JAGUAR STEVENS
Logo and promotional material for the band Jaguar Stevens located in Denver, Co
FORCE OF NATURE BREWING
Logo and label design for local craft brewery in Desoto, Ks
ORIGINAL LOGO
BLACK AND WHITE LOGO
PRIDE LOGO
EAGLE PRODUCTS/TSHIRTS.COM
Below are samples of design and illustration work for the whole sale division of Tshirts.com formerly known as Eagle Products, a wholesale t shirt and apparel screen printing facility. I also designed and did layouts for design catalogs, customer art packages, and any promotional material needed for trade shows.
QED SERVICE COMPANY
In the summer of 2019 I was approached by a friend to design a logo for his new company repairing coffee brewing equipment. He wanted to stand out from his competition. His idea to have a graphic logo to represent his business, not just text and stock photography on a business card. After he finalized the name of his company I then began brainstorming the image in the logo. I wanted to experiment with utilizing the QED in the graphic so it could stand alone from the phrase "service company" and still communicate the industry that was serviced.
My friend liked the idea and we went through my thumbnail sketches but we both knew which version was the best. The agreed upon concept used the title of the company to imply the top and the sides of the espresso machine in the logo.
While I was working on a cleaner image to scan and digitize he sent me a style of espresso machine he wanted to incorporate into the logo. The graphic image came together easily enough, my initial idea of the espresso machine being delineated by text became a problem. To keep the perspective believable would render the text illegible. I decided that the best option would the build the espresso machine as just an image. While the image worked well, placement of the title became the next issue.
After a few failed attempts of integrating the text and graphic, I decided to use the QED as a stand for the espresso machine to create a nice visual block to anchor the rest of the text. I went ahead and designed the text, dropped it into illustrator to get the correct perspective. I played with the dimensionality of the type which led to me extruding the letters out to give them mass to visually hold the espresso machine.
Placement of the rest of the title became the next issue. Though I liked the the symmetry of the text as "wings" the betters solution was to nestle the rest of the title on the left of the logo. We decided to change the type face of "service company" to be a closer match visually to the type I created for the logo.
MYRNA GAYLE'S BAKERY
I had made a deal with a friend of mine to trade labor: She'd cater an art show I was having and I'd design a business card graphic. She told me what she wanted: Just a pastry bag with the name of her bakery over the top. She sent me an image of a pastry bag that she liked but said she wanted it grungier.
I had seen companies with variants of the same business card but with different images on the front. I thought this would be an interesting approach for marketing her company. I approached her with the idea which she liked and she added a whisk and rolling pin to the list of objects to illustrate.
Before I started working on this project, I had just purchased a set of texture Photoshop brushes so I was eager to try them out. I sent her the images above, which she liked but she wanted the illustrations to be more line focused. I then sketched out each object then traced them in Photoshop. I then went through old scanned documents to and collected visual "flaws" to add as noise to get the "grunge" motif. I found a nice marker typeface that complimented the relaxed demeanor my friend has and reflected the imagery she was looking for in the business cards.
UMKC HOLIDAY PRINT SALE POSTER
While I was a GTA at UMKC I was asked to create print and digital fliers slides advertising the Printmaking Department's 5th Annual Holiday Print Benefit Sale. I was given examples of previous fliers and a collection of student art images to use. The only instruction was to make the flier look "cool".
At the time I had been endeared with cheap vintage plastic outdoor holiday decorations and decided to use that as inspiration for the fliers. Of course I had to use the classic snowman decoration. I decided to use a still from the classic "Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer" animation from the 50's. I felt that I needed to represent Thanksgiving since the sale was before Thanksgiving and Christmas.
My idea was to visually play off the kitsch of holiday decorations but give them a little visual twist by painting them in half tones and superimposing an offset color. I had originally incorporated the student artwork since it was provided, but upon review I was told I didn't necessarily have to use it. Since the student art stood out too much I decided to let my illustrations stand on their own.
Initially the Krampus was to make an appearance. The decision was made to remove Krampus since it was a little too fringe to be recognized as part of the Christmas season.
KANSAS CITY VOICES / WHISPERING PRAIRIE PRESS
Whispering Prairie Press (WPP) is an independent non profit publisher in Kansas City that publishes "Kansas City Voices" (KCV) an annual magazine which features works from artists and writers. The leadership of WPP was in a state of transition and the new president felt KCV needed a facelift. I was brought on to start the overhaul of KCV in the 9th issue with the idea that the 10th issue (coinciding with the 10th anniversary of the magazine) would debut and new logo and a new layout design. The older members of the board wanted the new logo to still be familiar to longtime followers of the publication. The board wanted me to keep aspects of the previous logo (viewable here), yet they were extremely vague in what they were looking for. I decided that I'd use two different type faces like the previous logo but make the new logo a visual block. I then used the motif of the two type faces as titles through out the rest of the magazine.
After the 10th anniversary issue I decided to stay on with WPP. Since the artwork was going to change for each issue cover I decided that it would be fun to tweak the logo in various ways to reflect the artwork around it. My thinking was by altering the logo each year would give every issue that an individualistic feel with out breaking the branding standards established. I took the initiative to do this on my own and when I presented the idea the president of the WPP liked the idea.
After 4 more issues the president of WPP decided to relinquish her position. I decided to use issue 14 as an ode to the work she had done on KCV by imitating the 10th anniversary cover. After the president of WPP left I felt that my time with KCV had come to a close as well and resigned as WPP designer.
While I worked on KCV, I designed a logo for WPP. I had an idea of connecting the profile of an open book to an image of the rolling prairie hills. I inferred the landscape with the simple division of the black as the ground and the white as the sky. The book is hinted with the addition of the extra curved line. Below are variations of the logo and text. The final logo is the bottom right.
RE-PEAT SPORTS
Re-Peat Sports is a small start up that manufactured tools and guides to assist in training young athletes. The client had already begun drafting simple ideas for a logo but wanted me to elaborate on his ideas and assist to incorporate ideas he had been playing with. While his drawings were a great jumping off point I worked out a few ideas that emphasized the idea of repetition through the looping arrow. I also wanted to include hints of repetition in the name of the company and began working on a custom type.
The client liked the use of the arrow and informed the first product line was going to involve baseball, then depending on the growth of sales branch out to other sports. We decided to use the red stitches that hold the outside of a baseball together in the arrow of the logo. Next decision was colors for the logo. We experimented with two routes. The first was picking the school colors from his Alma Mater which was University of Oregon. He also wanted to try out the colors of the Kansas City Royals, since they had just won the championship. The Oregon colors felt too random, especially for a product designed for baseball. We both like the colors from the Royals but ultimately we decided to use a variation of the MLB colors to make the appeal of the product fairly universal.
