AIGA Design Conference
AIGA
When renowned designer Sean Adams chose Primal Screen to create all the motion graphics for the AIGA Design Conference, we were super excited and a teensy bit panicked. We knew the world’s premier graphic design event would host the best and most influential design heroes and we wanted to dazzle them. That meant creating great design that supported the theme without eclipsing the speakers. Did we get it right? Well, they asked us to do it again. Twice.
Connections
With its theme of “Connections,” the Minneapolis conference offered up plenty of chances to explore how people (and things) connect with one another. From microscopic organisms in a petri dish to an astronaut’s boot on the moon, we animated 59 different scenes that were themselves connected by morphing transitions. As an homage to the host city we even featured some local attractions, while the purple color scheme paid tribute to Minneapolis icons the Prince and the Vikings.
The music tracks also supported the theme with familiar objects like car keys and drinking glasses forming the rhythm. Eschewing epic effects, the sound design remained tactile with all the clicks and thumps of the everyday emerging from the music.
For the conference’s branding package, we created three opens, one for each day, as well as dozens of speaker intros.
Culture
We were delighted when the AIGA had us back to create the motion graphics for their conference in Pasadena. Here we sidestepped the previous year’s literal representation of the theme, choosing instead to show “Culture” as multicolored strands which swoop, overlap, intersect and merge.
The music and animation grow bolder each day, moving from a syncopated string quartet to a chill, jazzy backbeat, and resolving finally on a thumping chorus of drums. Visually and musically each piece embodies culture as it clashes and converges with quiet nuance or brash audacity.
Again, we created the three daily opens and numerous other branding elements.
Bridges
The Pittsburgh conference’s theme was “Bridges.” however because of COVID lockdowns, the February 2020 event was postponed and became virtual. Adopting a restrained approach for the now at-home event, we created a branding package emphasized the power of bridges to bring people together.
Fertile Collaboration
We loved building the many elements we created for the various conferences. Over the three years we collaborated with the AIGA, we delved deeply into pure design, unconstrained by commerce. Or was it? Perhaps “Connections,” “Culture,” and “Bridges” are ideas worth selling. We like to think so.