Graphic Design

Whatever design work you may need, Gillico can handle it. From the smallest logo to the biggest billboard; print advertising and online advertising, collateral, multi-page brochures, and ebooks; or website and UI design, I have experience with them all. I keep up with current standards, I know design history, and I am passionate about good design and typography, all of which are essential to making your project great.

Please contact Gillico if you think I can help you.

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Web and UI Design

LookSmart.com

As lead UI designer at LookSmart, my responsibility was redesigning their online advertising and publishing platform to be resold to other partners. With that in mind, it needed to be designed to be customized for other end users, which meant there were many different user cases that had to be considered and different work flows to be accommodated.

Below are wireframes and mockups I made charting the progress of the design of "Orlando," the 2007 revision to the Advertising Center, as well as tours of the final product for both LookSmart and Ask Jeeves, who was their premier publisher at the time.

Funny or Die

The Blue Collar Comedy Tour partnered with Funny or Die to create a comedy video site based around Jeff Foxworthy, Larry the Cable Guy and Bill Engvall. The original designer was unable to complete the design, so I stepped in and worked with both sides to come up with a user interface that satisfied both the technical needs of Funny or Die and the style desired from the management of the Blue Collar Comedy tour management.

The Futon Shop.com

While I was the Creative Director of the Futon Shop, I redesigned and oversaw the redevelopment of the company's website from a static, jumbled mess that barely brought in $1k per month to a dynamic, database-driven site that, when I left the company, was generating upwards of $30k per month in sales.

In addition to completely revamping the content management system and graphics, I also optimized the site content to help the company's pages go from obscurity to top ranking in search.

LiveTouch.net

LiveTouch.net is a telephony company local to Alameda, CA, that came to Gillico looking to freshen up their image. They were about to launch some new products and wanted a new look to appeal to potential customers. I was asked to take a difficult to navigate homepage and bring it to life, and make it more usable.

I made the front page inviting and welcoming, not overwhelming. I cut way back on the amount of copy. What was most lacking from the previous design, and is now present, is a connection between the user and the company, that makes people connect with the site and want to go further into the pages to find out more.

Think Secret.com

Think Secret was a notorious Macintosh and Apple rumors site that grew to be one of the best known and respected sources of information on the web. I twice redesigned the site: first I took a jumble of information that spanned more that 10 monitors of content, and condensed it into an easily-navigated two-screen page. To highlight the "confidential" nature of the content, I chose a manila folder theme

For the second redesign, I mimicked the sleek industrial design of the then-new PowerMac G5. The site included the ability for the user to choose the background behind the content. Among the thanks I got was a subpoena from Apple demanding to know who Nick dePlume was, since mine was the only other name on the site as the design credit.

NearbyNow.com

NearbyNow contracted Gillico to design the UI for their search platform for shopping malls. Their product was to add value to mall sites by allowing shoppers to check store inventory and reserve product in advance, as well as receive promotions for using the site. Below is a mockup of the original site for testing purposes using the Eastridge Mall as a template.

Other site design

Online Advertising

For the past several years, Gillico has been designing custom ad units for Funny or Die. They usually require quick turnaround and coordination with major national ad campaigns, while being tailored to Funny or Die's specific site needs, in a variety of sizes and formats, including ad banners, overlays, and site skins. The ad units are for a variety of products but usually fall into the three major categories listed below.

Movies

Television

Consumer Products

Logos

America True

My favorite logo I designed is also the one I have the least control over. I created it for someone who was providing design services to the America True folks, who were based in San Francisco and went on to compete in the America's Cup, representing the USA. Shortly after I delivered the logo, they broke off their business relationship. The logo went on to be used on millions of dollars of merchandise, and was featured prominently all over the boat. I am most proud of the way the sails give the feeling of catching the wind, and gives an overall feeling of speed.

Funny or Die

Along with developing the UI for the Blue Collar Comedy Tour site for Funny or Die, I also designed the logo and other associated promotions.

Looksmart

My job at LookSmart was the lead designer for B2B platforms, but I also had a chance to work on their identity beyond just that for the Ad Center. I created a whole system of guidelines for the main and sub-brands, including color palettes.

The Futon Shop

When I started with San Francisco-based The Futon Shop, the logo was bright green and yellow, and done in a dated 70's typographic style. In the process of updating the company Web site, I had the opportunity to rethink the original logo, and chose to update it, both by choosing a more contemporary type style and changing the colors to red and black. Subsequently, I developed a new brand identity, Dreamland, which I chose to depict in as timelessly as possible, using a slab serif typeface and a simple, universal logotype in classic blues.

Others

These are a few other logos I created that I am especially pleased with.

Collateral & eBooks

The Futon Shop

The first catalog that I designed for the Futon Shop was a 36 page, full color brochure, showing all of the different frames, fabrics and accessories. Many of these photos were taken at a photoshoot at the owner's private home in Petaluma, CA, where I art directed a half-dozen models and dogs, a photographer and assistant, and the nervous owner. We were going for an every-man kind of look, rooms that anyone could look at and imagine themselves settled comfortably in the furniture.

For the following year, I changed things up and created a tool to help salespeople on the floor, and save money in printing costs. The brochure's modular design allowed salespeople to provide customers with specific, targeted information, including finishes, dimensions and prices in an elegant, coordinated manner. It also provided a low-cost and easily renewed system for displaying the company's product. Each card explains three or four products, while the folder discusses the mattresses, company mission and store locations.

PC Mag.com

I was hired to design a group of four stand-alone eBooks about popular tech topics that were sold by Ziff-Davis Media. I given free reign to come up with something fun and engaging, so I chose to go a little bit retro, to play against the high-tech content. I even contributed some of the written content.

Pacific Bell

As the junior designer and production manager at HeadQuarters Advertising, a bilingual Spanish and English advertising agency in San Francisco, I got the chance to work on several interesting projects for Pacific Bell, which has since become SBC, and now at&t. I mostly worked on direct mail campaigns, which are shown below.

Positive Health Project

While Art Director at Better World Advertising, we were commissioned to create first one, then a second series of cards to be handed out at nightclubs, providing information about popular club drugs to patrons, so that they could make informed decisions and seek help if needed. I designed the cards to be eye-catching and to somewhat mimic what I knew of the effect of each drug, and helped to write the information on the backs. They proved to be so popular that they were reprinted several times.

Others

Print Advertising

The Futon Shop

Being the Creative Director of the Futon Shop allowed me the chance to try several different approaches to advertising campaigns. The chain of 18 furniture stores had an annual advertising budget of over $1 million per year, and advertised in over a dozen California publications while I was there. I started simply, picking up from my predecessor.

Then I created a coordinated print campaign, playing off the idea that futons were undesirable, when in fact, the product has many elements going in its favor that were easy to point out to potential customers. What made it especially fun for me is that I handled all aspects of the campaign: design, copy writing, creative direction, production, ad placement, trafficking, budgeting, and review.

After discussions with the owner, we decided to start to evolve the branding of the stores away from emphasizing the word Futon, to allow for other sales opportunities in the bedding industry. So I developed the Dreamland identity, and began incorporating it into the advertising.

Others

These are some print ads I have created over the years.

Transit & Venue Advertising

Better World Advertising's focus is social marketing, or promoting social and informational causes like HIV prevention and drug harm reduction through targeted advertising. The majority of these ads were run on public transportation in Boston and NYC or displayed in clubs and bars. These ads mostly feature my original photography and copywriting in addition to my art and creative direction.