Rafael Masoni / Work

Work

I was incredibly fortunate to work as a web designer, developer and illustrator for most of my life.

It was a great journey during which I experienced the startup scene in its infancy, and evolved with web standards and development methodologies over the years, all while learning and growing alongside amazing professionals.

In 2016, I shifted my career from full-time web design to running my own online language & culture school (which has benefited greatly from my skills).

Small-sized white user interface icons over a dark blue background. Two blue three-dimensional human silhouettes over a white background. Medium-sized white and light blue icons over a dark blue background. Small-sized full-color user interface icons over a white background.
Icons and illustrations I made for Clicksign.

Work Experience

  1. –

    Co-Founder at NihonGO

    We bring pop culture to language learning through online courses and free social media content on all things Japan.

  2. –

    Designer at Perfarm

    Perfarm offers agribusiness software, specializing in routine automation and strategic management with a focus on financial return. I helped them from the inception with design, front-end development and consulting.

  3. –

    Designer at Current

    For 10 years, my friend and I provided full-stack web development services to several companies in Brazil and the US.

  4. –

    Strategic Advisor at Oráculo

    Oráculo was a promising startup that aimed to provide a different, more honest and efficient take on weather forecasts and related services. From their conceptual phase, I provided technical and strategic advice to the founders, and arranged meetings with key partners and advisors.

  5. –

    Designer at Clicksign

    The first e-signature service compliant with Brazilian and international laws. I contributed to design and front-end development from the company's inception.

  6. –

    Freelance Designer at WebSpread

    One of the first SEO-focused agencies in São Paulo that promised high-ranking websites to all clients. I did UI design for several of these websites.

  7. –

    Freelance Designer at ViaRanking

    ViaRanking was a Yelp-like crowd-sourced business review website. I mainly helped implementing existing designs and creating new ones.

  8. –

    Art Assistant at Quad Studio

    Quad Studio does work for the largest advertising agencies in Brazil. I had the opportunity to work and learn with them by doing art assets for games, 3D modeling, UV mapping, texturing, photography and editorial pieces.

  9. –

    Front-end Engineer at Ikwa

    Ikwa was the first professional orientation web platform in Brazil that offered career guidance to a wide audience through tests, guides and publications. It was my first real job, and I joined the company after reporting bugs on their forums. I was lucky to work with an incredible IT team with which I learned SVN and Git, Ruby on Rails, agile programming and many other skills. Apart from front-end development, I also led the IT team in some projects. After leaving the company to pursue a freelance career with a colleague, Ikwa became one of our clients.

A grid of dozens of line icons depicting agricultural activities.
My last big project at Perfarm was drawing hundreds of icons for a plethora of agricultural activities.

Projects

  1. Ruby Talk

    A chat made for the Brazilian Ruby/Rails community to share ideas, get help and engage in meaningful conversations.

  2. Vuash

    Send secret messages safely. #7 Day Rank and #91 Week Rank on Product Hunt (August 28th, 2016 launch).

  3. Portal ACE Seguros

    First version of a web application that handles microinsurance sales for brokers all over Brazil. ACE Limited later acquired Chubb and adopted its name.

  4. SMR MEDLiQ

    This project consisted in developing both hardware and software for a breakthrough device that took fluid measurements in tanks. We built from the ground-up a 7" touch display running WebKit on a micro board connected directly to MEDLiQ’s sensors. It reported information on volume, supply and leakages.

A geometric illustration that resembles a bloodhound. An abstract geometric dark logo over a yellow background. A circle split into three sinuous shapes of different colors resembling a map seen through a telescope. A stylized capital letter ‘A’ with CMYK colors. A stylized blue tooth that loks like folded paper. A jumping yellow man made of very few pixels. A speech balloon with a diamond shape over a circular train track. A stylized blue paper airplane.
Assorted logos I made for several projects.

Side Projects

  1. Climatico

    Climatico was our Rails Rumble 2015 entry. It suggests clothing and preventive measures for the day based on the weather.

  2. Discovry

    Our Rails Rumble 2014 entry. Discover places from all over the world by navigating in a simple and fun way around the world map.

  3. Unsubtitle for Netflix

    Unsubtitle is a small extension that removes subtitles from any show on Netflix instantaneously. This is specially good for people studying foreign languages or those annoyed by the clutter it creates on the screen. It got nearly 4000 users and 5 stars on the Chrome Web Store.

  4. Alpha Color

    Alpha Color was our entry to Rails Rumble 2013. This app had the single purpose of collecting people‘s view on certain emotions through color. The visitors were presented with a list of random colors and asked which of those best represented a certain emotion. The app then plotted its findings on a statistics page.

  5. Gerundator

    A small jQuery plugin that adds loading states to buttons with proper gerund inflections in brazilian portuguese.

  6. Hiragata

    Simple hiragana to/from katakana converter.

  7. RailsPG

    This was our entry to Rails Rumble 2012. This app aimed to make it possible to play table-top RPGs on your browser. It has a chat shared by a unique link, several slash commands, Twitter sign-on and user roles.

  8. Minuet

    Minuet is a small add-on for Twitter Bootstrap.

  9. Skeleton Jigsaw

    A sidescrolling platform game made with HTML5 (canvas, audio and localStorage) and JavaScript (ImpactJS). Inspired by classics like Mario and Ghouls ‘n Ghosts.

  10. RECONQUEST

    RECONQUEST was our entry for Global Game Jam 2011. It‘s a bird‘s-eye shooter game made with Akihabara — a JavaScript and HTML5 open source game engine.

  11. Palavreado

    Learn the meaning of commonly misused or unknown Brazilian portuguese words.

A zoomed-in screenshot of the game focusing on the protagonist, which is an animated skeleton warrior. A screenshot of the game depicting the protagonist traversing a castle full of lava traps.
Skeleton Jigsaw — This game was a passion project that we completed in small sprints over the course of a year.

Talks

  1. Gamedev com HTML5: Skeleton Jigsaw at GURU-SP

    In this talk, my friend Willian and I spoke at length about our 1-year journey making an HTML 5 game with mobile support in 2011.

Volunteering Work

  1. Volunteer at Festival do Japão

    Festival do Japão is an event held annually to preserve and promote Japanese culture and traditions. It features Japanese cuisine, taiko shows, J-pop, cosplay, ikebana, exhibitions, and workshops.

Certifications

  1. Duolingo Proficiency Exam in English: Expert

    Perfect 10/10 score.

  2. 日本語能力試験 ３級

    Japanese Language Proficiency Test.