Carsyn is an art director in Austin, previously at Sanders/Wingo. (Don’t miss her Illustration page—she’s a killer illustrator, too.) Her “Nothing Punny” campaign for the United Way of Omaha brings pun zingers “to life” in disgusting, fleshy san serif nastiness. So gross. But so good.
Portfolio: carsyntaylormke.com
Big ups to VCU Brandcenter Director of Student Affairs and Industry Outreach, Ashley Sommardahl, for once again helping MC host VCU Brandcenter Week. And big, big ups to all of the VCU grads who will be running the ad biz soon enough. Do great work. Be kind to each other. Make the world a better place.
You can check out the portfolios of the entire VCU Brandcenter 2018 class, including copywriters, art directors, creative brand management, experience design, and strategy, on the VCU Brandcenter site here. Can’t wait to see where they land!
Brianna is a new copywriter and a recent VCU grad. One of the great things about student campaigns is that you get to take an idea and run with it. And run and run and run and run with it. Who’s going to stop you? Nobody. In the case of Brianna’s “Pull This” campaign for Kraft String Cheese, she went from print to OOH to digital to in-store to vending machine to a String Cheese Festival in Pullman, WA, headlined by the String Cheese Incident. Because why the heck not.
Portfolio: briannagross.com
Allison is a new art director and a recent VCU grad. At the time of this post, she’s got six spec projects and two produced projects on her site (don’t be fooled just because the produced ones are last, they’re just as good as the spec). Dig her creepy eye “Get Impossibly Close” campaign for Bushnell, and her “Sick Burns Candles” product development idea (so mean), which both have just the right amount of edge. Also dig her Unite by Kotex App. How have they not made that yet?
Portfolio: allisonrinaldi.com
Lynn is a new art director and a recent VCU grad. She’s got so many different looks in her portfolio, but all of them have the coolest vibe: Venmo (above), Mütter Museum, Sector 9, That’s What She Said, Little Tikes, Wonder Bread, and Olympics. Also, don’t miss her magazine “Skinny Dipper” in Not Work. So cool.
Portfolio: lynnlnakamura.com
Mike is a new art director and recent VCU grad. The typography throughout his portfolio is subtle and beautiful (great use of white space), which makes the lines sing. Love seeing an AD start off his book with a campaign for Merriam-Webster. High-five, Mr. Lee.
Portfolio: bookofmikelee.com
Thea is a new copywriter and recent VCU grad. So many smart projects on her site, from Hi-Liter “choose what to remember” to Greyhound “Took me there” to Daily Warmups for Chicks (above). Genius.
Portfolio: thea-ryan.com
Allie is a new copywriter and graduate of VCU. All kinds of hilarity in her portfolio including her very “real” campaign for Boy Scouts (above). Don’t miss her completely inappropriate children’s book (ahem) “Are You My Daddy?” So wrong. So right.
Portfolio: alliercarr.com
Shevek is junior copywriter at McCann in NYC and a graduate of Creative Circus. All kinds of killer projects in his portfolio and lots of great writing throughout. At the top of his site’s homepage is the line, “Here’s the work, and here’s the pudding if you’re short on time and just want the proof.” Click “here’s the pudding” and you go to another page that breaks out his work into Headlines, Commercials, Case Studies, Integrated Campaigns. Click on Headlines and you’re greeted with (in addition to some great lines), “Currently at a 200:1 embarrassing-scribble to solid-line ratio, but every 1 feels so damn good.” Amen.
Portfolio: shevekanandan.com
Spencer is a copywriter in Portland, Oregon who recently graduated from Brainco’s online program. His portfolio is a mix of spec and produced work that is both national and so very Portland (in such a good way). Clients (real and spec) include The Washington Post, Tetra Cannabis, Liquid Plumbr, Lipton Tea, 12oz Prophet, and the Portland Trimet (above). Looking forward to seeing what Spencer adds next!
Portfolio: spencerwknowles.com
Nick is a freelance interactive art director/ACD in Los Angeles. So many fun projects on his site, including “What’s In Santa’s Beard” Scratch-Its for the Oregon Lottery, Burton’s Mountain Festival & US Snowboarding Open sponsored by MINI, Lexus projects for a VERY popular movie (pass: wakanda2018), and the NachoTron 3000 for Mission Foods (above). Nachos and long copy ads print ads—what’s more delicious than that? Nothing. Nothing is more delicious than that.
Portfolio: nickkamei.com
Greg is a senior copywriter at Ogilvy NY. Since his last post on MC (back on 08.04.14, when he was a jr copywriter at Merkley+Partners), he’s been busy. All kinds of awesome projects for IBM on his site, including IBM Mobile, IBM Cloud (above), IBM Watson, and IBM Marketing. Plus a couple of projects for Mercedes-Benz. Plus some killer photography. Dig it.
Portfolio: gkissler.com
Carter is a copywriter/director/CD at Sanders/Wingo in Austin. At the time of this post, he’s got 14 killer projects up on his site for clients like DirecTV, Bud Light, Burger King, State Farm, Intel, and AT&T (above). Don’t miss his Passion Projects page, which include a couple of unbelievable agency holiday cards. So true they’re terrifying.
Portfolio: carterpagel.com