Behavior change doesn’t have to feel like a chore

Waste disposal and the proper sorting of it. Organics, recyclables, hazzardous and bulky waste. There are so many rules that its natural that option fatigue would make someone throw their hands up at it all. And while proper waste disposal is certainly an inevitable responsiibility, there’s no reason it needs to feel like the chore that it is. On top of this, a good habit is one you start early on. I remember as a kid, Captain Planet having a pretty pronounced effect on my generation. Maybe there was a way to put some of that fresh energy to use for Sacramento’s SacGreenTeam, an arm of Sacramento County’s waste disposal service aimed at promoting sensible environmental stewardship at the household level. 

Meet the “Bin fluencers”  

Yeah, its a goofy pun, but I wanted something with a little “bounce” to it since I’d be designing the characters in an almost primary color, school workbook vibe in the best tradition of far better illustrators like Milton Glaser. The Binfluencers would be color-coded to their specific type of waste and be drawn as simple vector illustrations in extreme, towering perspective and funky, bold proportions. And each would be so proud of their positive behavior they pulled out their phones to record the moment.

The other great thing about this approach is that Lottie animations for web were fast becoming a way to deliver high quality, infinitely-scalable animations across a number of channels and device types. The Binfluencers were made for this moment. And they exist everywhere from various social channels (where we saw engagement far beyond what you’d normally expect for a sanitation service) to the Recycle Reboot website where we offered practical tips for conscientious waste reduction and disposal to more commonplace assets like home mailers and fun swag like stickers and coloring pages for kids to help keep them engaged with proper waste handling. 

And using the fun visual language of color-coded illustrations made them universal in a way that really helped when translating their message across the myriad languages present in the Sacramento area. From Spanish to Tagalog, these simple characters reached across cultural differences and really reached people. We used local language translation and education service Language World to help make these characters resonate with an international flavor…

The above scenes were animated by Sacramento’s Noble Creative Collective, who also valiantly handled post on the full spot, seen below…

In fact, they really added something to even the most utilitarian spots on municipal waste and I think that spark of life is really what helped move the needle in some pretty substantial ways for the client.

Resulting in…

The Before Times

In January of 2020 (right before…well…you know) we were all still firmly footed in what some call “the before times.”  My copywriter and at-the-time conceptual partner Jenna Lazzarone (cracking good copywriter, should you be in the market for one) were working at Sacramento’s 3fold agency, and we had been tasked with a full rebrand Nevada County Transit, a rapid transit system servicing the Northeastern California area including Grass Valley. With our mission in place, we of set off north to the Grass Valley area to research what was working about the brand, what could be improved upon, and how we could find a new way to present Nevada County Transit as a brand.   

A Break with the Tropes of the Past  

At the time, the transit system up in Nevada County was beholden to some well-worn brand elements devoted to the area’s history as a gold rush boomtown. 

Dubbed the Gold Country Stage, it was a sturdy brand that had over time simply not grown alongside the region. It felt more aligned with mid-20th century tourism vibes than the sophisticated and arty town it had since grown in to. Further, the public in the area didnt really have much of a solid perception for what the transit line even was or how it could fit into their lives and lifestyles. 

Simplification was Key  

In interviewing locals about the service, one thing came up more often than anything else: its current map was unwieldy and too hard to parse at a glance. In looking at it you could see why. It’s a classic example of a map that’s trying to say too many things, to express every bend in the road, every detail for miles. What if we took the example of large metropolitan subway lines and worked from there? This would also give us a way to streamline not just the logo but the name itself.  

Exit Gold Country Stage, Enter: Nevada County Connects.

Making the Brand About Connection, Destination and Lifestyle   

I wanted to focus on Nevada County Transit as a consumer brand, since that was the way the public would be interacting with it. What does it feel like? How does it make you feel? What does it do for you? In a city full of brewpubs and art galleries and interesting restaurants, how will it fit in between the rider and those points.  The destination point itself would become an important piece of the logo mark, and we would articulate that out through the brand materials, posters, flyers, fare cards, shelters, and even the fleet itself. 

My goal with the “connects” logo was to tap into riders’ sense of adventure. For that reason, the end of the ”S” pushes off infinitely, giving a sense of an open-ended road with limitless possibilities. This is a concept that was articulated throughout print and environmental materials, as well as on the fleet itself. 

A sleek “supergraphics” style brand extends to the service map itself

We had our mark and a way to articulate it thoughout the brand system, but we needed to remember that one of the original problems we were hired to solve was the map itself. Fortunately, I had a fantastic designer to turn loose on it. Maria “Masha” Ratinova was my graphic designer at 3fold and being a native of Moscow originally, she knew her way around sprawling transit maps. She would take it on like it was the transit map for a large cosmopolitan metropolis, with all the minimalism and simplification that comes with it. Her system map was truly a thing of beauty. 

The system map comes alive

Masha’s terrific work on the map itself cant help but feel like a moving thing, even as a static asset. But she went a step further, tossed it into After Effects and really made it come to life in sprawling motion. We used it on several motion assets across every social channel.

The industry comes roaring back

In winter 2019/20 I was working on art for several music festivals (nearly all festivals are planned several months in advance as they end up impacting many artists’ touring plans for the years they occur in. Of course then (motions around) things changed. Spring dates shifted optimistically to early summer, then late summer, then autumn before being ultimately shelved. A trend that would stick around for a year or two. Since Covid first hit in 2020 there have been multiple false starts and plans that never made it past the initial planning stages. 2023 felt like things were finally geting back to normal. That year I would do four music festivals just in the first four months of the year.

I was thrilled when Activated Events asked me to help them rebrand their long-running Coastal Country Jam festival, which would be returning in 2023 but in a very different location than its original stomping grounds in Huntington Beach. The festival was moving north. To Long Beach. And that change of venue was going to inform the artwork.

Avoiding the usual “country/western” tropes

Sure, this was a country music festival but it was also a California country music festival. On the beach no less. The look would need to avoid all the usual trappings associated with country music. No boots, for instance. And it should at least nod to the California model of country. A bit more Eagles than Charlie Daniels Band. I set to work on a few different brand marks to see about presenting this specific vibe. And as I often do, I would start with color. What could bridge the gap in vibe here? Sand, sea, earth tones and honky tonks. All that. I put together a simple palette as my jumping off point. 

Color and type are often my way “in” on a project. Each carries its own language and tone into things that help light the path toward what the other elements will be. So next I’dd find some type that could live in that space between Country tradition and California attitude. I would mock up a couple basic logotypes.

California State Fair Poster 2017: The Concept

2017 marked the California State Fair’s 50th year at Sacramento’s Cal Expo fairgrounds since moving there from inside the city proper in 1968. To mark the occasion, my then-fiancé-now-wife (UnCommon‘s Amber Witzke, who has worked as Art Director and designer on CSF branding the past several years) suggested we make a limited edition poster in the style of Disneyland’s classic attraction posters, specifically an homage to their classic and iconic Monorail poster.

Cal Expo has its own monorail (if a bit less sleek and “jet age” as the ones in Anaheim and Orlando) and what’s more its also been the site of Disney’s California Adventure’s transplanted “CALIFORNIA” entrance letters since 2013. We could use these connections to create something really exciting and special as a souvenir to promote the anniversary.