Takeover Tuesday with Katie Trayte
An interview with Katie Trayte: an illustrator based in Washington, D.C as well as the Creative Director at Duke & Duck.
Q&A with Sarah Chokali.
Read time: 5min
Bella Alfonsi:
Hey, Katie! Thanks so much for being a part of Takeover Tuesday. For those who are unfamiliar with you or your work, please tell us about you and what you do!
Katie Trayte:
Thank you so much for inviting me to participate! I love your Takeover Tuesday series.
My name is Katie Trayte and I’m an illustrator based in Washington, D.C as well as the Creative Director at Duke & Duck.
Bella Alfonsi:
Do you have any formal training or are you completely self taught?
Katie Trayte:
I graduated from SCAD with an Illustration degree, but I am fairly self-taught when it comes to animation. I started out of school as an apparel graphic designer for Hollister. So if I made it here, you can too! I always felt a pull towards animation and storytelling, but never really saw where I could fit into the compartmentalized pipelines of feature and tv. When I found the world of motion design I was, in a word, obsessed. I was also what the French call, "Les incompetents". My love of the work made it easy to find motivation in closing my knowledge gap. It was an area where my illustration and graphic design passions could both thrive, and I was so drawn to the experimental styles and trend-setting approaches happening in the field.
Shot from Sony’s | Barbra Streisand project that Katie Art Directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
You have an impressive resume of clients, like Sony, Nestle, and Discovery Channel, just to name a few! What advice do you have for freelancers first starting out who dream of working with clients like these?
Katie Trayte:
I have spent most of my career in-house. From that experience, I would say there’s a huge benefit to being part of a company or studio to get access to those partnerships. Especially if you’re still finding your style and the idea of exploring a lot of different visual directions appeals to you. In-house is also a great place to get a master class on business and sales. Confidence in these skills can help you to feel more empowered to establish and foster relationships with your dream clients as a freelancer.
Bella Alfonsi:
What steps did you take to go from illustrator/designer to Art Director? Do you prefer doing one more than the other?
Katie Trayte:
I jumped from graphic designer in ‘the outside world’ to an AD at Demo Duck. Not having much motion design experience behind me at that moment was… different, but a lot of the skills that had led me to advance in design roles were still very applicable despite the shift between industries. Effective communication, articulation of ideas, and management skills all help take you from making great art to leading great art. I have such a strategy brain that I’d say art director is the role for me. I love being client-facing and problem-solving along the way during a project. I still get to do a fair amount of hands-on work in an AD role, so it’s a win-win!
Style Frame from Duke & Duck’s project for Nestlé that Katie designed and Art Directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
Do you have any advice for someone trying to become a director themselves?
Katie Trayte:
Start by demanding excellence from yourself in your area of production. If you’re producing high-quality work in your role, you’ll be trusted to own more and more of the pipeline. Hone your voice, always concept from a unique angle, and keep learning about areas of production that may be outside your expertise. Most importantly- develop your people skills! Effective negotiation, collaboration, and communication help to win the respect of your client and your team. At the director level, more often than not, your people skills are going to be what makes or breaks the success of a project.
Bella Alfonsi:
Tell us a bit about the piece, Be Aware. What was it like working with Barbra Streisand? How did the unique painterly approach come to be?
Katie Trayte:
Be Aware was such a dream to work on. Barbra Streisand was much more involved in the review and development of the project than I was expecting, which was a really fun surprise. I even have a first pass of my storyboards that came back to us with her handwritten notes on them! Treasure. She and Sony were both great clients.
Since moving to DC I’ve become friends with Elyse Kelly, who is an independent director and founder of Neon Zoo. I admire her work so much, and when she asked me to join the project I was excited about the opportunity to shadow her directorial expertise. The painterly approach came out of a lot of style development with Elyse. We wanted a look that matched the song- sweeping, emotive, and sensitive to the subject matter. I did initial sketch boards in a gestural, loose hand and that treatment felt like a natural marriage to the song lyrics. Elyse’s body of work is very painterly, so her talented animation team was very equipped to bring the look to life.
I love to paint, but most of my work up to Be Aware has had to be very graphic-driven. It felt like I got to really be myself with this style and say, “Don’t bring around a cloud to rain on my parade!”
Bella Alfonsi:
When you find yourself in a creative rut, how do you get out of it?
Katie Trayte:
Working remotely, (like I do now), or working freelance can make a creative rut feel like a creative canyon. An impossible abyss of creative failure from which you will never escape! On my own, I have never had a great solution for these difficult patches other than to take it easy on myself and let time pass, knowing that I’ll move beyond it. As a team, we’ve started a lot of open dialogue about overcoming ruts and are committing to more open avenues of collaboration this year. We’re working to let go of any self-inflicted shame associated with being stuck by reaching out to each other to talk through blocks, hurdles, or low points before they get too far. We’re having a lot of success. Working remotely, you're much more prone to anxiety and self-doubt that can make you retreat inwards. We’re all being intentional about training ourselves out of this habit through communication and feeling safe to be vulnerable with each other.
Shot from Duke & Duck’s “Plos” brand video Katie designed and directed.
Bella Alfonsi:
What or who inspires you?
Katie Trayte:
Both in my personal time and inside Duke & Duck we’re making more of a commitment to developing children’s IP. We’re even starting a sister brand for kid’s content called Double Scoop Studio! About a year ago, we discovered how much talent there was on our team for telling character-driven episodic content and have wanted to give that talent an outlet. That’s been a big inspiration to me- having this group of people come together that are committed to starting this new ambitious journey. I love working with my team to help find the special stories we have within us. Working together to grow these ideas, with a lot of laughter and joy along the way, feels like magic.
Currently, I’m really inspired by any kids media that takes more of a motion design direction to its animation approach or offers a new style in the space. Hey Duggee, Wide Load Vacay, City Island, StoryBots, and City of Ghosts are all great examples.
Bella Alfonsi:
Any final takeaways?
Katie Trayte:
I think I’ve said it all. Thank you so much, Dash team, for hosting these interviews and for always finding great ways to bring our community together!