client: The Wellington School
project: In-Person Event Media
Motion Designer
with KinoPicz American Studio
All Things Wellington is an annual event hosted by The Wellington School in Columbus, Ohio. It offers parents and community members a chance to take an in-depth look at the curriculums and experiences students partake in when attending the school.
All Things Wellington 2023 is the second time the school has worked with KinoPicz American Studio to organize media for the event. Unlike the previous instance (which was fully virtual), this year’s event returned to an in-person format. Our video department shot and created videos that ran in between in-person speakers and performances. My role was to handle the creation of all motion graphics that appeared on screen during the event. This included elements like title cards and thirds that existed within pre-recorded content—as well as event opening / closing and speaker introduction graphics.
ABOVE: While guests entered the auditorium a loop was played onscreen that showed the block of Wellingtons slowly filling and emptying of the shool's vibrant secondary brand colors. When it was showtime, the tech company running media crossfaded from that looping clip to the event intro, which sees the Wellington block come to life with more energy and speed. The rest of the clips shown display what in-person and pre-recorded graphics looked like. The Morning Show segment was pitched as sort of comical ‘Anchorman-esque’ introduction to a live version of the student’s typically pre-recorded morning show that inlcuded their existing student created logo.
Having worked with Wellington and their brand before, my initial mood board and concept pitches were created with what they had responded to positively in the past in mind. They have a very strict, simple brand language that I interpreted in three different styles to get a sense of the direction they wanted to go this year.
Upon reviewing those initial concepts, they shared that they wanted this year’s event to be a more elevated and refined experience. In our discussion with them, my creative director pitched the idea of leaning into the design aesthetics of the corporate world in the 1980’s to coincide with the school’s 40th anniversary celebration that was also occurring at the time.
Using that concept as a launching point, I developed a new mood board that was made up of the simple, elevated elegance of that era of design. The simplicity and visually satisfying grid-based look of those references was translated into a new set of concept frames. Their response to this second approach was overwhelmingly positive and only minor changes were made between proposal frames and final product.
The 1980’s ‘vibe’ was leaned into even further with the music that I selected for the event. The track is optimistic, energetic, and modern—but also uses synths in a way that harken to the time period without feeling dated.