Author Archives: pkerycom

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Minimalist Movie Posters

University of Minnesota and George Mason University posters

University of Minnesota and George Mason University

This project asked students to distill the essence of a film into a single image and a single word or two words — the movie title. The challenge: create a visually compelling movie poster that captures the film’s emotional tone, narrative arc, or pivotal moment, using only the film’s title and one dominant visual element. […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Branding a Restaurant

Various restaurant logos University of Minnesota, Duluth, Spring 2022

First year graphic design students at the University of Minnesota — Duluth, were asked to create branding for a local eatery of their choice. The logo would be used for a take-out app design and as inspi­ration for identi­fying icons used within the app. The visual language of the brand would also be used for […]

Work: Research

Textures

The following is a research and photo documen­tation project called, Textures. These photographs and layout exper­i­men­ta­tions are based on my daily walks through the woods of Massa­chu­setts and Minnesota. They are photographs of places that I contin­ually journey past but have decided to pause this one moment and take a closer look at the landscape […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Letterform Gestalts

Univ. Minn. Duluth, Fall 2022

Univ. Minn. Duluth, Fall 2022

Univ. Minn. Duluth, Fall 2022

Univ. Minn. Duluth, Fall 2022

Typographic Joinery: Form, History, and Abstraction As an intro­ductory explo­ration of typographic form, students were challenged to create original visual config­u­ra­tions by combining letter­forms from the Latin alphabet. Through this typographic joinery, they inves­ti­gated proportion, weight, counterform, and spatial relation­ships — gaining a deeper under­standing of letter­forms not just as carriers of content, but as […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Book Jacket Designs

Students created book jacket designs for a publi­cation of their choice. Sketching and the overall process included what imagery or visual language is appro­priate for the story. Discus­sions also included the difference between stories told on printed pages and stories told on film. Filmog­raphy imagery was avoided on purpose. Students inves­ti­gated imagery for their book […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Expressive Typography for Poster Designs

Alexei Lewis, Fall 2025, George Mason University expressive word, Cavendish

Alexei Lewis, Fall 2025, George Mason University, Cavendish. Prior to this assignment, students will work on an expressive word project. The nature of which is to express the meaning of a descriptive word - or communicate the name of a scientist and an aspect of their work through typography. Henry Cavendish was known for discovering hydrogen.

Expressing Visual Solutions Through Typog­raphy In this project, students designed exhibition posters using expressive typog­raphy as the central visual language. Each student selected an artist, scientist, or art movement to research and interpret — visually capturing its energy, mood, and conceptual essence through abstracted letter­forms and original typographic compo­sition. Impor­tantly, students were not allowed to […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Poster Designs —
A Visual Vocabulary

Josalyn Dehncke, Graphic Design, UMD

Josalyn Dehncke, Graphic Design, UMD

Jack Peck, Graphic Design, UMD

Students designed a multi-format poster campaign promoting a documentary series, exhibition, organi­zation, or media platform. Rather than centering a logo or singular image, the project focused on systems thinking—asking students to develop a flexible visual vocab­ulary capable of functioning consis­tently across multiple outputs. Through research, sketching, and iteration, students estab­lished relation­ships between form, color, typography, […]

Student Work: Graphic Design Education

Graphic Translations

Owl studies - Talia Bergeron, Fall 2022, University of Minnesota, Duluth. Bee studies - Zach Audette, Fall 2022, University of Minnesota, Duluth.

Owl studies - Talia Bergeron, Fall 2022, University of Minnesota, Duluth. Bee studies - Zach Audette, Fall 2022, University of Minnesota, Duluth. Cheetah study, University of Minnesota, Duluth.

In this project, students were asked to create a graphic trans­lation of an animal, bird, or insect — beginning with simplified, black-and-white visual forms. The objective was to explore how abstraction, reduction, and stylization could be used to commu­nicate the essence of a subject without relying on photo­graphic realism. The process began with obser­va­tional drawing, […]

Work: Branding/Identities | Websites

Cartel Auto Parts

Cartel Auto Parts top image photo

Cartel Auto Parts is an independent, family-owned and operated business. They have been estab­lished in Southwest Philadelphia since 1968. This assignment is a branding, website design and devel­opment. project for a set of junkyards! The objective of the project was to draw more attention and make the public aware of their multi-faceted facil­ities and operations. […]