Client

City of Durham | Community Development Department

Client Ask

Create a 30-second commercial that introduces Durham’s Down Payment Assistance Program and directs residents to where they can check their eligibility.

Within the 30-second runtime, the spot also needed to communicate the benefits of homeownership, acknowledge the barrier created by rising home costs, explain that eligible residents could receive up to $80,000 in assistance toward a home within Durham city limits, and provide both a website and phone number.

What I Did

I turned an information-heavy government brief into a clear, energetic, and memorable TV spot.

I organized the required information into a problem–solution–call-to-action structure, moving viewers from the benefits of homeownership and the problem created by rising home costs to the solution to that problem— the program, its key eligibility requirements, and the next step.

Instead of taking the conventional government video ad approach of featuring forgettable b-roll footage of happy families paired with a voiceover, I pushed for and created a fully animated, motion-graphics-driven spot. Bold visuals conveyed the information in dynamic and surprising ways that held viewers’ attention and communicated clearly.

I combined Swiss-influenced typography and asymmetrical layouts with editorial cutout collage and monochromatic photography, bringing every element together in a fully animated visual system. The spot used the City’s official brand colors, expanded with blue tints derived from the official dark blue, and star motifs drawn from Durham’s flag. Generous white space gave the City’s visual language a lighter, more energetic expression.

My Role
Strategy + Scriptwriting + Storyboarding + Art Direction + Design + Photography + Motion Design + Voiceover + Editing + Creative Direction + Client Leadership (Pitch + Reviews)

Results
The client later discovered that many participants were reluctant to be publicly identified as program users, limiting testimonials and organic word-of-mouth. That finding reinforced the need for proactive outreach that did not depend on participants publicly sharing their experiences.

By mid-February 2026, the relaunched program had closed 42 loans totaling approximately $2.79 million.