Rusken character redesign
I had the pleasure of working with one of Oslo Kommune's familiar characters from my childhood, Rusken. Responsible for promoting cleanliness in Oslo, our rebranding of Rusken was a detailed process. We fine-tuned shapes, behaviors, colors, and the character's drawing style.
With Team Rusken, our aim was to make Rusken more charming and relatable to our target audience by enhancing facial and body expressions. We also wanted to create a new world for Rusken while staying true to Oslo kommune's style and colors.
The collaboration between our team and Rusken's team resulted in a fresh take on Rusken's identity. Check out the creative process we went through!
Charecter refining V01 on eye style and selection
Expression and motion on the facial character
Charecter refining on eye style and selection
Eye style slection
This section focuses on trying to non-genderize the character and make it a bit more neutral and including
Elements that can surround Rusken
Concept on autumn outfit
Passive body possition with safety glows
Adding some color or facial detail stage
Body character and reactions
Passive body possition without safety glows
After countless meetings, feedback sessions, and cups of coffee, we finally nailed our desired output. Our goal was to expand this new redesign of Rusken into a world of elements that seamlessly fit into Rusken's universe and target market.
We were careful about how these elements should look, ensuring they respect the rebranding style. We focused on colors, line thickness, and detail levels so that the design remains effective in both small and large formats.
So yeah! Say hi to Oslo kommune's new Rusken!
Rusken in his work overall and beach Rusken
Rusken and several reactions
Standard outfit and seasonal outfit
Rusken’s univers elements and trash
Rusken’s univers elements
Rusken’s univers elements with nature
Rusken’s univers elements with nature and greens
3D reference of our new Rusken for real-size mascot production
Our process rebranding Rusken
Since I was a kid, even in primary school, I remember how Rusken made us aware of keeping Oslo clean. That message stuck with me. So, when the day came for me to rebrand Rusken, I was thrilled to take on the challenge and meet Team Rusken’s desired outcome.
We utilized a character-matching system, Blink, prepared by our project manager. Blink helped us analyze the pros and cons of similar existing characters and pinpoint our new design for our target market based on collected data.
From there, we developed our unique style of drawing lines and considered how it would impact the character and its surroundings. We focused on the visibility of the character in different contexts, determining the optimal line thickness for each element to enhance Rusken’s support elements.
We meticulously reviewed each body part and its components to ensure the final design hit the sweet spot of our desired output.
Client: Oslo kommune - Rusken
Team: Hill & Knowlton / Frank J.
Production: Character design, Charecter production, storyboard, animation.