snape . san francisco . 415 235 5605

ABOUT

PRODUCT DESIGN

WEB DESIGN

LOGOS

PHOTOGRAPHY

SOUND DESIGN

OPTUM RX MOBILE APP

CAREER LADDER

ENTERPRISE TOOLING

ENGAGE PLATFORM

TEAM SNAPE

DEREK SNAPE

With over 25 years of diverse experience spanning roles as a business owner, Design Director, Creative Director, Senior Art Director, Senior Web Designer, Art Director, and Professional Photographer, I thrive in dynamic and highly creative environments. My passion lies in collaborating with inspiring individuals who share a profound love for design and art.

As a creative talent, I excel in providing innovative solutions across multiple disciplines. I have a proven ability to build and direct teams, articulating a compelling vision for each project. As a strategic thinker with a wide range of design capabilities, I am process-oriented, organized, and highly motivated to achieve exceptional results.

Clients Include: Rally Health, NIKE, Adidas, Rockwell Group, MNML, Fuseproject, Charles Schwab, Albert Watson, Neenah Paper, MCI, Kwaku Alston, Walter Iooss, Christopher Micaud, Robert Diadul, Tony Barbera, Janice Richer, Patrick Henningfield, Diamler Chrysler, Richard MacDonald, Handman Associates, Powerade, About a Baby, Bloomberg Publishing, Time Inc., Coca Cola, Wholefoods, WW Grainger, Motorola, IDEO, Cal Tech, American Red Cross, ABN Amaro, Progressive Insurance, Bjorn Iooss, hubwear, Ryall Porter Sheridan Architects, Harry and David

FEATURED

Albert Watson is a giant in the photography world. His vision is extraordinary and his images are legendary. I built a site to showcase his work, the approach was to create a very cinematic experience.

See my solution

Ryall Porter Sheridan, NYC based architectural firm, contacted me to design, build their website. They do beautiful work, so they needed a site to compliment their work.

See my solution

Walter Iooss has been a great client. His work inspired my photography while I was at RIT, I was giddy when he called me out of the blue one day. I designed and built his first website, and continue to work with him, now 5 years later. Take a look at his site, this being the fourth version.

See my solution

Kwaku Alston, LA based photographer and good friend, wanted a site to showcase his fine art work. kwaku projects was born. Amazing photography, cool site.

See my solution

MNML Studio based out of Chicago, does amazing design work. I have been fortunate enough to work with Scott over the last 15 years. I designed and built a portfolio site. Great client. Great friend.

See my solution

Handman Associates is a Chicago based Interior Consulting + Design firm. I have been working with them over the past 8+ years. We launched a new site last year to showcase all their beautiful work

See my solution

NEWS

Added some new case studies to show the work I have been doing at Rally Health and Optum.

Take a look >

Listen to some of new tracks.

Celebrating 8 years, working on the coolest products at Rally Health. Managing a team of 12 über talented designs, and learning everyday.

Fun photoshoot for Harry & David

Handman Associates new site, looks great and showcases their beautiful work.

Take a look >

Have you checked out this site on your ipad/iphone hooray adaptive design.

Mobile Projects, I did as the Senior AD @ Men's Wearhouse.

Take a look >

New site just launched, let's call it snape 4.0, since you are here, guess that means you know about the new site.

See More Screens

Launch Site

Client: Albert Watson

I was thrilled to be asked to create a portfolio website for legendary photographer Albert Watson; we studied his work while I was in photography school at RIT.

The challenge:

To showcase his work in a cinematic way. With over a million negatives in his archive, he was looking for a site to hold a large volume of work and give him easy control of content and updates.

The solution:

I designed, built and programmed his site incorporating a custom CMS. I built the site for the web first, then upgraded it to support a custom mobile + ipad presence.

See More Screens

Client: MNML

MNML is a high-end product + lifestyle design studio working with a range of clients that includes new technology, healthcare, clothing, and furniture. I designed built a site for MNML to showcase their wide range of work to both customers and potential clients.

The challenge:

To organize the vast range of work across many disciplines into a clean, elegant solution, while retaining the flexibility necessary for expanding content.

The solution:

I conceived, designed and built both a Flash-based front end site, and a custom content management system. This gave them all the freedom they needed within a structure to keep the visual and navigational integrity of the site content consistent.

See More Screens

Launch Site

Client: Handman Associates

Handman Associates is a Interior Design and Consulation firm based out of Chicago. This is the second version of the site I have designed for them. They need a portfolio style of site to showcase all their amazing work, across a variety of categories. We also wanted to include a team page, and links to the various publications showcasing their work.

See More Screens

Client: Ryall Porter Sheridan Architects

NYC based, RPS Architects requested a site which would showcase their work in a manner which would not detract from the elegance of their work.

The challenge:

To build a site that is both simple, elegant and flexible. The client would control and update the site content on a regular basis.

The solution:

I produced a site that is invisible. Their work remains the hero of the project, with clean navigation it's intuitive and easy to use. I also developed the custom backend solution that would allow them complete control over the site content.

See More Screens

Client: Walter Iooss

When Walter cold called me, I just about dropped the phone. I had seen and loved his work for years. Walter is the top sports photographer in the business, since he's based out of NYC I have not gotten a chance to meet him directly, but that hasn't stopped this 6+ years working relationship.

The challenge:

His work spans 40+ years of the sporting life. I needed to design a site that could hold a substantial amount of work, and also allow for easy browsing and keeping the viewer focused on his images.

See More Screens

Internal: Mens Wearhouse

My work at the Mens Wearhouse included several mini-sites for special events or promotions.

The challenge:

To develop a tool to transform the bottleneck at tuxedo rental locations during high school prom season into a streamlined process.

The solution:

I developed the user flows, designed the UI, coding. The Top Tux Tool allowed students to quickly look through all available tux rental styles, interact with a color selector, and print out a reservation sheet with their preferences. Each store would use this detail sheet for faster, more efficient fulfillment. Along with the laptop verion I also developed the mobile version of the tool, for this on the go audience. I also made the tool bilingual (English / French ) for use on the Moores Clothing site in Canada.

See More Screens

Internal: Mens Wearhouse

While working at Men's Wearhouse I developed their mobile site presence, fine tuning the site to optimize the experience for the mobile user.

The challenge:

To create a mobile centricc experience, focusing on the core functions of the website for the user on the go. I also wanted to create an experience that would change and be reflective of the current site specials and offerings.

The solution:

I conceived, designed and built a solution, in partnership with the MW IT team. I narrowed the mobile site to key elements: Promotional specials, GPS driven find a store functionality, and Email sign up. I worked closely with the site director to established a promotional calendar, linking the calendar into the mobile site via javascript to allow the site to be relatively maintance free, and reflective of the offers on the main MW site.

See More Screens

Internal: Mens Wearhouse

Seasonally MW would put together a gift guide. I worked with the designers to develop a mobile version of the online piece.

The challenge:

To create a mobile site that would be representative of the online experience, showcase the seasonal items that they wanted to highlight in a clean, elegant solution

The solution:

I worked with the designers to maximize the impact of the piece for the mobile platform, the user flow was complete redesigned, for mobile optimization. I designed and programmed the piece and worked with the MW IT team to implement the site onto the MW servers.

See More Screens

Client: Kwaku Alston Photography

LA based photographer Kwaku Alston is a premiere celebrity, portrait, and lifestyle photographer. He has an amazing ability to illuminate the personality and character of his subjects.

The challenge:

Kwaku wanted to develop a site that created an experience. He also wanted his work to be displayed as if you were in a museum. My goal was to create an enviroment that would support the work and not distract from it.

The solution:

I designed and built this site, incorportating location aware audio cues, elegant simple navigation, and a custom CMS. That would allow him to incorporate custom videos in the intro and a soundtrack to play throughout the site experience.

See More Screens

Client: Discovering Hope

Eli Rubel, LA based photographer, approached me with a pro bono project. He was documenting and photographing holocaust survivors, and needed a site to showcase the work and solicit donations to complete his photo essay. He had amazing images and powerful stories.

The challenge:

I needed to create a site that not only showcased the images but also could be used to drive donations and something he could use to seek gallery interest.

The solution:

I wanted to keep the information available but as a secondary element to the story and images. I also wanted to design a site that had the room to grow as his project grew. I often look back at the site and enjoy the silent strength of the subjects and their presentation.

NOTEABLE + PAST PROJECTS:

Bjorn Iooss Photography
Janice Richter
Eva Iooss Illustration
Richard MacDonald
Robert Diadul Photography
The Rockwell Group
Powerade

Ozone

Ozone Online asked me to lead the direction for their logo redesign and a more efficient and smoothly-operating website.

See More Screens

About A Baby

I started this company when my first daughter was born. The concept was to provide expecting and new parents with their own subscription mini-site to share photos, daily thoughts and activities with friends and family.

Coup De Style - Men's Wearhouse

At the Men's Wearhouse, I headed up the creative arm of an internal team tasked with developing new online brand initiatives. The first one we worked on was Coupe De Style, revolutionizing the woman's work wear space.

Rally Health | Enterprise Tooling

I worked on designing a tooling system that would allow for a wide range of tasks, across a variety of administrative users, that focused on creating a seamless experience that would vary from tool to tool but use foundational workflows. I also created a style guide and work it into a living sketch styleguide to help speed up the design and implementation of any new tools projects.

My Role - Designer, Collaborator, Director

_ Primary designer and helped craft the global concept for the tools
_ Built and lead a team of designers working on the tools
_ Direct the design team working on the Enterprise Tools

Multi-prong Impact

The Rally Tooling initiative contributed to multiple efficiency improvements: snape

My Approach

_ Modular approach to the tools, to create reusable patterns and components
_ Develop a workflow that could flex based on the needs of any individual tool
_ Atom Design Methodology

Tools Dashboard

Allows an admin to view all the tools they work with and see any tasks that need their attention and notifications. It also focuses the admins work based on common workflows.

Rally Central Tools Dashboard

Style Guide

Developed to maintain a high level of consistency across all the tools. This would allow any admin to be able to work in any of the tools and be able to understand the steps needed for any configuration. The style guide was also adapted both as a shareable sketch library, and a development driven living style guide. This greatly increase the speed and accuracy of the designers work.

Style Guide Excerpts

Common Patterns + Workflows

Wizard Configuration

was used throughout all the tools. This allowed for a modular approach to configuration needs, but has the flexiblity to custom any given step in the wizard.

Partner + Client

relationships is a common pattern this was always the initial step in every tool, as that configuration determined other parameters or data that would be available during the configuration process.

Publish + Promote

allowed the admins to determine when, and where to publish a configuration, moving something from development to production, created a smoother workflow without needing the help of development teams. The process also allowed for time and date specific promotions, which was key for our implementation teams large 1/1 deliverables.

Content Version Control

We developed a process for draft vs. published content. When would the content still remain editable vs. being locked post client sign off. Also the ability to copy a configuration, either as a new version or a unassociated version that could then be tweaked or customized further while using the base configuration as a starting point.

TOP

Rally Health | Engage

Through a fine tuned balance of curated challenges, programs, recommendations and rewards we looked to reach the users with content that best fits their needs. I worked to keep design and information consistent throughout the users’ Rally experience. Rally is a B2B/C product, our user base are employees whose company provide UnitedHealthCare insurance and have opted to use Rally as their wellness program. Currently, Rally has a user base of 25+ million.

My Role - Designer, Collaborator, Director

_ As the designer I worked on the Incentives, Challenges and Missions
_ As Director, my team of 13 designers work on all the pieces of the engagement product.
_ My team, Managing Desginers, Lead Designers, Sr. Product Designers, and Product Designers.

Impact

At Rally Health, both my work and my team's efforts positively impacted the bottom line through our Rally Engage product. snape

Process

_ Focus on consistency and collaboration
_ Direct and focus them on the business objectives
_ Keep all the design patterns and user experience consistent
_ We are all designing an end-to-end experience for each individual user

50,000 Ft. View

I break down the users experience into 3 buckets:
Things To Do, primary engagement points for the users.
About You, all about the user; biometrics, stats and activity progress.
Rewards, where users go to spend their earnings.

Health Activity: Things to do

Use are offered activities to engage with they are also able to see what the are currently involved with. We worked across several product and development teams to integrate the content and bring all the pieces together based on the ideal user experience. I work to translate the product owners needs into the design solution, drive my design lead in the direction to provide the best experience while fullfilling all the business requirements.

Health Profile: About you

By providing the user with relevant data to show the user how they are progressing in their goals and their biometrics data. My goal was to work with the design team to pinpoint the highest value information to engage the users, celebrate their achievements, and continue down their wellness path.

Rewards: Spend what you've earned

Users earned incentives through a variety of ways, the Rewards Marketplace is where they can spend those earned rewards. We had to take into account a wide variety of client variations and programs, the modular approach allowed for wide range of configuration options.

TOP

Optum Rx Mobile App

The Optum Rx mobile app provides users with a seamless way to manage their prescriptions and healthcare needs. It offers convenient features like easy prescription refills, medication reminders, and a pharmacy locator to find nearby pharmacies. Users can also access digital ID cards, track their order history, and compare medication prices for cost savings.

My Role - Director

_ Worked closely with product and dev teams to solve business objective
_ Led team of designers through UX iterations, UI implementation, user testing scenarios, accessibility audits and finally adjustments and launch

Process

_ Focus on UX patterns, and testing design directions with research team
_ Interpret business objects for features with product teams, and guide UX/UI designers
_ Work towards feature "smart parity" with our web and mweb teams
_ Adjust expectations based on often required phased approach to feature completion
_ Get an MVP feature to makret, gather feedback, iterate, update, relaunch
_ Keeping my peer leadership team and senior leadership team in the loop and work through product challenges

Core KPI

• Increase Biometrics login rate
• Increase Order Placed Completion rate

Mobile Application

The Optum Rx mobile app offers a range of features designed to streamline prescription and healthcare management. Key features include easy prescription refills, medication reminders, and a pharmacy locator to find nearby pharmacies. Users can also access digital ID cards, track their order history, and compare medication prices to find cost-effective options. The app ensures secure access to personal health information and provides 24/7 connectivity to pharmacists for any medication-related inquiries.

Figma + Native Component Library

A robust and comprehensive design style guide is essential for ensuring consistent UX patterns, accessibility, and UI elements. A Figma library provides the design team with easily accessible assets to incorporate into their designs, streamlining the collaboration process with development teams. Additionally, we closely collaborated with development teams during the creation of coded components, ensuring they were thoroughly QA'd against the provided design specifications.

"Smart Parity"

Leadership prioritized achieving parity as a goal for the remainder of the year, aiming to better align the mobile app experience and UI patterns with our web and web-responsive experience. The current native approach has been hampered by development resources and product priorities, so I advocated for a quick win with a web-wrapped experience, allowing the application to quickly align with new features or enhancements completed by the web team. Once a higher level of parity is achieved, I plan to focus on "smart parity," considering user behavior and interactions with their devices. This involves examining the primary actions users take on mobile devices compared to laptops or tablets, including gestures, biometric authentication, and camera interactions.

TOP

Career Ladder

The uniform approach that many large companies adopt for their employees often falls short. Optum was no exception, providing leaders with various goal-oriented tools and management programs for team development and review. I wanted to create a more hands-on and personalized method, enabling me to work closely with my team members to foster their growth through specific self-review topics, relevant skills, and a goals worksheet to guide and measure their progress throughout the year. With these principles in mind, I designed and built the "Career Ladder" worksheet and workflow.

Goal

_ Develop a custom worksheet to help managers and reports create a focused goal plan for advancing to the next role on their career path
_ Define focus areas assigned by the leadership team for various roles, creating a checklist for designers to follow and grow within the company
_ Establish a flexible and adaptable connection point for managers and designers, ensuring a clear roadmap for the designers' development.

Self Ratings + Manager Ratings

Optum utilizes a framework called the Common Language of Leadership (CLL), which includes a set of attributes across various themes that are quite subjective and general. Each person can address these attributes and rate their performance based on a specific attribute. I aimed to create a worksheet that considers the user's current role and links specific CLL attributes to it. As part of the leadership team, I identified the most crucial attributes and assigned value to each. The manager would then rate the user on these same attributes. Additionally, I compiled a list of specific skills relevant to the role that both the user and the manager would use for rating.

Defining Goals

The main purpose of the user and manager ratings is to identify areas of alignment or significant discrepancies in their assessments. These areas are crucial for setting up goals for the user. By using the next role as a benchmark, we can tailor these goals to meet the user's needs and help them advance in their career within the organization.

Action Plan

We know your next role and the leadership's focus areas, as well as where users and managers have identified key areas for improvement. Now it's time to put a plan together. I collaborate with users to define their goals and establish measurable actions. Whether users learn better through hands-on experience, watching TED talks, attending conferences or seminars, or using LinkedIn or other learning platforms, it's crucial to tailor actions to their preferred learning styles. This approach ensures they can succeed and grow into their new role or further develop in their current one. Not all goals can be achieved within a year or a quarter; some are ongoing. This worksheet is designed to be used throughout the year, allowing flexibility so that your reports have an active plan for continuous growth and learning.

TOP

Team Snape

As a remote team leader, I prioritize clear communication and active listening, ensuring everyone feels connected. I balance strategic planning with strong organization to keep us aligned with company goals and deadlines. Adaptable and supportive, I help the team navigate remote work challenges and foster collaboration. I trust my team members, encouraging their creativity and growth, and I value ongoing development through mentorship. Recognizing the importance of social connections, I organize non-work syncs to keep us engaged and bonded.

Small Team of Experts

I developed an exercise called "A Small Team of Experts" to showcase the strengths and diversity of my team. Using FigJam and loosely structured categories, we rated ourselves on various skills—mostly UX/UI related, but also including personal talents outside of work. For instance, I enjoy sound design and music composition, which, while not my expertise, is a creative outlet that could be valuable. After the exercise, we created "trading cards" for each designer, envisioning a searchable app the company could use to find the right talent for projects, whether it’s designing a logo or creating a soundtrack for a video.

"A small team of experts" - Two Spys in the House of Love by Jam&Spoon

Good Times

Who doesn't love a meeting where the agenda is "Who's watching something good right now?" These "un-meetings" are a great way to keep the team connected, relieve stress, and bring out everyone's personality. I created this FigJam for my team to interact with and build upon. Need some recommendations? You know what show is great...

Rally Session

I started and ran Rally Sessions every week for two years straight. The Sessions were a weekly radio DJ show featuring DJs from our offices in San Francisco, DC, Chicago, Minneapolis, and Denver. Every Friday, a DJ would mix live for an hour and stream it online. We also hosted two all-day anniversary shows, several Christmas parties, and an onsite event in Las Vegas. If you find a Rally Sessions t-shirt, hold onto it—it's a vintage piece now. All the shows were recorded, so if you need some new tunes, check out a few sessions!

Rally Sessions 132 Shows

TOP

Photography

My first love, and the gateway into how my mind works. To me, concept has always been king.

STILL PORTFOLIO

Portrait Portfolio

Sound Design

What is an experience without sound? I have always been interested in sound and music creation, from mixing my parents records together on cassette tape, to working with a full midi studio running pro tools. I love the mood that you can create for your audience through tone, texture and pattern. Samples include both personal and commissioned work. Use the soundcloud link below to hear more tracks

*Audio supported in Safari and Chrome Browsers only.

Adidas: Dunk Full Version

Singularity

Triplex

Singularity (Jericho Remix)

Closer

Mia

Resonance

1ne