So. After last Mondays post, I actually took the time to look and saw that I had miscounted my posts by 3. While we are Close to the 100 mark, we're not as close as I'd thought. This actually came as somewhat of a relief to me, because there are things I would like to include in that post that I haven't really had the time to deal with this week... Been busy.

This week, I was looking through the archives to see if there was anything that I had neither shown you all yet, and that I was ready to post. I know (and I knew before she said anything) that that is incorrect gramatically, but my wife (standing behind me) felt compelled to correct me, so I feel compelled to spite her. I have a couple of older images to share.

This first one I did about five years ago as a thank you card for a family friend. Once or twice a year, he goes to Haiti as part of a medical mission.
The second image is a t-shirt design I did last year for the organization to use as part of their fund raising for the 2009 trip.
Last I heard, their trip that was scheduled for this February has been postponed until March, due to current events in that part of the world.

Wow. This was a really horribly written post. Ugh. Until tomorrow... Take care and be good.

Your friend,
Jeffrey

Daily Life Logo: A little process.

Designing logos for yourself is always hard. Okay, I mean for myself. I feel like when I'm designing for other people, 1. I usually have a clear idea of where I want to go and 2. There's always the "safety net" of the client's feedback.

At any rate... I've been working on a logo for the "Daily Life" section of the blog, and thought I'd share a little of my process.
The first two steps here are pretty much interchangeable for me. There's different type of "thinking while I'm working". I begin by generating ideas. This is either in my sketchbook (above), or on the computer (below) and both methods have their merits.
Working in my sketch book, I am not hampered by specific fonts, or images. I can work out of my head, trying out different shape combos with out having to figure out how to make that happen within a program. I can abandon an idea that's not working and write notes to myself without changing tools. I'm not as good at this method, but I am trying to get in the habit of doing it because I will not only get better at it, but I think that it will ultimately help me generate stronger, more original layouts.


When I'm generating ideas on the computer, I usually start with an idea of what types of font I am looking for, and "pull" samples that fit that. Going through the list also sometimes gives me possibilities that I hadn't thought of and which might push me in a new direction. Fonts are useful, and can be a great time saver, but sometimes can lead us into a rut where we aren't doing anything really new and original.
So I take my a font that I like (or two or three) and set them aside along with all of the other characters from that font. What I'm looking for here is shapes that I can use to embellish existing letters. One of the really nice things about working with text on the computer is that you can cut text apart as shapes, and then paste those parts onto other letter shapes to get new effects.
As I'm working, I'll add graphic shapes and maybe some images to turn the plain text into more of a design.
I came up with a few versions of the logo. The top one is a definite no. It's one of those ideas that worked in my head, but just didn't translate well. The rest... I like all of them pretty well, but am not really feeling WOWed by them yet. I'm leaning toward the one with the blocks and the ball, but think I need to do a little more work and find a few more ideas.
Until tomorrow then, take care and be good.

Your friend
Jeffrey

Fun with Banners

So I've been thinking for awhile about opening up an Etsy shop. Actually, a real long while. The problem is, most of my physical work is five to ten years old, or else just sketchbook pages, and pretty much all of the newer stuff is digital. I realize that I am totally capable of doing a high quality print of any of my digital art to sell, and that is one of the things that I am looking into doing.

Also, I did some looking around, and there are graphic designers there selling banners and avatars, business cards and logos. That's an option as well, but I worry about selling graphic design work at crafters prices. I don't mean that in a nasty way at all, but looking on there, a lot of the work is marked at 5 to 10 dollars that really should be three times that. If you crank them out, and sell a lot of "premades" I think you can do okay, but it just feels like that's devaluing a skilled labor, and that sort of thing just tends to compound on itself. So it's something that I'm thinking about, but I am just not sure about.

A third option, and I'm just not sure that this fits into the sites regulations, is doing illustration work and selling as clip-art for scrap booking and graphics supplies. That way I can get paid over and over for one piece of artwork, and it doesn't devalue the work that I did. Like I said, I'm not sure that this is something that would be allowed, but I feel like it should be. The possibilities here extend into digitizing it into embroidery files, and also using it for screen printing and custom books, etc... It's a thought, but I have more work to do before I'm ready to really pursue it.

I made a couple of banners for myself, for the etsy shop, and also I'm using the second one on my CG Hub profile.
There's things that I like about both designs, but I have to admit that the bottom one is probably stronger. The cleanliness of the text and logo in general better represent my design aesthetic. I think this is going to be a good year for me, and I'm slowly working my way towards some of my goals. I'm hoping to squeak an extra post in this week, but if things don't quiet down a little bit, I may not be able to. So, until Wednesday for sure, and maybe sooner. Take care and be good.

Your friend
Jeffrey

What you talkin' about?: Concept Art House

Concept Art House LLC is founded on the idea that great art does not come from an assembly line in an outsourcing factory, rather it comes from passionate individuals who truly enjoy their craft and believe in the products they produce.






Today's post is about Concept Art House. I was going to post about them in the next couple of weeks anyway, because not only do they do stellar work, but I am also a member of their team as a graphic designer. Recent events bumped them up to the top of my list. I don't know if anybody noticed, but I missed my post on Sunday. I was swamped with work, which is a good thing. Even better is that the work I was doing isn't under NDA so I can actually show it, and use it in my portfolio.

Maybe it reminds me of my days as a picture framer, or when I worked as a gallery assistant hanging shows in the Art Center Gallery, but I LOVE being a graphic designer. and I love working in print. It's really hard to describe how fun it is arranging elements and cutting out pictures and layering them to show everything off at its best. And to top it all off, getting to see and work with so much fantastic artwork is the icing on the cake.

Headed up by James Zhang, who got his as a concept artist for Lucas Arts working on titles such as Star Wars:Star Fighter, Gladius and Star Wars:Republic Commando. From there he went on to work for Factor 5 as a lead artist, and then to VP of a major game-art studio before finally breaking away to form Concept Art House.

As a company, they do high quality concept art across the full spectrum, including Fantasy, Science Fiction. They do Stunning 3d assets as well as high impact illustrations for game companies such as Wizards of the Coast and Blizzard. The website offers a good selection of artwork, as well as a consistantly updated blog. My only complaint is that the blog is in chinese, so I can't read what they have to say about the artwork, but it's straightforward to navigate, and there is a lot of great stuff to look at.

I hope you like the brochure, and I hope that all is well with you. Until next time then, take care and be good!
Your friend
Jeffrey

What I did on Vacation...

Have you ever thought it would take less time to get something done than it actually did? I went into my spring vacation with thoughts of how much stuff I was going to get done, and how nice it would be to finally have the time to do it. Ha-ha-ha! Seriously, though. I did get a few things done. I would've gotten more done, but... well I'll tell you about that in a minute.

I got a little bit of work done on the "time" drawing. Literally. Just a little bit. There were so many other things going on that I just didn't have the time and energy to start vectorizing this yet. I did talk to my friend Ryan about this illustration though, and he mentioned that he wished I had done something more with the smoke. Worked it around and integrated it into the drawing a little bit more.

It's not too late to do that (it's not finished 'til it's finished and all) and I am thinking about it. Compositionally, it might help balance it all a little more, and add another diagonal, criss-crossing with the shape of the wall. I still have at least this week to think on it, so maybe I'll at least try it and see if it works.

Okay, now here's part of why I didn't get everything I'd planned on doing done. Tuesday night I get this "Viral" activity in my mailbox on Facebook. Just in case any of you don't know what this means these are marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message. Basically, any time you forward an e-mail, you are participating in viral marketing of some sort. So here were the directions:

album cover
1 - Go to "Wikipedia." Hit “random”
or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first random Wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 - Go to "Random Quotations"
or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.


3 - Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4 - Use Photoshop, Gimp or similar to put it all together.

Sounds kind of cool. I figured I'd at least see what came up in the randomness. Well I dipped three times, and the stuff that came up was just so cool, that I thought I'd actually try to do a couple of really nice album covers out of them. Just to note. While I DID follow the directions for getting the information, and didn't cheat, I did add to and edit the pictures a little to fit the needs of my album concepts.
On "Gene Roof", I cropped the photo, added the light and sparklies coming down from the flower, and extended the stem just a tad.
"Ekstraklasa 1972-73" got a major overhaul. The original photo is on the right, and I added all of the rest of the graphic work on the final image on the left. Over all, I think both album covers turned out really well, but they took up most of my first day just messing around and trying things. I guess I learned something though, and I don't begrudge the excersise at all.
I am pleased to be able to show the drummer for the animal band. I thought a rhino would be really cool, and it would also be neat to have this huge drummer looming over a seeming small drum set.Lastly, I have a little work in progress for this weeks Illustration Friday topic "Breezy". I also plan on using this for my blog header for the month of March. So I'll have it done in the next day or so. So keep a look out for it!

I didn't do anything at all on the computer on saturday. First off, I spent the whole day at the St. Louis Pipe show. This might sound silly, but it was REALLY cool. There are soooo many different sizes, shapes, and styles of pipes out there. Some of them are kind of clunky and ugly, but most are just beautiful and elegant. Real works of art. It's hard to explain, but I guess it's kind of like going to an art fair and checking out the ceramics. There are just so many craftsmen and artisans out there doing simply wonderful work, inspired by nature, fashion, design and culture.

The other reason, is that I was suffering from pretty bad eye strain from working on the computer, playing video games, and watching movies. Vacations can sometimes be harder on us than actually going to work, ha-ha! I hope you all had a good week, and that this one is even better. I'll talk at you again on Wednesday, if I don't sooner! Take care and be good.

Your friend,
Jeffrey Johnson