Shop 'til you drop

No thanks. But I recognize others enjoy this activity, so I felt compelled to punch up this display for our Business page.

It's worth noting that this display was assembled entirely in Unisys Newsroom, for those of you who know what that is. For those who don't, let's just say it's a PC coding-based page-design system very unlike Quark, InDesign or any other such program most designers won't let go of in order to learn how to do good design in a system that maximizes efficiencies.

Trying times

A few weeks ago, I was called on to help coordinate a special section for all of LANG — a Financial Survival Guide. Although it represents some very long hours over relatively few days, I'm very pleased with the results, both in its content and it's look.

The concept spiraled off of our "DON'T PANIC" centerpiece, hence the tie-in headline on the double-truck. Designed to be solution-oriented, the guide is stacked with Q&As, definitions, tip lists and the like. The goal was to provide quick and immediate answers to a range of economic topics: from banks and the bailouts to navigating the turbulent mortgage climate to taking the temperature of the region's job climate.

The overall look was simple by design. The turn-around on the project itself was a little crazy, but we definitely wanted it out there before Election Day. No cutouts. No type treatments. Just straight-forward styles, a touch of color here and there.

I especially love the cover shot, which came about after handing the piggy bank to a reporter, who happened to have decent looking hands, AND he was wearing a nice shirt and tie. He instinctively held it like a football. We ran with it. (The cover shot we had originally intended ended up as the double-truck, and works nicely there anyway.)

The section appears in today's editions. I hope it will be as well-received by our readers as it has been among our editors and advertisers. And I hope it helps.

WILL DEZINE 4 GAS MUNNY

October has been rough. This isn't news, but it has been, and it's made for some interesting visual opportunities.

I've taken lead on most of these, running with the assignment of "get all this stuff out there, OK?" which is my cue to figure out how to package all the tidbits of the day's financial happenings and get them ALL represented on the front page... somehow. Save for the "Don't Panic" CP, which is little more than a story treated right. The theme came straight from the editor's mouth himself, and the panic-button-as-main-art idea came from our photo editor. The rest — from intros to rails to spiffy backgrounds — is just me playing Tetris with good material. OK, maybe a little more work than that...






*Note: The bailout vote CP (top right) is a pre-press version. The headline (and likely some other stuff) was changed; I just don't have a PDF of the final cover... yet. I'll be swapping it out for the final version at some point... stay tuned...

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A note about the Dow item: Not a completely original concept, the falling line across the page and behind other elements. I did dress ours up with a cool graph-paper-like background grid that I didn't really see anywhere else, and I also indicated times when the Dow was "in the black" that day. That element proved an interesting adventure in itself as I essentially had to make two graphs, then superimpose pieces of one onto the other. The line element started in Illustrator, but it ended in Photoshop.

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SIDE PROJECT: I've also been working on a special section we're calling the Financial Survival Guide. That project has pretty much been a blur from start to finish. Definitely my baby, visually, and a very big learning experience.

More on that later... maybe even the whole enchilada if you're lucky.

Predators, process... and patience

Yay! I went with my gut...

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THE HOUSE: It needed to be skinny. Not only to leave room for the predatory monsters, but also because the space on the page for this CP was going to have to be very vertical to fit everything else on. So I did that part first.

The sketching was pretty easy. But time was running short, and once I had the pencil outline, it became very tempting to just follow my cartoony style of outlining and coloring in Photoshop. But I really wanted this one to turn out differently. I had brought my watercolor pencils with me, thinking I would have time to try that technique, if not with the water, then at least with the pencils. But I kept getting interrupted with, you know, MY JOB. Go figure.

After completing a rather unsatisfactory cartoonish outline in Photoshop and realizing I had several hours in front of me getting the monsters in shape anyway... I packed up and went home. Actually, I got the rest of the page ready, measured my allotted space, and then packed up and went home to color.

In favor of keeping the streaks of the color in house, I decided not to water down the house but outline it more heavily instead. The results were not bad for coloring with insufficient light, I think. (The monsters I left for the next morning.)


THE MONSTERS: OK... these look simple, and I guess, in retrospect, they weren't overly complicated to execute. But coming up with just the right sort of look was pretty tricky.

The concept for this illustration was initially a big snake wrapped around a house, but I never intended to draw snake coils, mostly because I thought the house would have to look cinched in the middle in order to make the drawing more effective. So I rethought the concept and thought that creepy hands on either side of the house — giant hands, as big as the house, maybe, to appear closer and help with perspective.


I thought hands would be easy, but I wasn't satisfied with my first effort as I felt they needed more detail to properly counteract the cute-ness of the house. So I tried my "hand" (nar) at the snake, and for some reason kept getting an image of a character I know I've seen before, but just couldn't place. The character was very Maxx-like, for those who remember that MTV cartoon of yore, but a little smaller. Basically, little round black blobs with rows of tightly packed, freakishly long razor-sharp teeth. So I started drawing my "snake," which turned into just a basic reptile sort of being with lots of long, sharp teeth. It did look menacing, but also weird... so... just not quite right.


Then I started getting images from the "Lemony Snicket" movie credit sequence popping into my head for whatever reason. (I hadn't seen or thought about that movie since I saw it on cable probably more than a year ago.) I really loved that style, the heavy black angular figures that looked like they were made of cardstock cut to form appropriate lights and shadows. I also thought this would be an easy fix to my monster problem.


So I made a sketch. There were things I liked about it, but again I stumbled over the hands. The first face was cool, and I knew what modifications I would make during production to make it work. But the hands...! I couldn't decide on proper thumb placement, and even then, the whole thing started to look like less like a sinister figure and more like a villainous Mr. Rogers marionette. *Sigh* ... Plus, I needed TWO faces, and as time wore me down, I figured I would have to simply duplicate and flip the one head to move the process along.

So I fled. Packed up and went home.

I didn't end up scanning in my sketch, but rather used it as a model for what I thought would work or not work. With all the angles involved, there was no real freehand drawing, only polygonal lasso. Felt very much like a project that a grade-school art class might attempt at Halloween... (Oooo — good idea for decorations this year!)

Initially, the monsters were going to be simply black and white, but after I got all their teeth outlined, I really wanted to tint them yellow, so I pulled a few tints from the house. Things went from there...


NITS AND PICKS: So I had some homework, but I think it was worth it. The house isn't perfect, but maybe that adds to its charm. I've considered taking a little water to the original, but I'm not sure yet. Someday, maybe.

Not entirely happy with the hands, which I struggled with from start to finish (as I mentioned above). The one on the right seems too small, given the head on that side is so large, or closer. Maybe I could have flipped the hands, and it would have been fine? Not sure. And I'm really not in the mood to mess with it further. It would just drive me crazy to know something so simple would have made it better. Ignorance is bliss, and all that...

Cha-ching!

When you don't feel like drawing all that money, I have two words for you: MIXED MEDIA. Kind of a cool effect, I think. Not something I'd try all the time, but I think it helped punch it up a little because otherwise, it's really pretty plain. Which was good this time around because I had very little time to pull this together, despite being given the idea a bit earlier in the week than usual.

Oh, and the hand dipping INTO the money was a happy accident. In my original sketch, the hand kind of hovered above the building (which, for some reason, had a skewed angled roof. Don't ask, 'cause I have no answer). I was stuffing the money into the building and hand turned the hand layer off, for some reason. When I turned the hand back on, it was "in" the money... PERFECT. It just clicked and made the whole thing work a lot better.

SIDENOTE: I like the shadow and proportion work I did on the building. I almost messed up the bigger windows; they were originally going to be half as wide, but then I realized the correct proportions would mean they should be longer than the "squares" on the end, which are "shorter" because of perspective. Yes, occasionally I get it right even on deadline. Go me.

I could have a little better making sure my outline strokes were even throughout. I think I've got three widths up there. A little schizophrenic for whatever reason...

CREDIT WHERE IT'S DUE: Incidentally, this original concept for this illustration again came from the reporter on the story. Kudos to you, man. I don't think I'd ever get these things done if I had to sit there and come up with ideas from scratch. Could be worse, though... could be illustrations about SPORTS topics. That would just be beggin' for trouble. Anyway... thanks again, Matt!

On cloud... three?

I have a label cloud! NEAT!
(It's on the right, three items down.)

I've wanted one of these since I first laid eyes on one on someone else's blog. Yes, I covet thine Label Cloud. So, in my ongoing efforts to triumph over technology, I did what any respectable geek would do:

I came. I saw. I conquered.
OK, in reality... I Googled. I backed up. I copied, pasted and poked around in the coding.

If I can do it, so can you. Someone else has already done the heavy lifting. (Thanks, Phydeaux3... whoever you are...) It's up to you to break it apart to get it to conform to your own preferences. Oh, and like I mentioned above, don't forget to back up your blog before you go tinkering with all that coding.

Good luck, and have fun!

Illustration 102: Follow your gut

This is another illustration for a Business story. The original concept was the reporter's idea (thanks, Matt!). His story was about banks having a difficult time after the fall of IndyMac. Lots of banks have been working to distance themselves from the troubled financial pariah.

Shoulda followed my gut and kept it in play, but my day was wearing long at that point. Live and learn. And keep drawing... even if you hate homework.

Upon reflection, I kinda wish I would have done this particular illustration in another medium, like rough sketch, or even given charcoal another go. This subject matter screamed for something grittier than I gave it. But I did learn a lot about Illustrator in the process; mostly that CS3 is far superior to the CS2 version (next time, I'm definitely brining in the laptop... or working from home).

Everything I do starts with a sketch; this time, I just chose the wrong path for that sketch. This looks too clean and tidy for the IndyMac cloud to look very menacing. Maybe I could have held onto the "tidy" banks, but kept the grittier original IndyMac cloud sketch (below) either as is or in charcoal above it.

My first commissioned piece

My fee: One iced triple Grande, nonfat latte, please (w/two Equals). THX.

Yes, this illustration was a special request for a couple of coworkers on the desk who are putting together a zine. I've been told I get a credit in the mag, or at least a special thank-you mention. Neat.

AND a latte.

You're welcome. :-)

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The first edition on the e-zine "The Dead Protagonists Society" hit my inbox at the beginning of August. I was given permission to put the whole thing here, but couldn't get Blogger to clear a PDF for upload, or Photoshop to separate the cover page out. Unless I'm doing something wrong (always a possibility).

Anyway, if you want to get a look at this publication yourself, you can contact the publication's editors, Amanda Keith and James Zvonec, directly at deadprotagonists@gmail.com if you'd like to find out more. Or post a request here in the comments, and I'll get it to you myself. Good stuff.

Taking the plunge

I've been tiptoe-ing into Illustrator for a few months and finally decided it was high time I just go for it. The story, for our Business page, was about a local program that helps first-time home-buyers get the financing they need.

The whole idea for the illustration was mine, concept to execution, and I learned a lot about the Illustrator process with this one. There's certainly room for improvement, but I was pretty pleased with the results here.

Oh, and I'm putting a digital pen at the top of my Christmas list this year. That sure would have made this drawing a lot easier to accomplish.

Trying something new

I wanted to try charcoal sketching, and I thought this assignment would be a perfect fit for that tone.
The story was about layoffs, and I really wanted the image to be a box of stuff that would be on a desk. Initially, I thought this would just be a photo illustration, but our photographers are pretty loaded down with assignments these days, so I thought I'd take a crack at it.

So I picked up a basic charcoal sketching set at the local art store and a watercolor pad (since I thought I might be watercoloring). I was going for a gritty look, but the end result didn't turn out exactly like I was hoping. Probably because I ran out of time and had to do the coloring in Photoshop — not that I had any decent markers anyway ("Dear Santa..."). But it was a valuable learning experience that produced a totally usable image.

If I could go back and start this one over, I might have just done really ragged marker edges to achieve a different take on a "gritty" look. (Next time...) I especially liked adding the details here: the farm picture... days of the week on the calendar...

At the last minute, I added the brown "label" on the front to serve as a background for a breakout of tips that went with the story. Without that bit of color, the words got lost.

Definitely gotta get me some markers...

It's kinda like lip-synching...

So we had a photo of three girls singing in a competition, and a story about a competition these girls were NOT competing in. What to do....? OH YEAH. Turn the photo into a photo illustration for one of our features covers.

This background, a nod to the iPod ads, came together very quickly and was pretty fun working up all those layers. The white lines should have been a little darker; they got a bit lost on the newsprint. Other than that, this was a quick fix that looked like we planned it this way all along.

The smaller, alternate version was cropped for use as a background for a skybox promo on the front page.

Ready for take-off

I've been suggesting illustrations — especially for our Business centerpieces — for quite awhile already. My only stipulation was that I needed to have ample time to come up with an idea I felt confident about executing. Finally, this week, I got some marching orders.

I'll put more details on the topic later. Just wanted to get this posted.

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This illustration finally ran... about three weeks AFTER I stayed late one shift trying to finish it up to run that first weekend. So it goes.

The story was about how some travelers were finding it cheaper to fly out of Mexican airports for their vacations, some reportedly saving upwards of $1,000.