Published: April 18, 2023
2022 saw some new clients and big opportunities for the OC Creative team. We’re always excited to take on challenging projects, and they often turn out to be the most rewarding in the end for us and for our clients. We truly enjoy almost every creative endeavor we take on, so it was hard to pick favorites from last year. But after a few months of consideration, we’ve each decided what our favorites were. Check it out!
Katie:
Ok so my obvious favorite is Lumos’s commercial for Blaines Farm & Fleet. You can watch it here: Upward-Facing Dog Distraction
It was so fun to be on set with him and see how well he did! So proud of him. We wrapped sooner than planned because he did so well and they got through the shot list quickly. Adorbs.
I also really liked the ENCAP website I helped create. The client was great to work with, there was some good imagery to use, and the design was fun to build. See it here: ENCAP Website
Darren:
My favorite project from 2022 was Midwest Express Clinic’s “Healthcare for Any Mode” series of Super Bowl tv spots. It was a huge, high-profile project with high expectations, but it was such a rewarding challenge to take on. We had a great crew and were ultimately able to film four tv commercials in one day. Within a few weeks, we had 4 fully produced tv commercials ready to air throughout the Midwest during the Super Bowl.
Sara:
One of my favorite design projects was the Lakeshore Recycling Systems display walls. I had minimal involvement, but these different displays showcase the great talent of our design team beyond graphic design. The displays were installed in the LRS headquarters in various meetings rooms, hallways, and common areas.
Favorite web projects were for the DeKalb Chamber of Commerce and LaGrange Public Library. Both needed to be easier to navigate and more user friendly. The Chamber site is a big resource for our community that I personally visit often for information. DeKalb Chamber of Commerce
I especially enjoyed the LaGrange site because I learned just how much that particular library provides in the way of services and resources. You can do all the typical library stuff and also rent all kinds of equipment! Libraries are definitely unsung heroes. LaGrange Public Library
Leslie:
One of my favorite projects was also the Lakeshore Recycling Systems display walls. We have designed display walls before, but this project had more walls of greater size. The designs were multilayered, adding dimension in a variety of materials.
Brian:
I was really impressed by the NIU School of Theatre and Dance performance designs we did. It isn’t often that we are able to create a campaign theme and all of the elements that will be involved with it, but I hope we get to do it more often, as our design team knocked these out of the park. NIU was looking to create themed designs for their 10 theatre and dance performances throughout the ’22/’23 academic year. Elements had to be applicable on a playbill as well as printed tickets and social media graphics. See for yourself how cohesive the designs are across all the unique performance covers.
Meredith:
I also really loved the NIU School of Theatre and Dance poster designs Leslie and I worked on. It was a great collaboration for the two of us. We were able to have total creative freedom, which meant we could incorporate more of our preferred styles of illustration! I think the posters turned out amazingly! These two are probably my favorite designs from the 2022-2023 performance series.
Austin:
Okay, So, my favorite project was definitely Proven Winners Certified and University. This is because this was my first project I got to work on from production until final steps. Getting to see how everything was done and be a part of it was eye opening and a lot of fun! It’s a series of training videos for employees and growers, so there’s not much to share publicly, but trust me when I say it’s a big production with a long pre-production period and an even longer post-production. It felt great to see it through!
Amy:
The Blaine’s Farm & Fleet Mother’s Day Gifts video was one of my favorites from last year. I always love when Blain’s lets us take a project from concept to creation to final video, and we got to be really creative with this one. I even got to make the main prop for it!
Secondly, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to mention it, but, like Darren said, we got to do a Super Bowl commercial for Midwest Express Clinics! Need I say more? Scroll back up if you missed it. We’re super proud.
Finally for me, our photo shoot and videos we shot for Opportunity House’s Tackling the Limits campaign were incredible. Rocky & Cole were amazing ambassadors, and they were so great to see with the athletes. The smiles on their faces during both the photos and the video production just made for a great day all around. And getting to help our nonprofits make impactful videos for things like Give DeKalb County always feels meaningful.
Did we mention we got to do a Super Bowl commercial? It’s amazing that anything we did would top that in a given year, but it just goes to show the diversity and scale of some of our favorites from 2022. Every project got a unique solution, attention from our whole team, and the creativity we live for. We don’t plan to quit bringing that creativity to everything we do, so there’s certain to be bigger and better favorites next year. Stay tuned!