Follow That Dream

So a couple days ago, I sat down at my trusty little Macbook, fired up Photoshop and a couple episodes of the /Filmcast, and spent a long and fulfilling day making this, inspired by a quote from here:



I think it needs to be on a shirt. And maybe a stein. And everything else possible, really. Oh, and my portfolio too, duh.

The Making of the Belgrade Draggin' Masters Snowmobile Club logo!

EDIT: (Because I have no idea what the final post is going to look like from the "preview" option.) Ah, formatting. :/ Click to see the pictures full-sized.
By another one of those extremely happy coincidences, one of the members of the Belgrade Draggin' Masters Snowmobile Club had seen one of the dragons I drew for the 700 Dragons project, liked it, and contacted me to create a new logo for the club. This was a very fun project to work on, and I thoughtfully kept a record of the work in progress.

This is just one of many concept sketches. Both the club and I enjoyed this one the most. I went ahead and brought the sketch into Photoshop to do a line art version.

I wanted to keep the feeling of the original sketch, but make the lines more graphic. The image had to be easy to read, and it had to still be understandable when printed at wildly different sizes. The Club liked this concept, but they wanted a very different style.

And here is the *almost* final version. The Club approved this, but they still wanted a few minor changes (nothing big, just human errors -- Belgrade isn't spelled right here!) This has the honor of being the first piece I (a) produced on my Macbook and (b) drew the line art with a calligraphy Photoshop brush, which is almost a trademark of mine by now.
The final version can currently be seen as the title graphic of the Belgrade Draggin' Masters' website.
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Once again, in lieu of a Sketch of the day, here is some wonderful news: Starting today and going through Sunday night, the MA Horticultural Society's Spring Flower Show is back! This is fantastic as my aunt and I were going through withdrawals last year.
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And dang it, Disney, WTF?

RadioBoston.com Banner Ads!

(Modified from a post originally posted at the old Realm of Mad-Ness on 7/16/02.)

Note: I'm not associated with any bands, musicians, or anything else mentioned here that I didn't invent myself, and the following isn't meant to be an endorsement or the opposite.

You're about to see some of the earliest graphic design work I have ever done. These advertisements originally ran on the front page of RadioBoston.com, a local online radio station from those wild early days of distributing free music over the internet.
I was in charge of creating banner ads to promote several different shows and bands. I never kept track of how many ads I made in all, but I know that this is just a small sample of the ads I liked best. In 2002.
You see, I basically had to rescue these from the RadioBoston servers in a hurry. I didn't really want to get into this (because, frankly, it depresses the hell out of me), but I won't forget the day we all learned that the radio station was being shut down. Those of you who went "oh no..." when I mentioned "those wild early days of distributing free music over the internet" can probably guess what happened. Long story short, our scrappy little online radio station was caught in the crossfire during the spectacular Napster debacle. More information can be found at the RadioBoston website itself, on a webpage that still makes me want to cry.
Ahem...
So here are all of the banner ads I was able to rescue. Remember, this was the first graphic design I had ever done, I was still getting used to Photoshop, and I was experimenting with animated gif files. All of these ads are gif files, and time tends not to be kind to gifs. I'm not going to post them in any particular order.
Comments are open, so if you were a fan of RadioBoston.com -- or one of the bands we played or a former "E.J." -- please share your memories.

In happier news, it looks like we finally can have nice things! (I am guardedly happy about this. I won't be leaping for joy until I actually have it in my hands.) Also, Disney has seen fit to release one of my favorite featurettes on DVD: "Donald in Mathmagic Land". This had previously been put on DVD as part of a limited edition collection, and it is a little pricey, but if you're either a fifth grade math teacher or a Disney Channel Brat who remembers having their mind blown by this short, it is definately worth a look. (Also, hilariously off-model cover art. It looks like poor Donald's head has become a perfect sphere and his right eye is about to collapse into a singularity.)
As of now, I have rescued everything worth rescuing from the old Geocities sites. Some of it will show up here; others are currently readable or scheduled at the New!Realm of Madness. Better yet, new reviews will be arriving at the Realm starting next week (and hopefully every other week at least until the end of the year.)
I may rescue some stuff from my old MySpace blog, but I'm definitely sticking with the Tuesday/Thursday schedule for the rest of the summer. If anyone told me I'd be nostalgic for the unseasonably cold rains back in June...