Interview with Brandon Payton, Co-Founder & Interactive Director of Brandora, US

Brandora is a Dallas based design studio that specializes in creating meaningful experiences for businesses through interactive branding.

We are honored to share this achievement and have our work featured alongside the best from other successful creative businesses. It proves that we are preforming at the highest professional level in the industry and that translates to better ROI for our clients.

Our Easter Egg Hunt VR project transports the player to a beautiful environment and completely immerses them in that world. We chose to enter it because it looks amazing and it was extremely fun to run around collecting eggs before the time runs out. People loved it and we think it was a massive success.Another project we entered was for ARM (Academic Risk Management) and is a complete rebrand. The company is mitigates risk for universities and their new branding and identity presents them as a trusted, strong and professional consulting company.We also entered 4 of our cinematic e-card animations. These are gorgeous holiday animations that bring an emotional aspect to a fun end of the year experience. They are all created in 3D and are very non-traditional in the e-card industry.

The Easter Egg VR project was challenging because we only had 1 month to design, build, test, and launch for a trade show we were attending. It was also the first time we’d created anything like that before so it was a continual learning process from start to finish.The ARM rebrand was challenging because after a complete audit of their current marketing and business plan we needed to develop an identity that perfectly aligned with their business objectives. Budget constraints also had kept the project challenging because we had limited time and resources to produce a winning design.Our cinematic e-cards are always challenging, as we push the limits of what we can do in 3D. Storyboarding and conceptualizing is the initial hurdle, but once we have a plan building the worlds and animating falls into line. Music and sound fx are also sometimes challenging because we feel that the music is almost more important than the visuals and helps really connect the viewer with the animation in a strong way.

The awards we win at Brandora have helped us gain a higher professional position in our industry and really proves to the world that we know what we’re doing. We think it builds our credibility as designers, especially when our clients walk into our office and see all of our award statues in the lobby.

1. Finding creative solutions to our client’s projects and business challenges.2. Working together with other like-minded individuals to achieve a goal.3. Always learning new things and approaches to creative problems.

It appears the industry is in a template based era at the moment and I think after everyone gets tired of pre-made design they’ll revert back to wanting 100% custom solutions. UI interfaces will become part of everything and also will help automation. As design and interaction becomes more sophisticated the tools will become easier to use and more expensive to build. Hopefully the design industry gets a renewed budget increase and people spend more because they value design and realize how important it really is for their business and life!

I’d say learn the basics of business and have a strong understanding of contracts and how to navigate the design industry as a business first even though you may be an artist and have no desire for the business world it really helps you in the end. Never be afraid to submit your work to award competitions. Believe in your abilities, even if you are an amateur, keep practicing, learn everything that interests you, and try new things.

Find inspiration from other artists, follow them, watch tutorials online, get involved in meet ups within your specific interests.

I want to be a Youtube star!

My business partner Tia. She is an amazing designer and I look up to her for making me a better designer. I see the world differently because of her and it’s made me a better person.

Never stop believing in yourself and continually keep learning new things. Get out from behind your computer or phone and experience the world, it’s a beautiful place and will bring you infinite inspiration!