web design, graphic design, art, music and illustration

Pulp Fiction – DVD Package Design and Logo Design

UFOTV – Venice Beach, CA – 2010
Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop

How I made the DVD package:

I was hired by UFOTV to make the package design for Pulp Fiction, a documentary on early science fiction authors and their work. I watched the film, it was inspiring! So…

…The Pulp Fiction DVD package design started with a volcano! I duplicated an area of a volcano, rotating it so it would form a sphere. An explosion!

I tried to stick with classic pulp colors: red, yellow and black.

From a large selection of AMAZING artwork, we chose images from these works.

After some detailed cut and paste work, I place the images into the layout.

The logo is added to the design with some DRAMA!

The final layout is heavy on the red and black, with much of the yellow exploding on the front cover. The sun that was made from a volcano is barely visible. The hands that were once reaching upwards towards a woman, are now reaching for a woman – defended by a robot. Meanwhile a white man in middle eastern duds is being goosed by a golden serpent! Come to your own conclusion here: _________________________.

The Pulp Fiction documentary had a custom menu screen. I designed the volcano to be a bit larger in this layout. The perspective on the logo drips super drama.

The Pulp Fiction documentary comes with two compact discs. Each disc has a custom image that relates to the overall package design.

Nights of Wonder – DVD compact disc cover and logo design

John Flinn – Portland, OR – 2010
Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop

Great photography requires little design work, but the logo works well with the composition.

STAR Autism Support – Sunshine Literacy Educational Kit

Star Autism – Portland, OR – 2010
Illustration, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Streamline

The STAR Autism Sunshine Literacy Kit assists teachers with lesson plans, activities, data collection and educational games. Constructing the kit involved over 50 original illustrations and designing hundreds of printed materials. There are 10 total activities that require materials from the kit. Most of the activities required illustrations: 20 illustrations were converted for stencils, 19 illustrations were created for an activity which involves gluing macaroni on the artwork. Additional illustrations were created for the Bingo Cards and Teacher’s Manual. I designed and prepared 434 files intended to be used as flash cards. The flash cards show photographs, colors, shapes and words. Some of the material in the kit is provided on a cd to be printed by the teacher. On this CD, I created custom-built icons. All in all, the project resulted in over 1,000 files that are to be printed by the manufacturer or files that are provided on the compact disc that comes with the kit.

STAR Autism Support – Sunshine Literacy Lesson Plan Folder

Star Autism – Portland, OR – 2010
Illustration, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Streamline

All activities in the STAR Autism Sunshine Literacy Kit are explained to the teacher inside of 10 folders.

Each folder holds lesson plan props, data sheets and the one of the 10 illustrated lesson instructions (above).

STAR Autism Support – Sunshine Literacy Teacher’s Manual

Star Autism – Portland, OR – 2010
Illustration, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, Adobe Streamline

All activities in the STAR Autism Sunshine Literacy Kit are explained to the teacher in a manual.

The teacher’s manual has 32 pages and include instructions on collecting data on student progress. I also designed the data collection sheets for the teacher’s aid kit.

UFOTV – DVD Package Design and Logo Design

UFOTV – Venice Beach, CA – 2009
Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop

With 2012 approaching, there is an increasing awareness of the Mayan Calendar. Attached to this new awareness, are various opinions on how this ancient system was developed and how it relates to our moment in history. The general response to this information has been fear, connecting the end of the Mayan cycle with a divine act of human extinction. In contrast to this, we have 2012: Evolving Perspectives on the Next Age. This documentary is an optimistic look at our opportunities at this tipping point in world events. The movie is divided into more than 12 short features covering grass roots movements that will influence our future societies. From alternative energy systems to Shamanism, the documentary will leave the viewer anticipating 2012 and the positive communities that will be created by today’s progressive movement. In creating a package for this concept, I wanted to address a number of points. First, I felt the DVD needed to be green. Not only for the environmental reference, but to address the technology mentioned in the film. Supporting the high-tech look, I placed the contributors on a 90 degree angle in front of the temple and behind it. The font for 2012 also adds to the technology look. The spiritual ideas in the film are represented at top and bottom (the moon and Mayan temple). Finally, to connect the Mayan Calendar with our current world events, I gave the temple the same lighting and color effects as the city skyline. In a sense, hinting that todays skyscrapers reach for a higher meaning the same way the Mayan temples did. The background of this composition is made up of a number of Hubble Telescope photos and photos of clouds. One of my favorite projects so far, look up the film on YouTube. It’s inspiring!

Star Autism – Discrete Trial Essentials Teacher’s Aid Kit

Star Autism – Portland, OR – 2009
Graphic Design, Illustration, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Streamline

Star Autism makes teacher’s aid kits aimed at students with autism. The DT Essentials kit was developed to help motivate participation in the class lessons. The package comes with 11 interactive and sensory toys which students will have the opportunity to play with as they complete their lessons. When a lesson is completed, the student earns a coin, after 3 coins have been earned the student may play with the toy. To make this process as simple as possible, I illustrated a store where the student may collect toy credits. I also did over 11 illustrations of toys that are placed on the store. The final element of the product is the package design. The background of the box contains many of the toys included in the box. The box also features the illustration of the store, a visual representation of the teacher’s kit.

Classic Clunker Online – Web Design

Classic Clunker – Los Angeles, CA – 2009
Wordpress, HTML, CSS, PHP, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator

This site was designed to display information, photos and videos of automobiles that survived cash for clunkers. I had to develop the site’s information architecture with a number of navigation techniques in mind. The automobiles can be searched and listed by use, make, model and location. The classicclunker.com site also includes a ranking system where visitors can rank their favorite clunker. In addition to the site-wide ranking system, the home page features a poll to elect the clunker of the month. All polls, galleries and content is now managed by the site’s owner using the wordpress content management system. All photographs in the site’s graphics are provided by the client, all illustrations in the site are done my me. The site also has a feedback/comment system and a contact page so viewers can submit photos of additional clunkers. You can view the site here: http://www.classicclunker.com

UFOTV – YouTube Web Design

UFOTV – Venice Beach, CA – 2009
Graphic Design, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe ImageReady

On the skinning of UFOTV’s YouTube page, I kept the theme of ufotv.com. Although the heading contains the same slogans and logo light effects, the navigation tabs and body background was given a new look. The dark background makes viewing videos easier, and the grey tabs attract the viewer to the links but do not take priority from the logo. The UFOTV YouTube site can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/user/UFOTVstudios

Hearistic Partnering – Web Graphics

Gray’s Web Design – Yachats, Oregon – 2009
Adobe Photoshop, Adobe ImageReady

I was hired by a web agency to design the graphics for this communication company.  People interested in eastern philosophies and progressive values were the target market.  I was provided the heart-spiral logo and created the remaining elements on the site design using textures from royalty-free photography sites.  This site design took 2 hours.