BRANDING
ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN
EXPERIENTIAL DESIGN
SOCIAL MEDIA
PRESENTATION DESIGN
Art Direction: Nina Nguyen
Project Manager: Sarah MacAaron
Marketing Team: Minji Kim Kim & Hannah Lee
PR Team: Jacquelyne Brazzale-Hayes
After years of hosting panels and even a booth collaboration with McDonalds, WEBTOON was finally invited to be a full-fledged exhibitor at the illustrious Anime Expo in 2025. Anime Expo is the largest anime convention in North America, and one of the biggest cultural touchpoints of anime in the US.
As someone who’s been attending conventions my entire life, getting to design creative for one is a dream come true. Every part of these explorations comes from a lifetime of love, fandom, and respect for all things nerdy. Because conventions are so high-profile, they become a big opportunity to connect with readers and people new to WEBTOON. Furthermore, because our app and business is mostly digital, one of the biggest challenges is trying to see how our brand can translate into the physical realm and elevate our company story in person. Going to conventions growing up has taught me how big of an impact a well-designed experience can leave on the audience.
When designing for conventions, I try to take into account the surrounding environment and culture to draw inspiration from. For this concept for an experiential-forward approach to the booth at Anime Expo, I was influenced by California’s car and diner culture. I was in love with the idea of a large physical sign to act as a secondary wayfinder for the booth, so these sketches explore this.
The following are social media posts in anticipation for New York Comic Con in 2025. This time I was inspired by the loud and haptic energy of the city, and I primarily drew influence from Paula Scher’s posters for Bring In ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk. I was drawn to her expressive and bold typography, and I tried to convey that the best I could whilst balancing the message our marketing team wanted to communicate. I combined this with the idea of comic book frames to help frame our imagery and a stylized speech bubble to command attention and create a call-to-action for our audience.
The following are samples from our presentations for our 2025 convention slate. Because our convention talks tend to be imagery heavy, I wanted to use color and text as a textural element that recedes into the background, allowing the art to shine. I also designed the presentations for our sister company, Wattpad, and our presentation with Disney on our upcoming Disney graphic novel to webcomic adaptions.
