Following up on a post from about a week or so ago, I got an email from Istockphoto yesterday notifying me that Forum has purchased the appropriate license for my illustration used on their Pat Moore Custom Zip Hoodie. Woohoo! Gotta be happy about that.
A couple weeks ago the Globe Fall/Holiday Catalog was finally completed and sent off to print. Before I knew it, I had a copy of it on my desk. You wouldn’t believe the amount of time, money and nerves go into producing these huge 150 page bastards. You’d never know it by these crappy pictures, but it came out looking fantastic. Lots of high-contrast black and white photography from March’s Slaughter At The Opera contest in Sydney, Australia.
Below are a couple of spreads that I’m particularly happy with:
I spent most of yesterday running around doing a little marketing and trend research. Hit a bunch of shops between Hermosa Beach and Santa Monica, everything from the larger, more mainstream stores to the hole in the wall skate core shops. I’ll be posting some shots from that venture soon. The last shop I hit as traffic was starting to get backed up, because after all it was 4:00 on a thursday in LA, was 9-Star in West LA. While I was there checking out all the new boardshorts and clearance hoodies I came across something that stopped me in my tracks, though to be honest I had to do a double, maybe even triple -take to make sure I knew what I was looking it. What I found was this:
At first I was floored to see one of my stock vectors on a Forum hoodie. That’s pretty damn cool, right? Well immediately after I had that thought it hit me… wait a second… no one’s ever purchased an extended license agreement for that image. In fact I know because it’s definitely not a best-seller over there on iStock. So what does that mean? Is Forum ripping me off?
I know you’ve all thought it before… “it’s 9am, I’m enjoying a wonderful home-cooked breakfast
and damn… a beer sounds so good, but drinking before at least noon sorta makes me (look like) an alcoholic, doesn’t it?”
Well, the answer is no. I’ve got your perfect solution. While everyone else is fancypantsing it around drinking their mimosas, you be the one that says, “Dammit, beer mixes with orange juice just as well if not better than champage. Pfft… champagne… this shit won a blue ribbon!” Then pour that golden PBR (pronounced Peeber, at least according to me…) into your favorite pint glass and top it off with a splash of OJ for christ’s sake. I mean really, you’re not in college anymore - you don’t want people thinking you’re an alcoholic.
Moral of the story is:
Did a little bit of beveled lettering and some custom type for Skechers over the weekend. Did a bunch of comps, but I don’t think I can show much of the other stuff. I figure since I’ve already shown some of the artwork I used in this comp that I probably won’t get in too much trouble if any.
Track 6 has worked out a nice deal with GLOBE, the details of which I may disclose at a later date. Let’s just say that you’re gonna bee seeing a lot of work bearing the GLOBE brand on it in the future. Like this new ad I just developed for the limited edition “Puzzle Series” shoes that’ll be appearing in Sneaker Freaker mag.
Pretty excited about how clean this ad is and how it’s helping to reshape the brand and take it in a direction it hasn’t really gone before. More to come.
Hey all you PC users! my buddy who’s a field trainer for HP just told me about a cool new little web technology that just became available for download. It’s called Smart Web Printing and it allows you, via little icon up in your toolbar area, to choose certain elements of a web page, or multiple web pages for that matter. It also can cut ads and other useless info from your printouts - point in case - how often do your Google maps prints take two pages instead of one, just to include the http address on the second page? What a complete waste of pape, not to mention annoying.
This handy little browser plugin is incredibly useful. Though, sorry OSX users, as of right now, you’ll still have to do all of your print document manipulation in InDesign! Ha!
>> Download it here.
A little while back I mentioned working on a promo for the Travel Channel. Now you can not only see all of the ads that are currently airing on TV as well as on TravelChannel.com and to my surprise they’re also all on Facebook. Now, not only can you see all of the spots that the crew worked their asses of to film in 2 very long days - you can also watch some of the behind the scenes clips and have a look at what it was like being surrounded by some gnarly “food” and be amazed at the amount of detail work and detail that goes into making a commercial that looks as ordinary as a day at the office.
Also, speaking of Facebook, I recently created a profile to see what the hype is all about. If you have a profile over there, go ‘head, add me up. Don’t be shy. Let’s make it happ’n, Cap’n!
Just when I was trying to slow down a bit after a steady month or two of heavy workload I got a call from Ed Hardy. The brand is iconic and working on a bit of it would be a pretty awesome gig. I have tremendous respect for Don Ed Hardy (the artist) for being a forerunner in the Americana tattoo culture and his venture into publication, but like many others I have serious reservations about what celebrities like Madonna and 50 Cent wearing over-glamorized Ed Hardy (by Christian Audigier) threads is doing to the very culture the original art is born from.
Aside from my moral dilemma, I’m pretty excited to see where this venture heads. A major upside to designing for a fashion oriented client like this is that you get to use all of the really cool printing techniques that most brands either can’t afford or use very sparingly. Pretty sure I’ll be having some fun with this one.
I just received a couple copies of this year’s Wakeboarding Magazine Board Buyer’s Guide edition in the mail today (Thank you Jason). I’m pretty pleased to see Calibrated taking center stage. I really wish the Chmel and the Lovett were shot with decking, but amongst all of these other boards, I’m just happy to see those graphics really stand out.
The 09 product will feature new, even fresher graphics - some of which I’ll be creating and other I’ll be looking for a couple of artists for. If you’re up for an art project and you know some of the ins and outs of the printing process, send me a link to some portfolio pieces at dave@track6designs.com. I’m looking for some folks that are willing to take it out to the edge and maybe even kick it over.
