Illustration Research Assignment

The magazine cover I chose was the 2008 TIME magazine cover of the year. It was an illustration about the 2008 presidential elections in which Barack Obama won. I loved the illustration because it was a subtle way to depict the celebration of Obama’s win. It shows how safe and sound America is again now that he is elected. The early morning setting and the moon’s light over the Lincon memorial and the calm water shows how they think America would be. The composition is amazing too and how how it used the “O” in the title to make it the moon and use it as part of the artwork. The metaphor of Obama’s celebration and how the US feels about their new president and showing it this way was very creative and amazing.

I believe the illustrator did an absolutely great job because it showed a feeling of comfort in a nation after a great victory and milestone in their presidential history. I think the glowing “O” somehow stands for Obama, shining over and comforting the United States of America.

 

Air Canada Annual Report 2012

Click the link for the Full PDF:  John.Dumrique-AnnualReport

Air Canada Brand Identity Guide

Click the link for the Full PDF:  John.Dumrique.AirCanadaBrandGuidelines

New Product Identity and Packaging: ArcticBeats

EUREKA MOMENT

It was really hard at first when I was thinking of what product to do for this project. Re-marketing a product to appeal to a totally different demographic can sound simple but is actually very tricky as well. I actually got stuck for a couple of days thinking then I stumbled upon my headphones. I immediately thought that headphones could double as earmuffs since winter time just started and it’s getting cold already. I then thought of how mountaineers in extreme cold weather can entertain themselves while climbing, then came the idea of putting them together. Since we were just going to design the packaging and not make the actual product work itself, adding the feature, electronically heated earpieces, was a great idea.  I now had a plan to market these specially heated headphones from just to urban teens to mountain climbing professionals who want to be entertained while still having enough warmth.

DESIGNING STAGE

Since I was to combine cold weather and heat, I thought of the Yin and Yang, fire and ice. I asked myself, how would I integrate the balanced chinese concept to the package yet make it attractive to mostly north Americans and all the other mountaineers up north. I then thought of using the shape of a mountain. Triangles for me are very sleek and sexy therefore that’s the look I wanted to go for; make it modern and appealing to all ages and genders. The slideshow shows my other ideas for the packaging box.

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BUILDING STAGE

As our design teacher, Todd Barsanti, said, “thinking of an idea and building a product in your head is one thing, but building it physically is another”. That’s the challenge I faced when I designed a triangular box that has a cover face that flips open. After researching ways how to make the box, I came up with a simple way to create the box. I made a dieline and created tabs that can be glued together out of a cardboard box. I ended up not really following my plan and just had to tape some pieces together as it would have a cleaner finish to it. While building the main structure, I thought of ideas to add on to the design, such as the mini compartment for the wires and a hook at the back to hold the headphones itself. Building it took a lot of time and thinking but having a strong plan makes it easier to execute even if you come across some problems. The slideshow shows almost the whole process on how I build the box.

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FINISHED PRODUCT

For finishing my packaging design, I had to paint the whole box a matte black to give it a very sleek and sexy look, inside and out.  I had the graphics printed out on sticker paper then I just placed them on the faces. I think having the shape and details of an ice mountain really helped me create this design and I think it really turned out very well.

Air Canada Redesign

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For quite some time now, I’ve been wanting to redesign a company identity that is based in Canada. Having to grow up in the Philippines my whole life, I was intrigued on what I can design based on the elements and character that a new and very different country would provide me. I got the opportunity in this school project in which we were chosen to redesign the logo, website and stationary for a Canadian-based company and as soon as I saw that Air Canada was one of the options, I knew that I wanted that.     I mean, what would be a bigger representation of Canada to the world than their own airline company.

 

LOGO

After researching what they are about and studying how they came up with their current designs, I started by redesigning the logo. I figured that Canada and Air Canada airlines are most recognized by the maple leaf, therefore, I wanted that to be my core element. Since they are an airline company, I wanted to incorporate the silhouette of an airplane and the maple leaf so I started to create some sketches. After a lot of refining and fine tuning, I came up with a nice shape and added a modern font for the text Air Canada. The placing was tricky too as I wanted to know what the best place would be for the text. While doing some sketches, I also thought about doing a secondary logo as my first one would fit that well on the tail of a plane or something so I decided to make one and it turned out nice enough to be included in my final product.

 

STATIONARY

The first thing I did for the stationary was the business card. I immediately thought of the shape not being a regular rectangular one but of the shape of a wing of an airplane. I gave an angle to one side and I had to be careful not to make it look like it was a cutting mistake and cut it too much either. (As commented by my teacher Todd Barsanti).  After some careful thinking I came up with the placing and the grid where the elements such as the names and telephone numbers etc.. would be placed. I also thought that it would be nice to put the secondary logo at the back where it can be a representation of the company and people would incorporate it with Air Canada.

For the letterhead, I wanted it to be very sleek and sexy so I created a grid system in which the body and header would create columns. I also used the shape of the plane’s wing from the business card and made it into sort-of like a tab in which I put the logo and put it on an angle. My inspiration were the vintage classic designs they used for shapes and logos.

For the letter envelope, I still incorporated that “Wing Tab” and I put it on the upper right corner so that it would be the place to stamp the postal stamps. I just played around with the colors of the envelope panels and topped it all of with a sticker of the secondary logo that would seal of the mouth of the envelope.

 

WEBSITE

For the website on the other hand, I still wanted to incorporate the shape and angle of the wing to give it a modern look. I added the color blue and made it image heavy so that there wouldn’t be too much red and that it won’t be boring.

 

Overall, my curiosity for the Canadian brand has payed off as I am very pleased with the redesigns I came up with for Air Canada. I hope this opens doors for me to discover more what Canada can offer as an inspiration to my art.

 

Sustainable Packaging: Gillette ProGlide

Classic Film Poster: Finished Art

This, is, it.

Finally, I got to finish my Raging Bull movie poster redesign after a few weeks and I am very happy about it. My approach to the design was to use the intricacy of typography and the boldness of negative space to give it a modern take on the classic film. I believe that hand-drawing type that spelled out a famous quote from the movie, “You Never Got Me Down, Ray” that formed a head of a bull too worked like a charm for my poster as it was the focal point of the whole thing. I also chose and edited a font that would show the poetic brutality that the movie evoked and also something that would complement the bull’s head design. For my background, I chose not to put any other elements but a texture that I made and put red over it so that it would somehow resemble a boxing ring in the movie and how grungy and bloody it was.

Overall, I think that my design worked great and interpreted the message and feel of the movie very well. It would capture the imagination of the current fans of the movie and captivate new fans to watch and love the movie as well.

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After I was done, I wanted to make a couple of other interpretations to my move poster design. Here’s what I came up with.

 

WordPress Blog Redesign

Blog design Before

 

Classic Film Poster: Presentable Concepts

For my concepts, I worked on two designs that I think that has the greatest potential.
This is the first one I made and it is mainly typography. I used my own type to create an image of a bull spelling out a quote from the movie, “You never got me down, Ray”. I wasn’t able to put color into it yet as I am torn between using black and white (which the movie was filmed on) or to put color in the background. I think my design conveys the emotion that the movie gives very well.

My second concept is an illustration of mine of a raging bull, literally. I think that the simplicity of the use of negative space and the grunginess of the font I used for the font of the movie title works very nicely and balances each other out to give it a nice overall design.

 

Project 1: Seventh Generation Rebrand

1. These are three logo concepts I drew for the rebrand project. The company Seventh Generation is all about being organic and environmentally friendly so I used very organic elements on my two concepts at the top, such as shapes of leaves, rays of the sun and soft curved lines. The concept I chose to work further on is the one on the upper left. I liked how its shape is centered on a circle, which gives it a very earthy and gentle feel.

2. After I chose my basic concept, I drew up some ideas on how I will lay the leaves out properly inside the circle so that it will show a number 7 and as well as show a plant or tree of some sort. I think that these elements represent the company very well because of how nature is incorporated in their products.

3. As shown on the image above, I have created a digital structure in which I could use as my starting point and develop it further as I get opinions from others and as I get more ideas. The elements I put in the concept are the tree trunk that has two leaves coming out of it on either side. The left one being bigger so that it would create a number 7, which represents the company name. I also used shades of green first because it gives it a very earthy tone. For now, I used a serif font to make it look more organic and classic and made the font a light shade of brown to complement the greens.

4. After further development and opinions from my classmates, this is what I came up with. A noticeable change would be the leaf on the right side of the stem, I transferred it to the outside of the circle and made it look like it was sprouting from the tip of the stem. I also changed the colors up and made it look more distinct. Now that I have a strong concept to build on, I will continue to develop my design and add, subtract or vary the elements and see what would work best.

This is what I came up with for my final logo design for Seventh Generation. As you can see from the previous photo, I have gone through a lot of thinking and changing on how to best portray and describe the company. For the overall theme of the logo, I wanted it to be very healthy and natural, thus using a circular shape and the shape of a stem and a leaf. I added two more leave at the end of the stem to make it look like more of a plant. I think that a plant describes the message of the company well because they use organic products. For the font I used, I chose to give it a classic, yet natural feel, thus using a handwritten font and a serif font together. I think that it represents the quality of the brand and their products. For the color scheme, I chose very earthy colors, shades of green, yellow and dark brown. I also incorporated gradients to give it a subtle feel of texture and dimension. I think that the elements I put in the brand logo represent Seventh Generation very well and that it can be beautifully applied to different applications such as business cards and packaging material. I look forward to using this logo for my future projects this term.