Elizabeth Vornbrock, a December 2012 graduate of Southeast Community College’s Graphic Design program, won two ADDY® Awards from the American Advertising Federation.
Vornbrock received the awards during the 2013 ADDY’s® Banquet Feb. 9 at the Rococo Theatre in Lincoln.
The ADDY® Awards is the advertising industry’s largest and most representative competition. The mission of the ADDY® competition is to recognize and reward creative excellence in the art of advertising.
Vornbrock won two student silver awards. One was in the Digital Advertising: Apps category, which was a redesign of Google’s My Tracks application for Android. She focused on making the application more intuitive for the user and easy to use while performing high-energy activities. The other award came in the Sales Promotion: Packaging category in which she submitted a redesign for Teas’Tea® Unsweetened Green Tea. Her concept packaging design highlighted the first-place Teas’Tea® received at the 2012 North American Tea Championship.
“I’m very pleased and very, very happy,” she said. “It’s a great feeling when your work is recognized and awarded.”
Sam Rapien, chair and instructor of SCC’s Graphic Design/Media Arts program, said Vornbrock was an exceptional student and an amazing talent.
“Both of these projects really attest to Elizabeth’s attention to detail and the effectiveness of the visual communication inherent in her design work,” Rapien said. “Elizabeth has never shied away from complex problem solving, especially the multiple considerations and challenges that come with package design and interactive media.”
Vornbrock, 21, moved to Lincoln three years ago from LeMars, Iowa. She said finding a great graphic design program was her top priority.
“I checked out a four-year school and wasn’t all that impressed with what they had to offer,” Vornbrock said. “I also didn’t like the idea of spending two years taking general education credits that weren’t related to my field of study.”
She looked at a few schools in Omaha but still couldn’t find the right fit.
“I had studied a year of graphic design in college before moving to Lincoln, so I knew exactly what I wanted in a program,” she said, referring to her experience at Western Iowa Tech College in Sioux City.
After looking into SCC’s Visual Publications program, Vornbrock discovered the Graphic Design program. But she had one concern.
“I almost didn’t give the program a second thought because it was in Milford, a town I had never heard of that was 30 minutes away,” she said. “But after looking at the class schedule and layout of the program, I knew this was what I wanted. All the right things were being taught, it was affordable, and it was quick. I saw the application process and it reinforced the value of the program and the fact that design was taken seriously.”
Vornbrock said she’s “obsessed” with package design.
“It’s my favorite form of design,” she said. “It’s an unhealthy obsession that causes me to spend far too much time in a grocery store when I only went in for some spaghetti sauce. When I walk through grocery stores such as Trader Joe’s, I spend more time oohing and aahing over the packages than I do picking stuff out.”
But is that a bad thing? Not for Vornbrock.
“Because of this obsession, I landed a two-week internship last October at Pure, an amazing package design agency in Nottingham, England,” she said.
Package design is Vornbrock’s passion for two reasons.
“One, it has many constraints that other projects do not, such as the size of the package and the required information that must be on the package,” she said. “Most people would think that’s a bad thing, and what can you possibly design with so many restrictions? It’s those constraints, though, that require you as a designer to hone in on what you can do and be sure to do something amazing. Secondly, package design shows the power of design in seconds. Many consumers base their purchases off of the design of a package. No other form of design has such an immediate and powerful response from the consumer/viewer.”
She also loves Web design and front-end development for the same constraints reasons.
“Also, because Web design and development are always changing and growing, you can never get bored,” she said. “Plus, there are times when you get to feel like you’re from “The Matrix,” or could take on the world from your computer because you just solved a coding issue after hours of beating your head against a wall.”
Rapien said Vornbrock’s “insatiable curiosity” will serve her well throughout her career.
“She is the type of designer who never settles on the information she currently has, but instead actively searches out new information that enhances her understanding of the technical and aesthetic demands within this profession,” he said. “While accolades are always nice as affirmations from other professionals, Elizabeth is driven by her desire to continually get better and build upon her work.”
During her fourth quarter at SCC, Vornbrock began to design a new logo for the Nebraska Information Technology Commission. Months later the logo was approved.
“It was through this work that I landed my job working as a Web designer for the Nebraska office of the Chief Information Officer,” she said. Vornbrock is the lead designer on redesigning the NITC’s websites, as well as other agency sites.
Vornbrock also recently began a design internship at Local Hero Design in Lincoln.
To view Vornbrock’s portfolio, go to www.enspireddesign.com.