The job that keeps on going...

Well it does, this is its second post and there is still more to come!

They Walk Among Us again, this time its the cover art for the CD and the on body, and the craziest part about this is, the cover isn't actually for finished! There is more to come and that will require photos!

The point, cover art!!!

Front:



Back:



On body:



It is a little odd that I have done 2 card sleeves out of 3 (I don't know, I haven't spoken to anyone about the Captain Accident physical sleeve yet!) in a row. What will the world bring me next....

Bed time!
Michael

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They Walk Among US Myspace

A punk rock chick...

A few years back I played a show with a very friendly gent from New York called Mike Borgia, super nice guy, super talented as well.

He has recently produced a record for a very talented young lady called Juliet Echo, and for some unknown reason he decided I was the man to get the artwork designed for her record, oh wait, he's an old friend, that's why. Taking note people, you can do good work for your friends!

So anyway back to the album design...

The album title is 'Saturated Youth', I was sent a concept sketch, which will for ever be kept for me to chuckle at (love you guys for doing it though), which gave me my initial direction. Me being me, I did it, looked at it and decided I wasn't fused with what I had done, so decided to do what I thought was right as well.



You have no idea how many photos this cover went through to finally get the right feel for this!

I am glad to say that all the work I did on the discarded front cover didn't go to waste in the end! It ended up being the back!



This went through a few stages aswell, one will be remembered as the photo overload! But I must confess to the fact that I was steered towards this be a client who loved it. Don't get me wrong I don't hate it here, but the original just wasn't front cover material.

Oh yeah there is an on body too!



Not a million miles away from the anything else, but I think it will be a nice thing in its physical form.

Time to finish this post.
Michael

Links
You can buy it here
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Juliet Echo

Deadlines are wonderful for inspiration!

It's Wednesday today, and its also the first time I have had a chance to update in ages!

On Thursday just past I had an email from a friend, followed by a phone call from another friend, then emails...

The long and the short of it was, "Record label want the digital cover ASAP!" "How ASAP?" "Tomorrow!" and muggins here took up the challenge, with a little help from a friend.

Captain Accident AKA Adam Parsons, has an amazing reggae record just around the corner, the single is called "Fire! Fire! Fire!" and is a love song about his wife. His brother in law, also an amazing designer/illustrator (his myspace is coming and it is off the charts!) agreed to collaborate to get this badboy done ASAP.

He provided me with this:



and a bit of info that was on his mind. I think between the two of us we have upped the standard of both of our work. His drawing was amazing, so I just had to piece it together and design a logo and some text placement. As you can see...



Here is a larger version of the logo:



Fingers crossed it will look like this when it goes to the physical product:



And it would be totally inappropriate for a band to not have a release show, but this is a special show on a special night. I'm looking forward to Valentines Day now!



This is one of those things that I feel I will be proud of for a very long time.

I'm happy I'm back!
Michael

Links
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Captain Accident's myspace.

A new project!

Inspired by a thread on emptees and thread on Design Forums (check my links for both) I have been thinking about the idea of doing something unrelated, in a just for fun/learning/practicing sorta way.

Emptees thread was more of a challenge, but it offered the idea of using 5 unrelated free stock images to create something a little different, whilst the DF thread was more about doing something every day. I would like to think I had time every day to do something like what is going to follow, but I don't, I have work to do! So I decided that hopefully once a week I am going to do something, a stock mash up, a tutorial, you get the idea.

The point is really to spend an hour or 2 less faffing on the internet and do something productive (oh the irony as I post this on the net!).

Here is my first attemtpt:



Get it here



Get it here



Get it here



Get it here



Get it here

So these are my sample images and here is my result.



I have used all the above images, the cloud shapes are made from the sheep's wool, that makes me smile. General conscientious of opinion is that the building is from Blade 2.

I like this idea so expect more!

Last post of 2009, is a positive one!
Michael

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Full Design part one!

They Walk Among Us are a Cardiff band who have been around for a while, seen some action, toured the US (got a few mental stories about a one armed double bass player), done SXSW...

Safe to say these guys aren't amateurs.

So working with them has been a really cool process, they have had ideas, but are willing to listen to mine, its been a nice collaboration.

First off I did them a logo, they like the SWPK big type, so they have something similar.



Univers for you type nerds.

Then a myspace!



The reason I say part one, there is CD artwork to come, as well as a few other bits and bobs, but they deserve a photo when it is all completed! Trust me its rather special!

Thanks
Michael

Links
Larger Version
They Walk Among US Myspace

Everybody needs a tattooist...

Ok, maybe not everyone, but I certainly do! My tattooist is starting a fresh in a new location and as we are more than just customer/client, we are actually friends(!!!), he ask me to sort him out with a myspace for his new shop.

He told me to, "keep it clean and just get it live, we can worry about an all singing and dancing one, once the shop is up and running." So here we have my response to that very limited brief.



I think that fits the brief. The Kids in Glass Houses video is going to be changed in a few days with a walkthrough vid of the shop, they are still painting at the moment.

Few more things to do...
Michael

Links
Larger Version
End Of The Line Tattoo Studio

Random Nice Things

One of the best things about doing this blog is that I get to ramble a little (well, a lot) about things that I think are cool or things that I have done, you get the picture.

So this post is entirely about some recent niceness relating to my work.

First off:

I was featured on a design blog!



Interviewed and sample portfolio, it was nice to even be featured, let alone well recieved by Amber who runs the blog.

Go to Design Splat or My interview.

Second off:

I enjoyed doing work on the Zenyth project, and it has resulted in some randomly cool things...

It was cool to go to their release show, take some photos and hang out with some friends, but it was way cooler to see my artwork projected on the screen behind the band.



I may or may not have mentioned my love affair with my local indie record store, Spillers, I was walking past there a few weeks back and the Zenyth CD was in the window. Simple pleasure. Excuse the low quality, camera phone picture.



Alot of clients will try and sell you doing their work on where and who will see your work, whilst this is always nice, it should not be a motivation for doing your best work. I usually try to ignore these sorts of things as I want to concentrate on the work, not the aftermath. However, it was fairly cool to wandering around HMV and see it in the racks.



Can you see it? Want a clearer view?



That put a smile on my face.

My shirt design for SWPK, was rather fun to do, I sent them a few drafts of the design and they ended up having 2 made, one colour and the 2 colour, I saw the 2 colour, it ended up different colours from my choice, but what the hell, they like it. I was also really happy to finally get my hands on one myself.



Success, success...
Michael