Presentation Design • Brand Management • Environmental Graphics
Oakland County, Michigan
State of the County
Presentation Design
The largest and most public event of the year is the annual State of the County Address give by the Oakland County Executive. For the past dozen+ years, I’ve been responsible for the visuals playing on stage behind the CEO during his speech.
SKILLS
Presentation Design
Brand Management
Event Branding
Environmental Graphics
2023: Creative Direction
The 2023 State of the County Address was the first year that I fully took on the role of Creative Director for the event. Not only overseeing the production of the PowerPoint presentation playing on stage, but also overseeing the production of 3 feature videos that were shown during the speech.
SKILLS
Creative Direction
Graphics Oversight
Video Production Management
Environmental / Signage
Video Production Management
I worked closely with my two-person video production team to produce three videos for the 2023 State of the County event. Once a script was produced by the copywriting team, I developed a detailed production schedule, prepared on-camera talent for interviews, scheduled the video shoots, and worked with the team on post-production reviews and edits.
2022: New Slogan Launch
The 2022 State of the County Address was the first step into normal life after the COVID-19 Pandemic. The event was hosted at the M1 Concourse and a new marketing slogan was announced. The branding for the slogan was carried through all materials for the event. This was also the first year that I served as Creative Director and had a team to assist with the event branding and design.
SKILLS
Presentation Design
Brand Launch
Environmental Graphics
Creative Direction
On-Site Presenting & Technical Support
Vendor Management
Introducing New Mission & Slogan
The big reveal during the speech was the introduction of the county’s new mission and vision statements, as well as the new slogan that would move the county’s brand forward.
All Ways, Moving Forward
This slogan was developed by an agency but the brand development was my responsibility.
2021: A Virtual Event
The COVID-19 pandemic forced us to be creative for a new solution to the traditional in-person State of the County speech. Rather than filling a theater with 600 attendees, we re-created the experiences virtually with a pre-recorded video.
Once the video production was done, a live stream event was held for public viewing.
SKILLS
Creative Direction
Video Production Workflow Oversight
B-roll Planning
Graphic Design
Brand Management
The production team spent the day at Baldwin Theater to film the County Executive giving his speech. The two-person video production team worked with the teleprompting vendor to create a seamless speech delivery.
Once the speech was captured, post-production editing could begin. B-roll from the video library and new footage were combined with the speech footage to produce a finished video for presentation to the online audience.
Throughout the editing process, I worked closely with my team to review drafts and sit with them to ensure the storyboard was executed properly. I then routed draft files for review to the administrative team.
2020: A New Era
The 2020 State of the County Address was the beginning of a new era in Oakland County, Michigan. After 27 years with the same leadership, a new County Executive was appointed and this was his first SOTC speech, just 6 months after taking office. I worked closely with the administrative team to give the speech a fresh new visual brand and incorporate the new visual features they were looking for.
SKILLS
Presentation Design
Environmental Graphics
Event Planning & Design
Creative Direction
On-Site Presentation
Design + Event Planning
While preparing the 2020 State of the County presentation, I was serving as the Senior Graphic Designer for the county executive office.
The county had not yet created the centralized communication department with an event planning team. Therefore, many of those duties were still my responsibility, in addition to creating the graphics being shown on the stage when the speech was delivered.
Sample of Slides
The video below is a small compilation of slides from the 2020 State of the County Presenation.
Not a Normal Slide Deck
The purpose of the slides in the SOTC presentation is to NOT draw attention away from the speech, but rather to visually support, in a subtle way, the words that are being spoken. The CEO doesn’t speak to the slides or refer to anything being shown on the screen behind him.
