“The Rematch” Poster

Earlier this year, an international friendly match United States Women’s national team was organised for June 2^nd 2013 at BMO Field in Toronto. This match against the Americans was the first time the two teams would clash since the dramatic semi-final at the Women’s Olympic Football tournament at the London 2012 Olympics.

The inspiration behind the marketing campaign visuals was the War of 1812, which had just celebrated its centennial. The announcement to the media was made at Fort York near Toronto, one of the key locations of the war.

With the War of 1812 in mind, I designed a poster that would literally transform the soccer field into a battlefield filled with smoke with captain Christine Sinclair kicking the ball as if it was a canon ball.

The match CAN v USA was Sold-out with the first hour and set a record crowd at BMO Field.

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin

Canada Soccer 2012 Annual Report

The 2012 Annual Report was definitely one the most interesting and labour extensive project of the year, because 2012 was highlighted by the 100th anniversary of the association and the memorable bronze medal by the Canadian women’s national team at the Olympic football tournament. With the title “Capturing the Moment” I was tasked to design a centennial annual report that would look like an old photo/scrapbook with a timeline section and the usual text, graphs and statistics you find in annual reports.

To play with the title “Capturing the Moment”, each section is identified by a meaningful out of focus black and white photo with the exception of a small sharp colour portion framed in white. The explanation of that “moment” is written down in script along side the frame.

To give the final product an old feel, I used a matte text paper for the inside and a linen textured cover paper for the cover. The final product and following appreciations was above my expectations.

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin

Concept : National Championships Emblem

Here is a concept I made for the Canadian Soccer Association National Championship. Unfortunately the emblem was declined and never used. The difficulty in this project was all the elements that needed to be incorporated i.e. both french and english title, the Canada Soccer logo, the year, the two sponsors and a reference to soccer.

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin

FIFA Women’s World Cup 2015 : Applications

As you may know, Canada will be hosting the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup in 2014 and the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2015. As the designer for Canada Soccer, I’m involved in some of the design work needed by the Women’s World Cup Canada 2015 National Organising Committee. Here are few of many applications I worked on so far.

 Copyright 2013, FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015 by Dany Pépin

Web Site : Octave Communications

Next on my list was the website. Even if they didn’t have all the content needed too fill the website pages, Octave wanted an online presence as soon as possible. Following the content structure they desired, I quickly designed a simple static website (ie non-responsive) that would also express their identity and branding. The website can be found at octavecom.ca

 Copyright  Dany Pépin 2013

Business cards : Octave Communications

After designing their new identity, my next task was to create business cards for Octave Communications. They needed business cards for an upcoming convention. Since there’s nothing like a special business card to make you stand out, I decided for a better quality card with a thicker paper and a 4 corner round die-cut.

The card was created vertically as a reference to a radio broascast tower. The front of the card feature the Octave logo in white over a rich orange color with radio waves emitting from the logo. The back of the card also makes reference to broadcast waves along side the information.

 Copyright  Dany Pépin 2013

A new identity for Octave Communications

Octave Communications, a Canadian engineering consulting firm that specializes in radio broadcasting and telecommunications, has hired me to create a visual identity for their company earlier this year.

The logo is based on a circle, which represent infinity and integrity. Further more, the center of the letter « O » is the emitting source of the radio waves (orange arcs) roaming through the air in reference to the engineering services offered by the company. The interrupted circular arcs in the shape of the letter « C » (for the word « communications ») along with the letter « O » from Octave can be use without the typography as a secondary and more stripped down logo. The colour orange was chosen for its energy, vitality and movement.

In the upcoming weeks, I will also post the business cards I created for Octave Communications along with the first version of their new website.

Other tentative logos that didn’t make it.

New look for the Canadian Championship

After Amway renewed their title sponsorship of the Canadian Championship, I was tasked in updating its visuals and brand. Again, the logo was not going to change, but I needed to create brand guidelines and update all applications (stationary, PowerPoint theme, etc.) accordingly. Also I needed to create a large backdrop that would be used behind the players and coach in the pressroom for media conferences and interviews. You will observe that I included the hexagonal mesh into the design to tie it with the Canada Soccer branding. Below are few pages from the brand guidelines and pictures of the media backdrop.

Note: The Amway Canadian Championship is the tournament involving the 4 Canadian professional clubs (FC Edmonton, Impact de Montréal, Toronto FC, Vancouver Whitecaps FC) and serves as the Canadian qualification for the CONCACAF Champions League. The 2013 Canadian Champion is the Montréal Impact.

Brand guidelines

Media Backdrop

Marco Schällibaum, Impact Head Coach, after 2^nd leg semi final win in Montréal. Photo by François Mellet

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin

Design for the 2013 AGM

Each year the Canadian Soccer Association’s board of directors and the provincial associations members assemble during an Annual General Meeting (AGM) to discuss different issues surrounding canadian soccer. For this year’s assembly, I simply used the new Canada Soccer brand to design the AGM accreditations, backdrops and some other applications.

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin

Rebranding the Canadian Soccer Association

One of my first order of business when I started my job at the Canadian Soccer Association (Canada Soccer) was to rebrand the non-profit organization. Besides a logo, the branding was almost non-existent. With that said, this was not a full rebrand because since the Women’s National Team won the bronze medal at the London 2012 Women’s Olympic Football Tournament, the Canada Soccer logo was more recognized than ever. So, I had to develop brand guidelines, a graphic signature and all the applications to go along the existing logo.

The main inspiration behind the graphic signature was the hexagonal netting of a modern soccer goal. It is the target and ultimate objective that every player is trying to reach. As an organization, it represent Canada Soccer’s quest “or goal” to reach the World Cup and for Canada to become a leading soccer nation.

The final product was well received by the organization and with this new corporate brand, the provincial associations seemed to be more inclined than ever to unite and develop the future of soccer in Canada. The short version of the brand guidelines is available here.

 Copyright Canada Soccer 2013, by Dany Pépin