2022/3
Momentum—IDEO North America Portfolio Review

January 2023

Challenge

A lot of the work done at IDEO North America often goes unseen even by those inside the company. To show off the incredible creative talent and level of output IDEO has, IDEO puts on an annual internal portfolio review, and I helped create the visual language for the 2022 show. Given the name “Momentum” as the year’s theme, my fellow Comms designer Michal Janicki and I brainstormed concepts we could use to represent each of IDEO’s craft cohorts.

Approach

Early on, we landed on the idea of using moving concentric circles to literally spin the title type and make it feel like it had momentum (see below). We knew we could do the same with the cohort names, and we really wanted to add images to them – but what images? Black and white photos? If so, which photos? Or maybe we could use famous paintings? Fun idea, but “famous” paintings tend to lean Eurocentric. Wait – what if we used an AI image generator to create paintings for each cohort? And we could use animals instead of people, doing things that represent what each cohort does! Bingo.

Outcome

Using DALL•E, we created Renaissance-style paintings of animals engaging in activities that related to each domain’s work; for example, a squirrel painting a self-portrait for Brand & Communications, a fox in a library for Research & Insights, etc. Once we created each image, we animated them using After Effects with the same concentric circles and made them into gifs to use in the final deck.

Spinning Gifs for Each Cohort

Early Alternative Concepts

In the course of business Michal and I came up with a number of other ways we could show “Momentum.” The concepts below were not ultimately chosen by that year’s portfolio review committee, but are worthwhile viewing nonetheless.

Early whiteboard sketches of ways to activate “Momentum.”

Concept 1

Concept 1 mimics a search bar’s auto-fill as users type begin typing in search queries. Motion could come into play as the remainder of the word “mo______” filled in with suggested endings.

Concept 2

Concept 2 activates “momentum” by literally giving each letter momentum – letters would extend vertically ad infinitum, cascading onto and off of the screen. Motion would ultimately play a crucial role to the concept’s execution, although for this exploratory phase motion was not yet utilized.