EMPATÍA
EMPATÍA
Empatía
In 2023 I led a team of engineering, business, and design students in the Collaborative Design Lab competition at John Brown University. Our team, Level Innovation’s, mission was to create a product to help level the playing field for those with disabilities. Many of our team members had personal connections to that community, so working together for a cause we were all passionate about felt really special. That mission and passion sparked EmpatÍa, a wearable device capable of reading a person’s emotions and relaying said emotions to the user’s phone, smartwatch, or desktop in real time. People on the autism spectrum often struggle with identifying emotions, and the use of Empatía in an educational setting is a great way to practice connecting with confidence in a safe space. Our engineers created a working prototype and app, while the rest of the team made a financial pitch and brand identity that we presented to a panel of professionals. We competed against 5 other teams and ended up winning first place.
Special thanks to my fellow designers, Trinity Andrus + Drew Pickle
My Process
The logo mark in the empatía logo is representative of two people connecting face to face, with the m and two connecting representing their bodies and faces respectively. The concept was a truly collaborative effort, and it was so fun to work with other designers and come up with a logo that we were all proud of. To execute our vision, I hand-lettered the type and logo with pencil and paper and then brought it into Illustrator to trace my drawing with the pen tool and make sure there were smooth curves and a consistent width to all the letters. To prepare for the presentation, I screen-printed our logos onto shirts for those in our team who were presenting and created packaging which I printed and assembled to give to the judges (3D model shown below). It was a 4-month process and a lot of hard work, and it was a great experience learning how to work with engineers and business experts who work and process things differently from the creative team.
