Donovan Pete

Tucson, AZ • Diné (Navajo) Graphic and Web Designer

Ya’at’eeh, áłtaháásiiłóó!

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Hello, everyone!

So I have been extremely busy with my graduate programs (LIS & NAMA) here at the University of Arizona. Although, I am looking to update my website, so that I can include more work that I have done. So, bear with me as I’m trying balance my design life and my potential linguist life as well.

I have focused on the phonetics of the Diné Bizaad (Navajo language) so that sounds are found for secondary Diné Bizaad learners (SDBL) can begin to map a new route to their current sound systems. Also, another part of the sounds’ building up the vocabulary that makes our language very unique, so that should be interesting because of how important the phonetic system plays in distinguishing vowels with tone or no tone, consonants that might be voiced or voiceless, and much more.

I’m still open to take on work, in case you were interested. Hopefully you all have a wonderful day/week, the following are the latest work that I have done so far.

We Think Dreams

We Think Dreams

Indigenous Graduate Education Science and Engineering in the Southwest

2/11/18 Quick Update

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Sunset in the west, just stepped out of the Communications Building at the University of Arizona.

The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, Communications Building

Ya’at’eeh ShiKé’i adoo ShiDiné’e (hello, my family, friends, and people)!

Happy new year, although, I am a month and a half off from saying that! I just wanted to let everyone know I am hard at work through the Native American Languages and Linguistics program at the University of Arizona in Tucson, AZ. I have also completed my course requirements to graduate in May 2018 with a MA in Library and Information Science, which I’m ecstatic about!

So far, the NAMA program has been challenging as I have taken tremendous steps to learning more about Diné Bizaad and all of its fine subtleties especially from the linguistics perspective. I hope to one day incorporate language into museum curation or even teach the Navajo language face-to-face or through some type of digital medium. The possibilities are endless when thinking about how to push the Navajo culture and language forward.

I still am doing freelance work granted they are smaller projects, I’m still available and I decided to drop a quick note for those that do follow my work. I do also plan to add some work I have done as well, and give my site a much needed face lift, and certainly add more language bits to my site.

Ahxéhee (thank you) for your patience!

Goodwater AZ/AVA Logo

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Logos I designed sometime back, the client wanted to use both to use on various mediums including disposable water bottles. They wanted an emphasis on purple clay and show all its holistic benefits to the body.

15th Annual Brown University Spring Thaw Powwow

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15th Annual Brown University Spring Thaw Powwow – Tshirt Design
15th Annual Brown University Spring Thaw Powwow – Official Poster

It’s that time of the season for powwows, specifically the 15th Annual Brown University Spring Thaw Powwow! I wanted to go in a new approach in creating the annual poster, and I was given creative direction to achieve the proper and consistent look that many have grown accustomed to. I hand drew the central figure which is a Woman’s Traditional Dancer, and input on the poster that you can see in the gallery. I also added some texture into the image using a variety of techniques to create the final outcome. I’m very pleased and the Native Americans at Brown are also happy with the finished design.

Band of Brothers: American Indian Medal of Honor Recipients

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Band of Brothers: American Indian Medal of Honor Recipients

I’m late adding this to my portfolio, but I’m happy the way the design came out. I collaborated with the Arizona Historical Society in Tempe, AZ to create a wide variety of panels which was focused on the American Indians whom received the prestigious Medal of Honor serving their time in the United States Armed Forces. I had the pleasure of creating the logo and display panels which were used in a variety of historical institutions. Here are a few examples:

Actual panel which focused on the last Indian scouts in 1947.
Panel from previous slide.
Much of the panels were matched up with various items from the era.
Last panel featuring a Crow Nation War Song

(Click to activate gallery)

Native American Heritage Month 2015

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RIC - Native American Heritage Month 2015
November is Native American Heritage Month, as declared by President Obama. On r/IndianCountry, we decided to create a weekly community discussion and the AMA (Ask Me Anything) Native focused topics. I really enjoyed creating and changing out the weekly banners for the subreddit. Here are some examples:

khfOUmQRo8jbO2lC9CbqjzqRZNj8-YxRw12klQuTm6I

ric-nov-8-13

ric-nov-15-21

nov-22-28

OxiMedical Respiratory

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I had the unique opportunity to work 2 years at OxiMedical Respiratory, they allowed me to be as creative as I needed to be on many of their physical and digital medium projects. They gave me the opportunity to work on business cards for various personnel and subsidies, create large printed posters, create and design fax based advertisements, launch nearly 30 websites which were focused on selling specific products, design and launch HTML Email messages, utilize SEO techniques on many of their websites, they wanted a variety of brochures which were specific to products, product accessories, location, explanation of what they do and how they can assist those with respiratory needs.

OxiMedical at the start of my employment were adjusting to using WordPress as their main Content Management System (CMS), at my insistence, OxiMedical made the integration from WYSIWYG based CMS to using WordPress as their choice of CMS. We decided to utilize the Genesis Framework and use Child Themes that were built by Studiopress, but due to some theme limitations, I was able to modify and adjust themes so that it suited each website.

The main websites that our focused lied heavily on were OxiMedical.net and OxiMD.com. OxiMedical net was used on Google Adword campaigns to generate sales calls and navigable for potential customers, and OxiMD was used specifically for Google Merchant/Shopping, I designed specific ads to show up on the Google Shopping section of the Google Search Engine Results Page. I’m happy to admit that many of the ads that we were able to have up had a high Click-Through-Rate, in the Top 3 Positions, and generated sales due to incoming traffic and users in need of a portable concentrator.

Much of what I had done at OxiMedical was either designing for print or online purposes, thanks to working with a great team, I was able to harness and use various software, understand and implement new techniques, quick thinking when editing content, complete prioritized projects, multitask various projects, and above all, attention to detail.

14th Annual Brown University Spring Thaw Powwow

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I was delighted to hear from the Native Americas at Brown (NAB) to conceive and design for their annual powwow, I was given free reign to create eye-catching aesthetics and promote the unity of the Native American communities and New England specifically Providence, RI. This year, I wanted to use different dancers compared to the Fancy Shawl Dancer from last year, so I input a Jingle Dancer and a Grass Dancer, which came out better than expected. I continued to utilize previous years’ design elements to create this year’s design.

I’m happy with the finished product, and I know NAB is too.

r/IndianCountry

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Some months ago, I was asked to be a moderator for http://reddit.com/r/IndianCountry, which I gladly accepted. The subreddit seemed plain, so I was able to add some CSS elements as well as design some branding elements to assist bringing new subscribers and readers. Our plan was to bring awareness to many about Native American issues and news.

Quick Update

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Tape Conversion

Lately I have been converting and updating cassette tapes that have been given to me by Shizhe’eyazh and Shinali, so that’s occupying my spare time, not too bad because many of the tapes have old Navajo and Native American Church songs.

The process goes from one program to another, and really focusing on clearing out the hums, clicks, crackles, and pops that old recordings have.

As far as design work, my job has been keeping me pretty busy especially on the various websites, which is great, because working on various projects keeps my mind sharp to providing the best output of design.

For awhile I was trying to create a WP theme of my own, but I did not enjoy certain things about what came out. I opted to stick with the defaul theme that WordPress recently rolled out with, very slick.

I will add more work, and perhaps write on this site when I’m not too occupied.

Aheehee for your patience.

Recent Designs

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