system / 06
// portfolio.app v2.6

Alejandro
Elias Serulle

An Art Director, in part, because of a fictional copywriter.

I fall in love with the process, and I consume enough to develop an eye for curation and a sense of criteria.

click anything
// also known as

DONTTI

Titi — a self-given nickname. The Don was added by my godfather, Tony Delgado, who called me Don Titi and Señor Titi as a kid.

Btw — you can click the sticky notes around the desktop to find easter eggs. (Just in case you needed an excuse to poke around.)

↻ click card to flip back
portfolio / 09

tip: drag windows by the title bar.

double-click the title bar to maximize.

— A

need my résumé?
go to FILE › DOWNLOAD RÉSUMÉ up top.

— A

about.txt — TextEdit
Plain Text·UTF-8·487 words

A longer answer to "what do you do?"

I regard myself as a creative appreciator. I appreciate art in all its forms — so when I'm responsible for the output of anything, I'm consistent in trying to make it better the next day than it was yesterday.

I fall in love with the process. I treat every brief as a learning experience and an opportunity to employ my craft. Attention to detail is my meta — something I learned from watching people who are masters at theirs.

In practice, that looks like: art directing campaigns, writing the lines that go with them, picking up a camera when the photographer can't, editing the cut when the editor's booked, and arguing gently for the better idea in the room.

What makes me lose track of time

Work that rewards depth. Detail-oriented, story-driven, always one upgrade away. The kind of thing where the obvious version is finished on Tuesday and you spend the rest of the week making it actually good.

What I'm proudest of making

Experiences, gifts, and conversations. The yellow socks. The book. The offhand comment nobody thinks I'll remember. With a few bucks I can make someone feel seen — and that's still the trick I'm proudest of.

The brand that lit me up

Square Enix. Kingdom Hearts on a PS2 did something to me at the right age — compassion to fashion, music to art, all in one place. Most of what I've made since has been chasing that feeling.

The honest weakness

I can always do more. Read more. Train more. Write more. Create more. Do more to feel less like an imposter. I'm working on the part where doing more isn't always the answer.

Specialist now, generalist later

Go deep on one craft at a time, until I've collected enough to see the whole board. The plan is Art Director roles at craft-first agencies — places where ideas get made, not killed.

Art Direction Copywriting Video Editing Photography Graphic Design Concept Strategy
process.md — Markdown

How I actually work

No "secret sauce." Just the steps.

  1. 01

    Listen harder than feels necessary

    Half the brief is what they didn't say. I ask the dumb question on purpose.

  2. 02

    Make a lot. Throw out most.

    Volume beats taste at the start. Taste shows up in the cut.

  3. 03

    Write before you art-direct

    If the line doesn't work on a napkin, no film treatment is going to save it.

  4. 04

    Sweat the details no one asked about

    Kerning. The third frame. The word that almost works. Those.

  5. 05

    Ship. Then make the next one better.

    Perfect is the enemy of out-the-door. Out-the-door teaches you things perfect can't.

reel.mov — QuickTime Player

Films

The campaign films, in one place.

contact.vcf — Contacts
AS

Alejandro Elias Serulle

Art Director / Copywriter

statusopen to work
basedUSA
say hi → it's just an email, you'll be fine
comp.md — TextEdit
Markdown·brand one-word·Miami Ad School

My one word is:

COMP—

A Compendious, Comprehensive Compositor and admirer of compelling complex conversations and compositions, completely composed as a compliment to the senses.

Although competitive and keen of comparison, I consider that I complement more than I take. I hold high expectations and a deep belief in myself. I love compliments, but I can't keep my composure when receiving one.

God willing, I expect to conquer the world as a CD, one COMP at a time — opening multiple companies, giving back, and providing for the company that accompanies me.

For life is all about Compartir.
(sharing)

↓   Added context — the piece in response to GUT's brand-one-word assignment

— A. Serulle, brand one-word assignment, Miami Ad School

bookme.app — Calendar
BOOKING

Find a time.

15 minutes. We can talk about the work, the industry, or whatever you're working on. Bring questions — I'll bring attention.

Embed not loading? Open the booking page in a new tab ↗

trash — Finder

Things I almost put on the site

Saved here so I never use them.

Bloodtype 1795C
CAMPAIGN

Bloodtype 1795C

HSBC — D&AD New Blood 2026 — Art Direction, Copy, Strategy

In 2025, HSBC officially owned Pantone 1795C. We turned the hex code into a badge of inherited wealth.

For decades, Pantone 1795C has been HSBC's color of growth and ambition. In 2025 it became official property — the bank's visual identity, formally claimed as a global mark of elite status. The brief: signal that acquisition to a tier of brands and leaders who already share the DNA.

The idea

Reframe the color as a Bloodtype — not a brand mark, but a passport. Any brand already using Pantone 1795C automatically unlocks access to HSBC's network: The Hub, a private business ecosystem reserved for the color-matched.

From there it built outward: a global headhunt for matching brands, the Red Milestones collection celebrating member growth, a Brand Validation system that turns the color into a literal verification step. The campaign treats HSBC's visual identity as inheritance — something you either share or don't.

Whiteboard from the early HSBC ideation session — "The Red Standard"
Where it started — the original whiteboard. "The Red Standard," before it became Bloodtype.
Airport billboard — Brand Validation, uploading a brand asset to unlock benefits Airport sign — Pantone 1795C, The Color of Opportunity, with the wall of color-matched brands Airport billboard — Pantone 1795C, Inherent Alignment
Airport OOH placements. Tap any to view full size.
+85Mglobal reach
+40,000%search increase
$45Bpartner revenue

*Projected outcomes — this is a student spec campaign, figures are aspirational, not measured results.

Credits
Art Direction · Copywriting · Video EditingAlejandro Elias Serulle
TeamCole Sisler, Noor Bakr
Gemini's Otium
AI / FILM

Gemini's Otium

Google — Young Ones Student Awards — Art Direction, Copy, Strategy, Edit

Everyone's "watch later" is a graveyard. We turned it into a faculty.

86% of YouTube's audience uses it for learning. They hoard the good stuff in playlists meant to be revisited — and then never revisit. The Forgetting Curve takes the rest: up to 90% of what we save is gone within a week. Saved playlists aren't libraries. They're graveyards.

The idea

Link your YouTube playlist to Gemini's Otium Mode. The AI reads across the videos and personifies them into a custom mentor — a Gem — built from the sum of your curated knowledge. Ask a question, get an answer with the exact timestamp. The mentor speaks in the voice of the library you built.

The system runs a private think tank called the Junto Group, where multiple Gems can be queried in parallel to synthesize across teachers. A feature called Silent Guardian keeps the pace human — the AI waits for you to finish your thought before it responds. The name nods to the Roman concept of otium: leisure used for reflection, study, and growth.

+30Mnew pro users (month 1)
+400Mearned media

*Projected outcomes — this is a student spec campaign, figures are aspirational, not measured results.

Audible: Choose Your Story
FILM

Audible: Choose Your Story

Audible — Clio Student Awards — Dirección de Arte, Copy, Estrategia, Edición

Dormir solía ser fácil. Ahora es ruidoso.

Una campaña narrativa que contrasta el sueño fácil y tranquilo de la infancia con el caos sensorial y el ruido mental abrumador de la adultez moderna. La estrategia posiciona a Audible no solo como una plataforma de contenido, sino como una herramienta de escape personal y restauración psicológica.

Al dejar que el usuario elija su historia, el film muestra cómo el audio inmersivo puede silenciar el mundo moderno y devolver una sensación de paz. La ejecución es un viaje cinematográfico y guionizado sobre recuperar el espacio mental a través de las historias.

Créditos
Dirección de Arte · Copywriting · Estrategia · EdiciónAlejandro Elias Serulle
Actuación de Voz (Español)Elias Serulle ↗
Actuación de Voz (Inglés)Saúl Birmaher ↗
Universal Syllabus
EDU TOOL⤢ click to view full board

Universal Syllabus

D&AD New Blood — Self-initiated — Art Direction, Copy, Strategy, Edit

Teachers shouldn't have to be designers too.

The best educators in the world are being asked to do two jobs at once: teach the subject and design the slides. Most of them aren't trained for the second one, and it shows — academic content that should be inspiring ends up looking outdated, scattered, or invisible against the noise of the digital age.

The idea

The Universal Syllabus: an open-source, decentralized library of high-fidelity teaching materials. Affinity does the craft. Canva does the scale. A modular system where the lesson stays the lesson and the design takes care of itself.

It's structured as four layers — the Lab for high-fidelity asset creation, the Library for distribution at scale, the Living Syllabus for modular reuse across 180+ languages, and the Truth Layer for peer review and primary-source verification. A visual infrastructure designed to liberate professors and democratize education at the same time.

+1Breached
+400Mearned media
+5Mpaid users (month 1)

*Projected outcomes — this is a self-initiated spec project, figures are aspirational, not measured results.

Credits
Art Direction · Copywriting · Video EditingAlejandro Elias Serulle
TeamSaige Zervos, Saúl Birmaher, Julio Rodriguez, Matilda Madfis
Professor / AdvisorJavier Mentasti, for believing in this vision and aiding in its creation
Studio Ghibli × USPS
PRINTNO AI ✕ HAND-DRAWN

Studio Ghibli × USPS

USPS — Spec — Art Direction, Graphic Design, Concept

A stamp set for the quiet cultural footprint Ghibli left on every kid who watched.

♪ Ghibli Chill — "Princess Mononoke" (asia_orni) — plays when this window opens

A spec stamp collection honoring the films of Hayao Miyazaki and the global cultural impact of Japanese animation. The brief I gave myself: make something that earns its place inside the USPS Forever canon — not fan art, not merch, but a real philatelic series.

The idea

Render each character in watercolor, not the sharp graphic style most stamp sets default to. Watercolor matches the warmth of the source material — these are characters drawn by hand, animated by hand, and they should feel that way at postage size too.

The set is organized by emotional temperature rather than film — warm characters (Calcifer, No-Face) cluster against orange washes, cool ones (Totoro, Chū) against blue and green, with a central panel for Miyazaki's signature and the series mark. The perforated borders keep the stamp grammar intact; the watercolor backgrounds bleed past the perforations like the world is too big to fit inside the frame.

Every character was hand-drawn or hand-traced in watercolor — Cat, Jiji, the Heron, the Soots, Calcifer, No-Face, Totoro and the Chibi and Mini variants, Ponyo's wave of brothers, Boro, the Kodama, Chū. The one exception is the Catbus, and the set says so out loud rather than hiding it.

Why no AI

This video is the reason. Watching how Studio Ghibli actually makes its films — the patience, the hand of it — made the choice obvious: a tribute to that craft can't be generated. So every character here was drawn or traced by hand.

Full Studio Ghibli × USPS stamp sheet — watercolor characters across warm and cool washes Studio Ghibli × United States Postal Service lockup Detail — Cat, Jiji, Heron and Mini-Totoros Detail — Soots, Calcifer and No-Face on the warm washes Detail — Catbus, Totoro and Chibi-Totoros on the green hill Detail — Ponyo's brothers, Chū-Totoro and Boro Detail — Jiji and the central signature panel No AI — everything is hand-drawn or traced, except for Catbus
Parliament Typeface Specimen
EDITORIAL

Parliament Typeface Specimen

Hoefler & Co. — Miami Ad School — Art Direction, Type, Editorial

A specimen putting Parliament through its paces.

An editorial specimen exploring the design, structure, and applications of the Parliament typeface. The project surfaces the typeface's historical inspiration, formal characteristics, and versatility through editorial spreads, specimen settings, and visual analysis.

The layout emphasizes hierarchy, spacing, and composition to demonstrate how Parliament holds up across headlines, body text, and display — and where it absolutely sings.

Two details I'm proud of

The alphabet column on the specimen page is arranged to form the silhouette of a little guy. And the black column of symbols runs off one page and lands on the next — so the glyphs read as falling.

Parliament specimen spread — the alphabet column forms a little guy, annotated Parliament specimen spread — 503 languages Parliament specimen spread — numerals, fractions and ampersands
Tap any spread to view it full size.

*Student project for Miami Ad School. Parliament is a typeface by Jonathan Hoefler / Hoefler&Co. — used here for an educational specimen, not affiliated with or endorsed by them.

Blood, Sweat, & Tears — WAGANJI
VINYL / ALBUM ART

Blood, Sweat, & Tears

WAGANJI — Single "Lost Soul" — Cover Art & Vinyl Direction · Client Work

Collage art, finished in Adobe Photoshop.

♪ "Cause & Affect" — plays when this window opens

The cover started as a physical collage — magazine and art-book scraps cut and arranged by hand, then photographed. From that raw paper layer the face was built: a white cut-out silhouette, a stitched grin, blue tears, a bat-wing body. The finished artwork keeps the seams of the analog process visible on purpose.

On WAGANJI

Waganji represents the person who tries their best but doesn't feel they're enough. Waganji represents the kid who got lost trying to find himself.

Below: the process, from the hand-cut collage through to the pressed record. The finished cover is up top.

The original hand-cut paper collage, photographed Physical collage laid out, second angle Pressed vinyl record with sleeve
Hand-cut collage → pressed record. Tap any image to enlarge.
Credits
Cover Art · Collage · Art DirectionAlejandro Elias Serulle
ArtistWAGANJI
FIFA Fan Festival Miami 2026 — FWC26 Work
SOCIAL / TEMPLATE SYSTEM

FIFA Fan Festival Miami 2026

FIFA Fan Festival · Miami 2026 — Artist Story Templates & Bilingual Guide · Client Work

A self-serve story kit that lets performing artists announce themselves — on-brand, in two minutes.

Every artist playing the FIFA Fan Festival Miami 2026 needed a way to tell their fans they were part of it — without a designer in the loop for each one. The solution: a templated Instagram Story system in the official Fan Festival brand. The artist opens a Canva link, drops their photo into the frame, types their name and @ in the official FWC26 typeface, swaps the date, and posts. Brand stays locked; the artist makes it theirs.

The problem it solves

Many artists, two festival dates, one brand system to protect. Hand-designing a story for each act doesn't scale — so the design had to. The template does the art direction so the artist can't break it.

Run one — the lineup teaser. The first template (cyan) simply announces that the artist is part of the festival. No date yet — just presence, in the official palm-burst frame with the FWC26 lockup.

Run one: the lineup-teaser template. Tap to enlarge.

Run two — the dated announce. The second template (pink) carries the show date, so artists announce their specific set. Two dated versions (June + July), built with a green placeholder frame that crops any photo to shape automatically.

Run two: blank June + July templates → a filled result. Tap any image to enlarge.

The build, in Illustrator — setting the frame, the type system, and the editable fields before the template ever reached an artist:

Building the template system in Adobe Illustrator.
In the wild

The real test: artists filling the template themselves and posting it — then picked up and reshared by the official @fwc26miami account. Different faces, different vibes, one system that held its shape outside the file.

Real artist stories, reposted by @fwc26miami. Tap any to enlarge.
Motion — One Game On Passion

Beyond the templates, I did video editing and montage on One Game On Passion content for the festival — short-form social cuts, posted by @fwc26miami and partners. Below is one of the reels.

▶ Watch the second reel on Instagram ↗

Video editing / montage on One Game On Passion (FIFA). Posted by @fwc26miami and pleii.app.

Quick Guide for Artists — EN & ES

To make it foolproof, I designed a step-by-step guide in both English and Spanish — open the link, add your photo, type your name, change the date, post. Same brand system as the templates, so the whole kit feels like one thing.

The full bilingual artist guide (English + Español). Tap to read the steps.
Credits
ClientFIFA Fan Festival Miami 2026
Art Direction · Template System · Bilingual GuideAlejandro Elias Serulle
Opportunity — work done thanks to a beautiful opportunity as Art Director Intern at UTAG
more_work/ — Finder
EXTRAS

Loose ends & side missions

Student briefs, private client work, half-finished ideas. Not full campaigns — just pieces that earned their spot.

Negocio Modelo Book cover design — first book I designed
Easy to See — Accessible Currency Spec concept — inclusive design
Café Santo Domingo — Website Redesign Spec / personal redesign concept
Playboy — News-cycle covers Spec editorial — art direction
The Sopranos — Title Sequence Spec — poster & animated main-title sequence
Levi's × Liquid Death Spec campaign — Death by Denim, sustainability made tangible
ARISE Video editing — short-form for a motivational account
Virgin Voyages — "We'll handle the rest" Spec campaign — art direction & copy
Jif — The Peanut Butter Film Festival Spec campaign — concept & art direction
Saul Bass — Timeless Clarity in a Noisy World Editorial magazine — student project
La Forja del Líder Book cover design — same author
Type Journey Personal series — expressive typography (38 pieces)
Photography Night football & flash portraits
TGI Fridays — Sauce Cards Spec campaign — concept, art direction & copy
Miller 64 — "Less than a slice of bread" Spec campaign — concept & art direction
Tela — Your Closet, Gamified App concept — pitch deck
Recreo — Play Outside App concept — pitch deck
About this portfolio

portfolio.app

version 2.6 — released 2026

built byAlejandro Elias Serulle
built withHTML, CSS, JS — by hand
wallpaperpixel-art landscape
typographyJetBrains Mono
palettewarm ink & burnt orange
frameworksnone. zero. nada.
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