Hi, I'm Van Nguyen
I'm an Oklahoma City based designer with experience in product design, graphic design, illustration and fine art. I'm passionate about creating design solutions for user experiences that integrate illustration and design. During college, I found my love for customer service (thanks to working through different service jobs) and I love using that in my designs. In my portfolio, I hope you saw my emphasis on ways that I wanted to make the user enjoy the app, either by color, text, or illustration. My philosophy in design is that I want it to be fun and easy.
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When not designing, I love reading Webtoons, listening to audiobooks/podcasts, and obsessing over Korean pop sensation Grammy nominated artist BTS.
Basic Information
Tools
Adobe CC * Sketch * Sketchup * Figma * Autodesk * Clip Studio Paint * Microsoft Office
Education
Oklahoma Christian University
BFA Communication Design
Skillset
User-Lead Product Strategy * Clear Communication * Agile Experienced * Creative Problem Solving * Project Organization * Adaptability * Print Production * Product Design * UI/UX Design * Visual Design * Front End Development * Illustration
Experience
May 2022 - Feb 2023
Line Webtoon
Associate Visual Designer (Contract)
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Work closely with their LCM Art Director in a highly-collaborative, inclusive, and fast-paced environment.
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Follow global WEBTOON brand standards and design across our North America and Latin America digital content platform (app, mobile and desktop)
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Create eye-catching, elegant designs that engage readers and communicate key messaging clearly.
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Partner with video and motion creatives to ideate and art direct visuals for compelling digital and social ad campaigns to drive new user growth and retention.
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A WEBTOON brand and audience expert—Help give clear, actionable feedback to external creative agencies and production companies.
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Juggle multiple priorities from stakeholders while maintaining clear communication with teammates to ensure projects are completed on-time and according to design standards.
Sept 2019 - April 2022
Paycom
Associate Product Designer
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UI designer that created hundreds of desktop friendly mock-ups based on Material Design Standards for React for multiple HR products.
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Maintained multiple large scale projects at once, communicating with product managers, development teams, and other fellow designers.​
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Created and organized clean file structures for easy team transparency
2019
Oklahoma Christian University
Marketing Intern
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Designed print and digital assets.
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Communicated with printshops to meet deadline of print colladeral
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Ensured all institution branding to standard
2018
Artspace Untitled
Social Media / Hive Intern
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Transferred all of Artspace's art items from one point of sales system to another
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Redesigned and reorganized the gift shop to follow brand standards
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Worked on posters and made advertisements on social media for different events
2018
Rocket Color Copies
Intern
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Learned the innerworkings of a printshop
2017-2018
Symbiotic Oklahoma
Mentored Student
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Was mentored by a local artist (Autumn Brown)
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Was a part of an art show
2014
University of Central Oklahoma
Multimedia Specialist
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Specialized in Photoshop
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Trained in Adobe Premiere Pro, Illustrator, After Effects
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Created storyboards and concept designs for games for different departments
Why did I get bread?
If you're reading this, you probably received my business card-in which case, hi! Nice to meet you! Thank you for taking my business card!
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There's a lot of story behind my branding being bread (ever since college, actually). It's not because "Oh, she's trying to get that bread!" or "Ah, because she's burnt out...and on toast", it's a more personal story.
When I studied abroad in Japan, they don't have a "V" sound, so instead, they called me "Ban-chan!" which is my name, plus the casual honorific used for endearment. "Come here, Ban-chan!" my elderly host parents would call me lovingly. In the states, however, I worked at a sushi restaurant owned by a Hong Kong man, that whenever he got angry, he would say, "BANCHAT!" which is apparently Cantonese for dumbass. So even though my sweet Japanese host parents would call me "Ban-chan" with love, I would wince in memory of working at a restaurant. When I told my next boss the story years later, he laughed and said, "Oh, that means side dish in Korean" which suddenly made sense because the Korean exchange students would laugh a little when someone called my name.
It's a banh mi on the business card because the business card was 'bout me. I'm Asian American, a mix of a bunch of cultures and experiences all together. Vietnamese, but not fully Vietnamese, because I live in a wonderful hot pot of cultures.