Richmond Public Schools + VCU Health · Educational Campaign · Comic Book

Hydration Heroes

From health education to a comic book-based learning experience.

The Transformation

A summer hydration reminder became a cast of heroes, a system of villains, a three-chapter comic, and a storyworld built to help Richmond children recognize what dehydration feels like before it becomes dangerous.

Partners: Richmond Public Schools + VCU Health
Creative Director: John Szalay
Role: Writer / Illustrator / Visual Narrative Designer
Initial Form: School poster campaign
Expanded Form: Three-chapter educational superhero comic
Distribution: All RPS students at the start of the 2026–2027 school year

How It Began

A SPLASH OF FUN WITH A SERIOUS MESSAGE.

John Szalay and I had worked together at The Martin Agency before both moving into freelance roles. He was developing a public-service campaign with Richmond Public Schools and VCU Health based on research indicating that local children faced meaningful hydration risks during Virginia's warm-weather months.

John served as creative director. I joined as illustrator and writer. The first assignment was a series of posters reminding students to refill their water bottles. The project soon proved it could carry far more story.

Hydration Heroes comic cover and interior pages arranged as a printed publication — The campaign expanded from a school reminder into a complete printed comic distributed through Richmond Public Schools.

The Starting Point

FILLING UP THOSE EMPTY BOTTLES WITH CHARM

Aqua Guardian, Hydro Flash, and Crimson Wave had already been named and assigned blue, green, and red to correspond with water bottles that would be given to Richmond Public Schools students. But they had no specific visual identity, personality, or shared world when I entered the project.

I designed the heroes as a unified bottle-based team, developed their individual silhouettes and personalities, and created the Hydration Heroes logo for both English- and Spanish-speaking readers.

Hydro Flash standing above a city — Hydro Flash translated the green bottle into a compact, agile superhero silhouette.

Crimson Wave standing against a fiery landscape — Crimson Wave used the red bottle, classic heroic scale, and a bold H2O emblem.

Aqua Guardian standing above a futuristic city — Aqua Guardian carried the blue bottle into a sleek, protective visual identity.

Building the World

HOT HEADS AND WET BLANKETS

I created Sweet Tooth, Heat Wave, Daze, and Squeegee—an angry little sponge that absorbs water and grows to enormous size. Together they turned overheating, excessive sugar, mental fog, heat exhaustion, and depletion into characters that could enter a story and create visible consequences.

I also established the central rule of the world: the children cannot see the heroes or villains directly, but they can feel their effects. That rule kept the fantasy connected to real physical experience.

Hydration Heroes villain lineup: Daze, Sweet Tooth, Heat Wave, and Squeegee — Each villain gives a recognizable hydration problem a specific personality and visual language.

Heat Wave character design sheet showing poses, expressions, and color palette — Heat Wave needed to feel dangerous and expressive while remaining simple enough to read immediately for younger audiences.

Proving the Possibility

UNLOCKING STORY IDEAS WITH KEY ART

Before the comic existed, I created simple black-and-white scenes suggesting the kinds of stories these characters could support. The images demonstrated how a classroom, a schoolyard, a backpack, or a refill station could become the setting for an actual superhero problem.

The key art gave the team a common visual language and helped us move quickly when the poster campaign succeeded and the partners decided to build a complete comic adventure.

Rough Hydration Heroes scene set in a classroom — A familiar classroom becomes the place where dehydration first makes itself felt.

Rough panel showing a bottle hero receiving a thirst alert — The thirst alert turns a health need into a superhero call to action.

Rough panel showing a bottle hero flying from a school — The heroes belong to the school environment even when the children cannot see them.

Rough comic panel showing children facing Heat Wave — Key art established the scale, stakes, and visual rules before finished sequential pages began.

Listening to the Audience

KIDS BECOME COLLABORATORS

Tess, Rudy, Noah, and Gabby were elementary-school students invited by VCU Health to participate in the dehydration research. They also became an ongoing focus group, helping the adults recognize choices that might appeal more strongly to children than the decisions grown-ups would make on their own.

Their involvement kept the project connected to the actual audience while the characters, stories, humor, and pacing developed.

Finished Hydration Heroes comic spread featuring Hydro Flash helping children during a kickball game — Hydro Flash enters a familiar schoolyard conflict, cools the mood, and turns the lesson into action.

The Result

THE LEGEND OF HYDRATION HEROES RIPPLES THROUGHOUT THE DISTRICT

I wrote the three connected stories, structured the book as chapters, proposed the post-credits page, laid out every page, and completed the pencils, inks, colors, lettering, bilingual logo work, and final publication files.

The finished comic was distributed through Richmond Public Schools to every student in the district at the start of the 2026–2027 school year. The public-service message remained clear, but it now arrived through characters, rules, humor, villains, action, and a physical comic children could keep.