Portfolio on Elise Volkman

Hounds of Faith and Fury

Thu, 10 Apr 2025 08:01:35 +0300

Project Objective

To print and hand-bind a draft of a fantasy novel I wrote, and create a cover that effectively communicates the theme and tone of the story.

Target Audience

Readers of young adult fantasy.

Design Process

Interior Layout

I laid out the entire 90k-word novel in InDesign, using a template for a previous project that I tweaked and refined for this project. I used the Monarcha Book font for all the interior text, and used hand-drawn icons from the cover design for the chapter headings.

Time for Tea Card Game

Wed, 09 Apr 2025 08:01:35 +0300

Project Objective

To design a game for families and friends that creates opportunities for connection while celebrating tea. Learn to play with the accompanying digital rulebook!

Target Audience

Tea drinkers and families or groups of friends who enjoy playing games together.

Design Process

The Playing Cards

After brainstorming design approaches based on research sourced from other tea-themed card games and a series of mindmaps for ideation around colour, style, and tone, I used hand-drawn assets imported into Inkscape to develop characters representing tea ingredients. I then combined the vector files into playing card designs with matching backs.

Write At Home Stationary

Tue, 08 Apr 2025 08:01:35 +0300

Project Objective

To adapt brand assets and colours into patterns for a usable stationary line.

Target Audience

Tea and coffe drinkers with a love for handwritten notes, and nostalgic penpals.

Design Process

This project started with greeting card design concepts from a previous class using symbols and a limited colour palette to create interesting designs.

Upon recommendation from my professor, I merged these concepts with the personal brand assets I had developed that semester, in order to create a stationary line for my brand. The brand assets are hand-drawn to develop soft-edges and an approachable style. For the colour palette, I chose from a selection of photos that embodied the calm, soothing feeling of a cup of tea.

Tortoise & Hare Brand Design

Mon, 07 Apr 2025 08:01:35 +0300

Project Objective

To bring whimsy & learning to growing young minds through stories and literature.

Target Audience

Parents looking to educate and entertain their children with reading.

Design Process

Hand drawing assets to develop a soft-edged, approachable style that inspires childhood nostalgia.

Design Challenges

Designing the tortoise and hare illustrations so that they’re recognizable at a distance and don’t become unidentifiable blobs.

Tools & Platforms

Inkscape
Adobe Creative Suite (Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign)
Mockup Templates

Columbia Bible College Website Design

Tue, 05 Nov 2024 08:01:35 +0300

Website Editor, Jan 2024 - Present

As website editor at Columbia Bible College, I updated their WordPress site to align with an updated visual branding guide. This involved adjusting global site settings in the WordPress dashboard, and also hunting for custom CSS in the additional settings to locate conflicting code that was preventing proper functioning of global settings.

Primary Responsibilities

Website audit of every page to identify design inconsistencies
Managing ticketing inbox to maintain and update information across the site
Designing custom templates based on the visual brand guide
Drafting a documentation guide of the site infrastructure for future staff
Designing graphics and editing photos to add to the site
Strategizing and implementing updated website menu structure
Updating the site page by page for mobile optimization
Communicating with marketing staff and contractors to coordinate website maintenance and updates
Connecting analytics tracking for reporting purposes
Building analytics reports for executive staff and review with stakeholders (board members, donors, etc.)

Tools & Platforms

WordPress
Flywheel
Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign)
Canva
Gimp (photo editor)
Google Analytics
Google Search Console
Lighthouse
Looker Studio

Stratum Systems Website Design

Sat, 31 Aug 2024 08:01:35 +0300

Website Designer, Sep-Nov 2024

As website designer for Stratum Systems, I met with their staff to develop a visual brand guide and a marketing strategy, and to discuss a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy for their marketing efforts moving forward. We chose Squarespace as a website platform, as Stratum’s staff need to learn to update the website in-house. This involved choosing a base template from Squarespace’s database and adapting the global styles (colours, fonts, layout, spacing) to suit the visual brand guide developed over previous projects.

Writer's Block Solutions Website Design

Sat, 31 Aug 2024 08:01:35 +0300

Digital Marketing & Tech Whiz, Mar 2022 - Aug 2024

At Writer’s Block Solutions, I wore a lot of hats, including that of website designer. In collaboration with their website developer, I rebranded and updated the design and layout of their WordPress site to align with their refined visual branding guide. This involved incorporating the Elementor plugin into the WordPress infrastructure and adding pages to highlight the agency’s service offerings.

Primary Responsibilities

Communication Consultation exercise to revamp the website copy
Drafting wireframes in Canva to communicate the design vision to the web developer
Collaborating with the web developer on implementing and troubleshooting the design
Optimizing the design for mobile and desktop
Implementing best practices for accessibility across the site after successfully applying for a government grant
Drafting a documentation guide of the site infrastructure for future staff
Designing graphics and editing photos to add to the site
Communicating with marketing staff and contractors to coordinate website maintenance and updates
Writing, editing, and designing the layout for monthly and/or quarterly blog posts
Connecting analytics tracking for reporting purposes
Building analytics reports for executive staff

Tools & Platforms

WordPress
Elementor
Canva
Gimp (open-source photo editor)
Google Analytics
Google Search Console
Lighthouse
Looker Studio

Print Design for The Louden Singletree

Fri, 05 Apr 2024 08:01:35 +0300

Design & Layout Manager, Sep 2023 - Apr 2024

Each year, a student-run board from the University of the Fraser Valley publishes a new edition of The Louden Singletree, a literary journal of student, alumni, and faculty art. In addition to supporting the board as co-Project Manager (formerly Webmaster), I was responsible for the design and layout of all finalized literary and visual art submissions in InDesign, to prepare files for professional printing with a local print company.

Fur Elise Font Design

Tue, 05 Dec 2023 08:01:35 +0300

This was a straightforward assignment from a graphic design professor at the University of the Fraser Valley. Using Adobe InDesign and/or Illustrator, as well as in-class instruction and supplemental notes, each student was directed to create their own font from scratch. The font had to include all letters from A-Z, could be either lowercase or uppercase, and needed to include an example of the font beind used in a sentence.

Visual Branding for The Tea Grannies Podcast

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 08:01:35 +0300

The Story

Miraya and I met in 2018 when we both apparated into the Speculative Fiction cohort under the guidance of Eileen Cook. What started as a mandatory classmate connection turned into a friendship that transcends age, distance, and whatever other weird barriers society places on people. School cohort meetings morphed into a monthly writing group that we run together, that continues going strong to this day. At some point, we looked back and realized we’d been messaging each other daily ever since: about writing, editing, books, and therapy.