Family History Visuals

 Before-and-after images of work for a personal history project now in process.  First up, a composite of two maps from 1911 and one from 1932 (each of the source images is in a different orientation and at a different scale).  The main item of interest is a home that is on the edge of one of the maps on the left.  This home is near the center of the finished image.  The school is also of interest, and I brought in the 1932 outline of the school because the new parts of the building were added just a few years after the 1911 map was made:

Next: the home is still standing, but the view from the street is obscured by trees, so I made a simple sketch with no trees showing:

 

Family History Graphic

I put this together for my extended family.  We grew up hearing about how Grandpa Don built airplanes during the war, and this shows exactly where it happened and some of what it looked like.  It started when I tried looking up "Weeks Ave." after I came across the photo of the house; it turns out that the street no longer exists.  So instead I found a map of San Diego from just before the war (the map is from 1940), and the rest came together from there.  

Postscript: Consolidated merged with Vultee in 1943 and became Convair, which was bough by General Dynamics in the 1950s, which was bought in turn by McDonnell Douglas in the early 1990s.  McDonnell Douglas closed all manufacturing operations in San Diego by the mid-1990s, and Lindbergh Field is now the San Diego International Airport.  All the old buildings are long gone, but you can still see artifacts from the 1940s on display at the San Diego Air & Space Museum in Balboa Park, including a fully restored PBY.

Office of Economic Development Booklet

An eight-page opportunity zone booklet I put together for the Governor’s Office of Economic Development after researching and writing the content.  As with the Campus Overview (and many of my other projects), I used existing material and created graphics and took photos as needed to get the best finished result.  

Campus Overview

A real estate report available both as a 27-slide deck and 27-page PDF.  Contains background information, photos, and floor plans for over a dozen industrial buildings.  I kept the report updated, and it grew another three slides/pages over time.  As of 2024 the newer version is still posted here.

Assorted Flowcharts

A handful of charts for various technical and business processes, including an overview of screens and functions for the third revision of my iOS app (the app of my design, at least).  These have been used both for management approval and programmer reference.

Most of my charts are created with Visio, but some are custom-made mixes that include interface mockups and other graphic-type cues as needed.

(As with other proprietary items, the copyright
 of the component images belongs to Novatek
and the thumbnails pictured are intentionally
shown at a size that obscures many details, alas.)

Company Business Overview Report

A multipage report made to provide a high-level overview of the company for select external partners.  As with the publicly-available press report [post forthcoming - available here in the meantime], this was designed to work both as a printed booklet and as an all-digital package.  Some design cues also taken from the capabilities report.

As indicated in the tags for this post, the project required a combination of creating new content, finding and adapting existing content, copy writing/editing, and then bringing it together into a cohesive whole.

The copyright on these images belongs to Novatek, and the versions posted are intentionally shown at a size that obscures the finer details, alas.  Though it's probably overcautious on my part, I've also blacked out some sections, just to be sure nothing even remotely sensitive is wrongly hinted at.  A further disclaimer: a period of time after the first drafts were proofed, the report was updated before further internal or external distribution, but what's posted here is the old, outdated content.

Family Reunion Invitation

An invitation printed two-to-a-page for a biennial reunion, with a "historic photo" of the root family at the top.  In the original photo, the family was arranged in more of a tall pyramid shape, so it took some masking and cloning work to get the result shown.

Also including a screen capture from within the program used to make the invite (Fireworks CS4), to give an idea of the number of elements used to create the finished product.

  

Cemetery Guidebook

A 52-page guide to the burial places of four generations of client's ancestry. Project included researching burial locations, on-site photography, creating a comprehensive organizational system, and of course the layout and formatting of all materials.  I also got it placed in the FamilySearch Digital Library/Catalog for permanent online availability. (Note that you'll need a FamilySearch login to get access to the full version and that I updated this 2010 version in 2014.) 

Significant features:

• Full-bleed maps of the region in which each cemetery is located (with addresses, hours, and contact information for regional resources such as museums and family history centers).
• Full-bleed aerials of each cemetery (with GPS coordinates and burial sites markers).
• Ground-level photographs of each gravesite, accompanied by map and portrait insets.
• Life outlines for each ancestor.

Hardbound Personal History

A 402-page personal history covering client's life from the 1940s to the date of publication. Project included extensive copy editing, the creation and/or improvement of hundreds of images and tables, and all layout and formatting.

Significant features:

• Full-bleed cover and endpapers.
• Cross-country collaboration with client and printer for the full duration of the project.
• Research and special organization of ancestry section.

Climatic Branch Overview Briefing

I made this PowerPoint briefing completely from scratch to replace one that was very old and ugly.  Some key attributes of the new version:

• Curb appeal: a polished, professional look that's clean and simple rather than gimmicky and cluttered. 
• Flexibility: the core slides can be used effectively for a five-minute overview, but they are backed by dozens of supplemental slides that contain enough information to use for test program negotiations. 
• Navigability: both the person giving the briefing and those receiving it benefit from the visual cues to the organization of the content.  Extensive linking allows for easily diving into details at any point and for easily returning to the point of departure.
• Maintainability: Updates and edits can be made without triggering a cascading set of consequences.  This was especially important in that an expansion of facilities and some organizational changes were imminent at the time this was produced. 

Travel Report Infographics

In both 2007 and 2008 my wife and I combined work trips and vacation time into multi-week cross-country journeys.  These infographics summarize the trips, and the state outline photos show some of the specific locations visited.