ON MOTION GRAPHISC AND DOING WHAT YOU WANT, With Valeria Lombo

We talked with Valeria Lombo, a digital artist from Colombia. She went to film school in Bogotá and after seven years of working in motion graphics and video composition she sold everything to study at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn.

In this interview we talked about balancing her corporate job with her creative spirit, her experience as an immigrant making it New York, and how to start from scratch.

How did you find your creative path while trying to understand what was your profession?

My film school years in Bogotá were not the most successful, I was interested in experimental film and telling weird stories, less narrative and more visually appealing, or at least more visually based and that was not well received by the academy, where classic narrative prevailed the most. There was a maximum of 10 people per semester, and for each film workshop we had to produce one story, and it felt like it was a popularity contest. I never got the opportunity to get people to work on my stories, and it kind of frustrated me, so I started going solo and took refuge in video art and new technologies, by myself. I was so interested in graphic design and illustration, I also realized I wanted to be an artist, but was scared by life after college, like how am I going to live as a professional artist?

I was lucky to have a teacher bring me to his production company for an animated tv series, and I started working as a digital compositing artist for Jaguar Digital. After that experience people kept recommending me from job to job, and I became very good with motion graphics 2d animation, video compositing, post-production, video editing, graphic design, and illustration. I actually gained that mastery from work experience.

After seven years of working in motion graphics and video composition I applied for an MFA in New York City, sold everything that I own (including an apartment in Bogota), and came to Brooklyn in 2014. I was so into printmaking that I joined the MFA program at Pratt Institute, focusing on printmaking, but I was lucky to find out later that I could do whatever I wanted. This experience was the best thing I could ever do in my life, it was both challenging and rewarding. I stopped working for two years and locked myself in the studio to experiment with ideas and materials, I forgot about everything that I knew at the time... With this experience I learn that I can do everything, I can make-believe, and it's often more successful depending on the mastery one has on some mediums and materials, but after trying sculpture, silkscreen, video installation, I realized I could potentially create anything.

Imagen de El Beat VR, un proyecto que tuve con mis amigos de Alterlab Colombia.

Then life stroke me again. New York City is an expensive place to be, especially when you come from a poor country like Colombia. I was in need of money and a friend called me offering me to freelance for Jet.com, a startup that was needing a motion designer to help define the user interaction flow of their products. I said yes and started working for them, and our relationship grew to the point that they offered me to have my OPT with them. The fun part was that they were also exploring, finding ways to communicate with their potential users. It was an opportunity for me to reconnect with the computer again, and I took it and I'm glad because it helped me pay for one of the loans I had to take for my Master's and it allowed me to stay in the US and live here for the past 7 years.

What other things are you that are not described in the answer above?

Ohh all the times I second-guessed myself... all the times I was sad and lost and didn't know where I was going... all the times I still don't know what I'm doing or where I'm going. All the people that supported me during this journey. How aware I became of the value of the things that I took from granted and that I lost when coming to the US.

What is motion graphics design explained for dummies?

Digital graphics evolving in time to tell a story, explain something, illustrate an idea.

You work as a motion graphic designer at Walmart. As a visual artist and creative, what are the challenges of working in the corporate world?

I work as a motion designer for brand social, which means I mostly create animated pieces for social media channels (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, TikTok.) I also do graphic design only, and illustration. I do giphy stickers, I edit video, I do AR lenses for Instagram. I do visuals for internal-facing projects as well.

The challenges are the restrictions of the brand, and the restrictions of the channels we create content for. The brand has a unique and specific voice, a specific visual identity, and we have to work within those constraints. So we have to find ways to innovate and stay creative within those constraints, which is super hard. This brand is quite conservative and we have to be simple and simple is more difficult, fewer elements to work with. Also, we target a specific population, the Walmart client, and strive to broaden the spectrum of people who buy at Walmart. As creatives, we challenge ourselves to make this brand cooler and appreciated by other parts of the population that may have other preferences.

What is your experience designing content for social media?

I think social media is super interesting because its a way to get in touch with the individual, and individuals nowadays spend a lot of time on social media, so you have this incredible window to communicate with them directly and seduce them. Also, their attention span is so short, so we have to come with ideas to grab their attention and interest in less than 10 seconds, because people swipe and scroll social media content really fast, they don't spend a lot of time on anything, so we have to strive to be noticed, but keeping the constraints of the brand, which is very tricky

This has been a growing process for me because I come from film, storytelling for tv and short films, museum exhibitions, and educational projects. I worked at a web agency and Colombia and did some commercial work, but my experience in this company has been full-on commercial, and also this is another culture, much more consumerist culture that the one I come from. So adapting to their way of thinking their way of spending, the value they put on products and trends, the way they view themselves.

Could you describe your creative process and methodology in your workplace?

There are some marketing needs, the business needs to promote or sell something. the marketer pitches their idea to the social media managers, the social media managers create a brief. The managers share these briefs with the creative team and we bring those projects to life. I'm part of the creative team, which is a group of talented graphic designers, art directors, and copywriters. We have one creative director and one associate creative director.

We brainstorm for those briefs and offer several concepts, and the managers/marketers pic one. We carry out photo and video shoots, do illustration and design only shoots to bring these projects to life.

When it comes to my creative process, I get a lot of random ideas, then research for social media trends and incorporate them. I sketch, research. I mockup my ideas and present to the bigger creative team, get feedback and incorporate before sharing with the managers. Then if the project involves a photo/video shoot, I work closely with the creative producer to get a photographer and usually a prop stylist (before COVID we mostly had the photoshoots in house, in our photo studio, but since COVID we've worked with remote photographers and in photoshoots via Zoom.) get props, define casting, scenarios, lighting schemes, and a shot list/script. We're creative leads for these types of projects. If the project is design only, illustration and animation, I first find visual references and create a mood board, then storyboard, then create the assets, and once they're approved I start with the animation.

What are some of the newest tools -soft and hardware- that you have been working with? What do you like about it?

I started working with software to create augmented reality lens filters for Instagram, which has been super fun. I'm interested in new technology and I've done some work for augmented reality and virtual reality in the past, so finding ways to keep learning and working on that area has been interesting for me, also learning to work with new software and a new language.

I made a lens for celebrating pride, and it has been the most used and successful AR lens that we currently have at Walmart's Instagram page.

Coming from Bogotá to New York, how do you experience and express your identity in your professional environment?

Sometimes it is hard to relate to others when you have a different background, a different sense of humor, different interest, and objectives in life. The personal boundaries in Latin America are different from the personal boundaries here in the US. People there are more open, warm, affective, whereas here there's more distance, more respect for individuality. I may be very awkward and open and outgoing, I feel that most of the times I'm very open and speak my mind, and sometimes I'm not that reserved or polite. I'm warm and festive. I help organize (or used to, before COVID) gatherings to bring the team together. I teach people about my culture and traditions, enlighten them with some history of Latin America, help change the cliches they have about Colombia and Colombian people. I also speak in Spanish and practice with some of them that want to learn Spanish.

Like most designers, you probably spend a lot of time working with the screen. How do you balance that out?

Cooking, going out, disconnecting from technology, hiking, being in nature when I have the chance. I like to be alone in a place I've never been before, and figure out how to flow in that different reality. Sometimes when you live in for a long time in a place and are in the same routine you forget there are other ways of living and other realities. I love going to places where life could be the opposite of how it is where I am now. I'm not sure if there's a relation between the place I go for a vacation and my work, I just wish to be away from the familiar, from the computer, from time to time.

Could you share a drawing you made in paper?

¨An old drawing, one of my favorites.¨

A design that you made working with the computer?

¨Screengrabs for a game I designed for Walmart's Instagram, tap to catch the easter egg¨.

The last picture you took?

¨My friend's dog.¨

What's your advice for someone that is exploring their path in film and visual arts and doesn't know where to start? And for someone that is pursuing to study abroad?

Just start, bring your ideas to life. You don't need a 4K camera and a full crew to do your short film. You don't need to have all the answers to your questions or know all the techniques, you learn a lot by simply doing. I think starting is always the most difficult thing. Be open to the challenges that come to not knowing... not knowing where you're going, not knowing what you're doing... not having all the answers or reasons. Stop investing a lot of energy in second-guessing yourself. I'd say also unless you have the privilege of an allowance that allows you not to work for money, find a trade that allows you to have a paid job, and find time to pursue your artistic interest. Independence is important. Ask questions. Own your mistakes. Work with your mistakes. Avoid trends and the things that are proven to be successful. See a lot of art ("fine" and "low" art), a lot of tv, read all the books, listen to all the music, go to all the shows. Do not limit yourself to only the things you like, learn to appreciate everything, and understand exactly why you don't like something.

For studying abroad: learn a different language and be comfortable speaking it with your accent and making mistakes. Learn from your mistakes. I'm not sure if this happens to more people but I thought that because I came from Colombia I might have had a less of an experience or a less of a talent (just because my country is "poor" in capitalist terms) and came to my surprise that I was even more prepared and had more experience than the rest, maybe because I had to work harder for what I got, so don't underestimate yourself because of where you come from. Go always for the challenge... you learn a lot from what you can do when you're outside of your comfort zone. Own your personal story. At least for New York, you get a lot from just being yourself, openly yourself.

︎ MY LOVE TO DISTORTION BY SHIS UNUSUAL

ON MOTION GRAPHISC AND DOING WHAT YOU WANT, With Valeria Lombo