May 20, 2024

KCAD Graphic Design students win top national honors in inaugural student OBIE Awards

In the first year a student component was added to the nation’s longest-running out-of-home advertising competition, two students from the Graphic Design program at Kendall College of Art and Design of Ferris State University have taken home the top two awards.

Senior Luke Maksymetz won Gold in the inaugural OBIE student competition hosted by the Out of Home Advertising Association of America, while fall 2023 graduate Sarah Schafer won Silver.

Established in 1942, the OBIEs have long been America’s highest recognition of out-of-home advertising excellence. The new student category of the esteemed industry awards aimed to find the top creative thinkers and groundbreaking innovators of the next generation of out of home designers and celebrate the future of the out of home industry.

Among the competition’s jury of industry professionals was OAAA Creative Committee chairman Rob Jackson, a 1989 graduate of the KCAD Illustration program and the executive creative director of award-winning Grand Rapids-based advertising agency Extra Credit Projects.

“It’s long overdue that the OBIEs feature a student category to be on the same level as other top international award shows,” said Jackson, who spearheaded the student competition. “We were thrilled to be able to award these up-and-coming OOH designers with this honor and recognition.”

Both students’ award-winning projects grew out of class assignments. In Maksymetz’s case, Graphic Design professor Joan Sechrist asked students create an outdoor campaign for any topic in the field of healthcare, and he decided to tackle something outside of his comfort zone after overhearing a friend talking about HIV.

Not knowing much about the disease, he began his design process with a thorough research period, surveying family and friends about their opinions and pouring over statistics. One fact that stood out immediately was that the American South is the current epicenter of the crisis.

“A lot of that has to do with misconceptions and stigmas,” Maksymetz explained. “People are scared to talk to their doctors because they don't know what the person's reaction is going to be.”

Following that narrative, Maksymetz began developing a general awareness campaign targeted to anyone who might be curious about HIV PrEP (the pre-exposure prophylaxis used to reduce the chance of contracting HIV from sex or injection drug use) but feels reluctant to ask about it.

Originally, he considered using images like a half-empty stadium to represent the number of HIV deaths, but he didn’t want to come across as fear mongering. Instead, he landed on the tagline, “Don’t be scared. Be PrEPared,” tweaking a traditional fire or tornado safety message into an HIV-focused tagline.

Using stock photography, Maksymetz then designed a series of billboards and bus station posters, continually tweaking his designs in response to feedback from faculty and peers into an approach that would ultimately win him the OBIE Gold.

“I got a lot of really good critique along the way,” Maksymetz says. “Early on, I was using a friendly, healthcare advertising style with sans serif type and big, colorful blocks of pastels, and someone told me this topic is more serious than how I was portraying it. So I pivoted into a more grungy look, like a 2000s-era PSA.”

Schafer’s Silver Award-winning project took a more playful approach to the concept of sexual health. Students in her class were asked to create a campaign for any organization, designing a billboard, a guerrilla marketing item, and another supporting piece of their choice. She selected Planned Parenthood.

“When people think of Planned Parenthood, most of them just think about abortion,” said Schafer. “I wanted my campaign to educate people on all of the other resources the organization provides.”

For her “Stay Safe Out There” campaign, Schafer envisioned a brightly colored condom-dispensing gumball machine.

“A lot of healthcare branding is very serious, but I wanted this one to be a little bit more lighthearted, a little cheeky, and more accessible,” she explained. “People are responsive to comedy. They like to laugh. If you can get someone to giggle a little bit, but also remember to use protection, that's important.”

Schafer designed condom wrappers with a winking smiley face and the campaign slogan, then Photoshopped them into an image of a gumball machine. The campaign also included a billboard and an Instagram post featuring the condom wrapper and slogan.

For both students, the high-profile recognition is a well-deserved validation of their commitment to continuous growth as designers.

“I was already blown away to be named a finalist in a national contest, then one week later, I learned that I had gotten the gold,” Maksymetz said. “I can't say how happy I am to hear that that Sarah won Silver as well, because she's always worked really, really hard but also had such a fun energy. I'm just so happy to see her get the recognition for that.”

All prizes were officially awarded at the 82nd Annual OBIE Awards ceremony at the 2024 OAAA OOH Media Conference in April 30 in Carlsbad, Calif.