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I have contracted a cold on my trip out to New York. So I didn’t go out and do much today. Luckily though I finished most of the stuff I had to do this weekend yesterday.

Feeling kind of puny from the cold I thought I would set it up so I could lay in bed and work laying down (and occasionally doze off from the NyQuil). I thought I would work on this typographic poster that I have been wanting to do. I have been seeing a lot of 3D typography lately and they all seem to look as if they are using the same technique (or tutorial). I wanted for this project to show 3D type that looked a bit more organic and not like it was made simply by rendering something out of a 3D program and adding a couple of effects in Photoshop.

So this is where I am at with the line work. It is starting to take shape and is a lot more work than I originally thought it would be. I usually like to work outside of the workspace in illustrator just because I don’t like to feel confined to that rectangle they put as the drawing board. Because I didn’t feel like moving my stuff into the drawing board area I just took a screen cap to show you what I have been working on. So you can see the progress so far below and a couple of notes on my workspace.

Continue reading Sunday project and my workspace.

So I arrived in New York today. It was a crazy day full of losing stuff, dealing with security and general tiredness. I always like to remember that in times like this you must stay calm. This video is a little exercise that I like to do when I am stressed.

Let\’s do this exercise together.

I was going through some old files and backing stuff up for my trip and found an old file (1.2GB PSD!) that had a project I did while I was at VFS. This was an assignment for my print class where we had to design a submission for Print Magazine’s young designers competition. The concept for my submission was to show how young designers even though we have all these digital tools we still draw a lot of inspiration from the great designers who came before us. But in the end I mainly liked the wallpaper which was just a small part of the illustration I submitted. The wallpaper isn’t truly Victorian but my feeble attempt at emulation is obvious. I exported some large versions of just the wallpaper that you can download below if you are interested.

1600×1200 Wallpaper (1.7mb)
1920×1080 Wallpaper (1.7mb)

I had the honor this evening to talk with my friend and former political science professor who has been a great influence in my education, work ethic and sense of government. He reminded me a couple of times in our short conversation that it was only 43 years ago that all people of color were finally allowed to vote and now we are able to witness our first black president. The last thing that he told me was actually a quote that was from of all people, Chris Rock. He said to me, “Was America ready for a black baseball player in the 40s? No, but Jackie Robinson was better than everybody else.”

I had been telling myself the past few days that if McCain won that I would cry. I don’t believe McCain to be a bad person or someone isn’t fully capable to be president. It was just that over the past two years I was not seeing the same man that I first got to know in 2000. I truly believe that he is a great American and has only the well being of this nation and it’s people in his heart. But despite all of this I told myself that I would cry if the we could not see this great opportunity that was presented to us in this election. I did end up crying tonight but it was out of hope, thankfulness, love and progress. I am proud to see our country say that now is the right time.

In addition to this landmark, there are a number of other things that I am proud of. I am perhaps most proud of the number of people who came out and voted and hopefully have a renewed sense of faith in our democratic system. I am proud to see friends become so excited about feeling like they had an influence in government again. In my state two measures were rejected that I truly believe would have crippled our education system and the students in it. I hope over the next few years we will see a renewed focus locally and nationally on education.

But there are a few results that have not come in yet. In California, Proposition 8 is still too close to predict but it is slowly beginning to look as if the ban on gay marriage is going to pass. In Florida they have passed a new amendment to strengthen a preexisting ban on gay marriage in that state. While our system is set up with a limited state sovereignty, I believe that these are bad precedents and a step back for gay rights. And in Oregon we still do not know if Gordon Smith or Jeff Merkley won. But I am too tired tonight to stay up any longer and know that I will sleep in near complete peace tonight.

I look forward to tomorrow and am ready for the march toward that more perfect union that our forefathers set out for us as a goal.

This post is about the process for an illustration I am working on for my good friend Meagan. I told her a while back that I was trying to draw more and she asked if I would do one of her. I didn’t really have anything to work on this evening so I decided to start this project. Lately I have been trying to draw in my sketchbook and finish it off before my trip but for this I decided to use the opportunity to practice working with the tablet and Illustrator (ugh).

Continue reading Meagan Illustration Process, pt.1: Lines

I don’t really know what to call these posts that I have planned to be an ongoing feature on the blog. I am not sure if I even need a title for this but for some reason I feel compelled to have one. Deep down I want to satisfy the pun nerd in myself and call it “Re-tales” but good taste and fear of running off what little readers I have prevent this. So for now I am just going to title this feature “Dead-End College Jobs”.

This feature came from a discussion I had with a friend. We were talking about how we were finding life to be changing, being done with school and working in our respective careers as opposed to the dead-end college jobs we had for the past few years. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with college jobs and they did allow me to actually go to college and pay rent, at times they honestly did flat out suck. This feature is just to tell a couple stories about funny, sad or dumb times I had while at these jobs. The optimist in me hopes that this will inspire some people who still work these jobs in knowing that most people go through the shit they do and it will end some day.

Continue reading Dead-End College Jobs: Don’t Pee On My Leg