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Quest for Code

Brand and culture are important at GitHub and the Art Team is charged with cultivating, creating and broadcasting that message. It spans from marketing graphics to office art work, and sometimes it’s just for the fun of it.

The “Quest for Code” project was in the fun category. We wanted to give GitHub Satellite conference attendees an exclusive show poster to take with them. The narrative aligned with the conference but flexed the mascot side of brand a bit more.

The thought process - code was front and center. It was important to show the explorative nature of the group of octocats and bots. They’re on a mission. The parade stems from a literal satellite (nod to the conference) and spills into the foreground. There are a variety of octocats and bots throughout the crowd, illustrating the diversity in ideas and developers at the venue. The HUD displays in the foreground most octocats has code reflected in it. This is direct code pulled from 3 of the major feature releases from the event (shhhh). The foreground is dark and opaque symbolizing the unknown. Bugs hide in the brush and it’s up to to the pioneers to push through in their quest for code.

The Deliverables

RISO printed posters were the medium of choice. Why RISO? I asked myself that many times throughout production. This printer is very specific in that colors needed to be separated into dedicated layers in the design files to match the optional colors for the printer. Mixing colors meant you had to determine the transparency of one color layered over another to achieve the desired output. It was challenging but the struggle was worth it. The final prints were high quality and had that vintage feel that the RISO is know for.

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Extras

We printed this design, along with a half dozen others, on skateboard decks that were displayed at the conference. Another brand activation of ours in action.

My Role

I worked with the team to develop the brief and each of us broke off and created our own design. There was of course invaluable feedback from my teammates that helped improve the final design. Some specific repsonsibilities include:

  • Concept

  • Illustration

  • Color

  • Print Asset Prep