From over 110,000 entries worldwide, and 47 finalists, West Australian Elliot Tawns has won the silver medal for graphic design at the Adobe Certified Associate World Championship in Anaheim, California.
Held by Adobe and Crepitant for five years and measuring graphic design skills, the 2017 Adobe Certified Association (ACA) World Championship saw the finalists come to California to complete a design challenge for a real-world client with Tawns the first Australian winner of the competition.
Certiport is billed as a “leading provider of certification exam development, delivery and programme management services” with “over 14,000 Certiport Authorised Testing Centres worldwide".
Ana Katarina Charvet from Las Vegas, Nevada, won the top prize out of 47 finalists who came to the final round of competition at the Disneyland Resort Hotel in Anaheim, California, USA from 31 July – 2 August.
{loadposition alex08}Aaron Osmond, general manager of Certiport, said: “The ACA World Champions join a list of illustrious young people who have impressed us with their talent and job-ready skills since we started this competition five years ago to promote industry certification.
“In order to take artistic ability and translate it into the workforce, you have to be able to follow instructions and use the most popular industry tools efficiently. These students did that for our client and exceeded expectations.”
We’re told that “finalists were asked to create a 16- by 20-inch poster in both print-ready and digital format for client Iridescent, a science, engineering and technology education non-profit organisation that empowers underrepresented youth to become self-motivated learners, inventors and leaders".
Finalists were given “eight hours and could use Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud (CC), Adobe Illustrator CC and/or Adobe InDesign CC. They were judged on their creative and technical skills, as well as their ability to implement the client’s vision and message. The top ten final entries can be viewed here".
Wallace Louie, senior director of marketing, Iridescent, said: “Certiport advised us that these projects would be both creative and professional, but we were blown away by what the finalists created in just one day.
“We enjoyed seeing and judging the projects and interacting with these bright digital design students from all over the world.”
The first, second and third place ACA World Champions were selected based on design score and were awarded scholarship money (US$7000, $3500, $1500), Adobe software, and gold, silver, and bronze medals.
Honourable mention scholarships of US$250 were given to fourth through tenth place with an additional US$250 for the People’s Choice Award (as voted on by event attendees).
This is Elliot Tawns' entry, his video interview and that of the 1st and 3rd place winners is embedded below.i
Tacy Trowbridge, Global Education Programs lead, Adobe, said: “I congratulate Ana Katarina and the other finalists for their superior digital design skills, passion, and creativity.
“The ACA World Championship recognises students from around the world. These students have demonstrated their skill by earning an industry certification and by competing in a design challenge judged by industry experts. This accomplishment will help these students in their academic and career pursuits.”
Next year, Certiport will host the 2018 Adobe Certified Associate World Championship in Orlando, Florida.
Video interviews with the top three winners are embedded below.
The 2017 ACA World Champions are:
First place:
Ana Katarina Charvet, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Second place:
Elliot Tawns, Australia
Third place and People’s Choice Award:
Yi-An Chen, Taiwan
Fourth place:
José Antonio Martínez Caballero, Mexico
Fifth place:
Soham Khatadare, India
Sixth place:
Alyson Janina Vidal Silva, Chile
Seventh place:
Franz Felipe Otiniano Camino, Peru
Eighth place:
Yi-Jing Lin, Taiwan
Ninth place:
Angel Patricio Canales Cifuentes, Chile
Tenth place:
Arisara Kotchatin, Thailand
Video interviews of the top three winners is embedded below:
Here’s the video of Charvet being interviewed by the organisers:
Here’s Tawns being interviewed:
Finally, here’s third-place and people’s choice winner, Yi-An Chen from Taiwan. Her answers are in Mandarin Chinese, there’s no live Google Translation of her remarks as yet: