SGMA 101

Writing, Motion Graphics

Project Overview

Turlock Irrigation District came to us with an immense challenge: how do we explain SGMA (the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act) to the community—a murky and still developing piece of legislation passed in 2014?

Fortunately, getting deep into the weeds to research highly technical topics, then distilling the information into something understood by anyone is one of my specialties.

My Contributions

This was one of those fun projects I had complete creative control over from start to finish. I researched the info, wrote the script, and storyboarded it out. Once approved, I designed, illustrated, and animated all of the elements.

Turlock Groundwater

Explainer Video

2019

I love being able to jump into a project completely and walk away having learned something new. This project required hours of researching the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and what its effects would be on the Turlock Subbasin. The script had to strike a balance between being simple enough for anyone to understand without talking down to the audience.

The design needed to be approachable and engaging, while still able to convey complex systems. A mixture of 2D and 3D animation was decided on. From frame by frame fluid animations to 3D models of the valley, this project created a number of workflow and technical challenges.

In order to make an accurate 3D representation of the Turlock subbasin, I taught myself the magic of GIS software and manipulating publicly available height data to capture our little valley.