FlatCAM
In 2020, The Colorado State University Alumni Association introduced a printable version of our beloved mascot for alumni and friends of CSU to use during the pandemic. Since then, the printable ram, dubbed FlatCAM, has become a companion for alumni across the world.
In 2020, the COVID-19 lockdown prevented the CSU Alumni Association from hosting their usual in-person events that would gather alumni and friends on campus and in the community. As a low-cost solution to keep Ram Pride going nationwide, our team was inspired by the Flat Stanley books by Jeff Brown to create printable versions of CAM the ram. I suggested an illustration instead of a photo, to help make him iconic no matter what size he printed out.
I used Photoshop and Illustrator to create the first FlatCAM, sketching and coloring in Ps and vectorizing him in Ai. In total, the first illustration took about 15 hours.
The first FlatCAM is classic CSU, from his colors to his gear! He represents any ram fan, from kid to student to alum.
Since 2020, I’ve illustrated several variations of FlatCAM, from graduate CAM to travel CAM.
The campaign has evolved into an easy way to show Ram Pride across the world, regardless of where our faculty, staff, alumni, and friends are. Folks can snap a picture of him to add a fun element to their CSU experience, without worrying about those “bad selfies".” FlatCAM has traveled to sports games and tournaments, alumni meet ups, conferences, and many more events as the community embraces him. He has evolved from a DIY printable we hosted on our website into postcards with call to actions to the CSU Alumni Association’s socials, stickers to decorate water bottles or whatever your ram heart desires, or all his variations lovingly used across the university!
