital

magazine” focuses on human-interest stories about the

state of Oregon. We produced the second issue using

Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite which, at the time, was

only a year old and still being developed. Our design

team actually came in one day to find that the interface

had changed and additional tools had been added.

My RoleMy responsibilities at OR were to design a few interactive

article spreads (or, as Adobe calls them, “stacks”), shoot

photos for various stories, and to get the word out

about OR by designing a one-page responsive website.

For the sake of brevity, I’ve included my favorite stack

that I designed and shot many of the photos for. The

concept for the article was to interview a variety of

Portland “creatives” and ask them about their jobs and

their creative processes. I pitched the idea to our staff,

OR MagazineiPad Article

PROJECT OR Magazine- iPad Magazine

ROLE Designer, Photographer

DELIVERABLES Interactive Article Stacks

(Pages)

PROGRAMS / TOOLS Adobe’s Digital Publishing

Suite, InDesign for page

layout/interactivity,

Photoshop for image editing,

Illustrator for drawing

buttons/shapes

DATE May 2012

who thought it would be a good addition, and I

found two friends who were as excited as I was

to help with photos and video.

What I LearnedThis was the first time I had ever designed for

interactivity, specifically for a mobile device.

I was hooked. I was able to experiment

with a new format for design (landscape &

portrait for the iPad) and I learned about the

design considerations that are necessary for

interactive design, such as: “Is this button big

enough for someone on an iPad to click?” or “Is

it obvious that this text scrolls?”

OR MagazineWebsite

About the ProjectOR Magazine is the first student-run iPad magazine

at the University of Oregon (and in the country). This

“digital magazine” focuses on human-interest stories

about the state of Oregon. I had many responsibilities

for this publication, but this page explains the one-

page responsive website I worked on.

My RoleMy role for this project was to work with a front-

end coder to create a website for OR Magazine.

We decided that the site should serve a few basic

functions: explain what OR is, provide a download

link to the apple store, show off its beautiful new

cover, and provide ways of connecting people to the

magazine, either by social media or email. I didn’t see

any reason we should make some huge, full-blown

website (especially because we didn’t want to give

away any of our magazine content), so we decided on

a simplistic approach.

What I LearnedThis was maybe my second time designing

responsively, so to say that I learned a lot would be

an understatement. I came to realize that minimal is

always better with responsive design, and since I had

some coding knowledge, I was able to make better

design choices because I knew what problems my

developer would be encountering.

PROJECT OR Magazine Website

ROLE Web Designer, Photographer

DELIVERABLES One page responsive website

PROGRAMS / TOOLS Photoshop for mockups and bg

image editing, Canon T2i DSLR

for the image

DATE July 2012

Fender Guitars

About the ProjectThis project was a class assignment to create a print

campaign for a brand of my choice. I worked with a

friend who wrote the clever copy in the designs. We

chose Fender because we both had a relationship with

the brand and we wanted our message to mirror that

sentimental relationship.

My RoleMy role was primarily design, although I did

brainstorming and strategy with my partner as well. We

both thought that stories are easy ways for people to

connect, so our campaign followed that strategy. Each

double page spread focuses on a different stage in a

guitar’s life: From starting out as just a piece of wood in

a forest, to being shaped into an actual instrument, to

being used by a musician. The text mirrors this concept

and tone, while also touching on the fact that Fender is

an American-made guitar company, and that the people

who cut down those trees, make the guitars, and buy the

guitars are all Americans.

What I LearnedThis project was a great way for me to think about

strategy and to focus on how the message of a campaign

should be consistent throughout all of its materials.

PROJECT Fender Guitars

ROLE Photographer, Graphic Designer

DELIVERABLES Three, full-spread advertisements

PROGRAMS / TOOLS InDesign for general designs,

Photoshop for image processing

DATE January 2012