Author Archive

…Sailor’s Warning. This is a sketch that I was working on last week (in my new, fancy Moleskin sketchbook), and I ended up inking it too as a rough exploration of what the final version would be. Unfortunately, I found a really similar concept called “Murphy’s Law” by another dude on Threadless! that is keeping me from really exploring this too much as a submission possibility (I’m really, really disappointed about this discovery). I’ll give it some thought since I’d enjoy just continuing with it and adding color, but in the meantime, take a look:

Just finished this one up for Threadless and submitted it yesterday. It’s still not up for voting quite yet, but I figured I’d share the illustration a bit ahead of time. It’s up for voting now! Enjoy (and vote!).

Here are a few images of the latest layout I did for a band out of Brooklyn, NY called GHOST ROBOT NINJA BEAR. Oscar Albis Rodriguez, formerly of Nakatomi Plaza and De La Hoya, has started this new project and the first output is astounding. I’m really happy to have been a part of it and I look forward to working with him/them more. In fact, pins and stickers are currently in the works and will hopefully be done in the near future – I’ll get some shots up of those when I get my hands on them.

The layout is a silk-screened piece on a 100% recycled chipboard Arigato Pack by Sire Press out of Philly. These guys did a fantastic job on the production and actually lead us into what I would call a “happy accident” when they were doing some ink tests; we ultimately ended up using a standard teal ink in the first pass, then added a plastisol yellow, which was repelled slightly by the teal, giving us the appearance of a third color (bright green). Totally sweet effect in person, and something that I may plan on using in the future. See the image below for all of the silk-screened, recycled chipboard goodness, and be sure to click for the full post, which has a few more images!

Continue Reading »

Welcome to the new design and architecture of the flickertoflame.com blog! I’ve gone ahead and launched it for now after a lot of beta testing, cross-browser viewing, and good old eye-shattering visual critique – and still with the knowledge that there may be some issues here and there, specifically in the wonderful world of Internet Explorer (no version 6 testing this time around – see the footer for more info). For now, I’m really happy with the new look, and even happier with the way I built everything; from the ground up, using nothing more than Smultron, CyberDuck, and my dearest friend, WordPress. With a little learning of PHP, and a real test of my skills at writing CSS and HTML from the ground up, I bring you blog.flickertoflame.com!

Please let me know if you see any glaring issues, so I can make sure to fix them. If you’re looking at this on IE6, well, tough luck (sorry, but Google is backing me up on this one).

A good friend of mine, Kevin Higgins and his co-pilot in filmmaking, Mike Salerno, are embarking on their second feature length film, entitled “Nitecrawlers” as you can see above. Their first feature, Plasterhead, was an independent success (on small-budget, indie standards, of course) and this time around they’re hoping to increase the stakes just a bit in this “coming of age horror tale”. Lucky for me, I was approached to do the branding for the film, as well as some Art Direction as they move into production. Needless to say, I’m stoked to be working on something like this, since it’s rather new territory for me, but gets me just as pumped as record layouts and music-related design.  I’ll keep updates on additional material as I move into new projects with them – in the meantime, keep up with their production details on their blog @ http://nitecrawlersmovie.blogspot.com/

After days of researching all of the available cases on amazon, eForCity, and assorted sites and blogs scattered across the internet, I stumbled across a small company based out of southern California that specializes in all sorts of gadget storage that not only protects your investment, but keeps it looking good; something I’m sure the gadget designers (laptops, iPhones, netbooks, external hard drives, etc.) really appreciate.

The company is called CaseCrown, and from my experience, it seems like they really do specialize in the royalty of gadget cases.  My experience is solely with the CaseCrown PolyCarbonate Slim iPhone case, but if this product is any representation of the rest of their chosen product line, they make and sell some of the slickest protective products out there.

I had a few criteria for my iPhone 3Gs case that I had to meet: First, it had to be slim, adding as little bulk as possible to the overall design of the iPhone since I keep it in my front pocket. Second, it had to be tough enough to withstand some normal bumps and bruises without allowing the iphone to feel the pain. And finally, it had to be reasonably priced; not like some of these absurdly overpriced products from the Apple Store or even Amazon.com. There is no way that any amount of silicone wrapped around an iPhone could be worth $30.  This lead me to CaseCrown and their line of iPhone protective cases.

The case itself does not wrap fully around the iPhone, but protects the back, sides, and corners fully. Continue Reading »

I like toys. So sue me. And since I like toys so much, I finally got my hands on an intuos4, even though the upgrade was seemingly frivolous and unnecessary. Let’s just say I didn’t have to invest much to experience the upgrade (and no, there aren’t any scratched off serial numbers in this story). As I posted back in March, my intuos3 had become a complete and utter addiction since I made the initial purchase – it had become an extension of my G5 – as necessary to my workflow as my monitors and my keyboard.  Like with any technology addict, I wasn’t in need of this new piece of hardware, but the “latest and greatest” got the best of me and ultimately caused the upgrade fever.  So now that I’ve gotten my hands on this fancy, shiny, incredibly well engineered piece of fun, I’m ready to deliver the good news and I’m sure Wacom fans will not be disappointed.

With the new intuos4, Wacom promised upgrades to existing functionality as well as innovative new features yet to be seen. New levels of sensitivity in the existing pen technology, a TouchRing (seemingly similar to Apple’s ClickWheel), an ambidextrous design, all new sizes, and the pièce de résistance: the illuminated display. So now my seemingly perfect tool had a bunch of brand new bells and whistles that quickly became a necessity in my mind. I’m ridiculous, but at least I can admit it to myself.

Upon unpacking the sleek matte-finished black box dripping in tantalizing, shadowy images of the intuos4, I’m greeted with the thinnest tablet I’ve seen yet. Continue Reading »

Here is a banner below to vote for the threadless tee that I mentioned (and displayed) in my previous blog entry! Please take a moment and go vote for it. I can’t tell you to vote a 5, but go vote a 5.

EDIT: So ultimately I didn’t get chosen for print, but thanks for taking a look and voting!

So in an attempt to get back into illustration and to expand my illustration portfolio, I made a design for entry into the weekly Threadless Tee Shirt vote.  Of course, I took the route of vinyl as my subject matter and made a design that takes a humorous (maybe even whimsical?) approach to the fun I have collecting and listening to records. Take a look at my entry flash file below – I’ll be sure to update the blog when it goes up for voting! I need all the help I can get – there are some really great and talented designers that have gotten printed, and I want to be one of them!

Enjoy!

Of course they would release this just weeks after I wrote my review of my Intuos 3 (which I am still in love with). I like my toys, of course, but I’m certainly not ready to drop my Intuos3 for the sake of getting the new version of the pro Wacom tablet. That, however, doesn’t mean I can’t drool over the new features:

1. Awesome looking click wheel navigation looking thingy. I’m sorry, it’s called a Speed Ring. If this thing works as flawlessly as the apple click wheel, then increasing brush size, zooming, and scrolling are going to be quite an experience.

2. Illuminated Intuos4 ExpressKeys™. Awesome. Now you can apparently quickly just glance at the tablet for a reminder as to what you have the keys programmed for.  On my intuos 3, I mostly use mine for some simple actions like switching foreground/background colors, and I’ve also programmed one for Exposé to reveal my desktop – I find it useful, but I do think that the lack of labeling for some not-so-frequently-used functions was a pain. Intuos 4 fixed this – I’d love to see this in action. It lights up – it’s useful – it’s a winner.

3. Ambidextrous design. I’m a righty, so I couldn’t care less, but I have empathy for all you lefties out there (my father and sister are both a part of your club) – This functionality, and the apparent simplicity in activating it, rules pretty hard.

4. Storage for the nibs in a pen holder. THANK YOU. Now, I am wondering where all my extra Intuos3 nibs are…damn. Continue Reading »