South Side Choppers - Art Piece

This is another one that I designed out of boredom. It was late, the kids and wife were asleep, so I started messing around. I grabbed a pic of a motorcycle online. Cut the background out, ran some filters in Photoshop. I used a dingbat of a tattoo design - which is in the background and just manipulated it until I was happy with the look.

All of this is made up - there is no South Side Choppers.

Photoshop

The Big Six Poster - Forgot this one...

This was another poster I did... Forgot to post this with the other ones.

Photoshop & FreehandMX

The Big Six Advertising Team - Poster Design

This was a series of posters I did for an advertising team. The top poster is the one that was chosen.

A digital photo was taken of the team in a hallway. I then took it, cut everyone out and made a path. Then ran some filters or made a bitmap tiff and used that. But I had to actually cut the photo down the middle in order for the little lady in the middle to show up. In doing so, I had to make a leg for one of the guys in the back. I know its hard to get that image in your head. I cut a leg off of one of the other guys, flipped it, morphed it and put it in place. Can't even tell, neither could he!

I used Photoshop & FreehandMX, Nikon Digital camera.

If it don't Rock • Then It won't Roll - Art Piece

I did this for a friend and his blog.

I used a pic of a hotrod from the web. I did numerous things to the pic - converted from RGB to B&W, bumped the dpi up to 300. Then I ran a few filters on it to get a distressed look. Then flipped it back to RGB and colored it.

Photoshop CS3

Kozen Contemporary Japanese Cuisine - Advertsing Design

I do a lot of design work for retaurants. Here is one that I enjoyed designing. The owner was a younger guy who let me get creative with the deign. Red is a color that really has alot of impact when used in a subtle way. I feel like the red really draws you in.

Photoshop & Quark

Biba Ristorante Italiano - Advertising Design

Quote from http://www.italiancookingandliving.com:

"Biba Caggiano is the chef owner of BIBA Restaurant in Sacramento, California, and host of her own internationally syndicated cooking show Biba's Italian Kitchen on the Learning Channel. (Presently the show is being seen on the Travel Channel.) Biba is also the award-winning author of six bestselling cookbooks. Combined, the cookbooks, which are all still in print, have sold over 500,000 copies. She has also recently signed a contract with William Morrow for two additional books."

I've designed several ads for her restaurant. This is my favorite, which never made it to print. This is a spec design that she turned down. I have to say, the one she went with wasn't great. I designed that one also - I'm not psoting it because, well, it sucks.

I used a old photo of Biba Caggiano. Used a full color photo of a picture frame. I aslo used some design dingbats for the little accent art pieces.

Photoshop & Quark

Ricky Dean - Del-Fi's Greatest - Album Cover Artwork

I know Ricky Dean personally... I consider him a friend. We work together. Everyday...

Ricky Dean recorded a series of singles back in '62 - '63 for the Del Fi record label (also on Emmy Records - maybe another - not sure). He's shared the stage with the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, Brenda Lee, The Champs & The Ventures to name a few. His singles have shared the radio charts with Elvis Presley, Neil Sedaka & Ritchie Valens. However, Rick decided to leave music and enter the miltary, where he served his country. Upon his return home he decided not to return to music as the scene had changed so much. He then started a new career at a major newspaper corporation in N. California. He's been here 35+ years and will be retiring soon. He's married to his beautiful wife Jan (see track #4) and has three grown sons and grandkids. When I talk about "Rick" I always say - "If there were more people like Ricky Dean in the world, it would be a much better place". And I mean that. He's a class act, he lights up the room when he walks in. You can't help but love Rick's enthusiasm - for work, his family & life. I have had the pleasure of getting to know & work with Rick for the past 8 years. And for that - I feel blessed.

THIS IS NOT AN OFFICIAL RELEASE. Ricky Dean only released singles. I'm a designer here where we work. I took his promo photo and another pic he had and scanned them to created the front & back covers. I also scanned the actual 45 of "Liitle Girl" and re-created the look of that for the CD label. I then burned, printed, hand cut and produced about 100 cd's for Rick to give to family and friends - they flew of the shelves!! My copy of this album is autographed to me, by the legend hismself.

I used Photoshop CS3 & Quark

Gene Vincent - Rare Sessions & Outtakes - Album Cover Artwork

If you know me, you know I love music. Especially rockabilly & oldies. Gene Vincent is one of my favorites. My buddy over in France, Uncle Gil, has a collection of rare recording sessions, rehearsals and other stuff. So I took some of these rare recordings and designed artwork. As a music collector certain personal and rare compilations are just priceless. Uncle Gil kept these great recordings from being lost to us all forever. So its nice to burn it to a cd and put in a cd jewel case with some artwork.

I was pleased that the Official Gene Vincent Fan Club of France was very pleased as was Uncle Gil.

RockHall - Web Banners

I designed these web banners for my favorite music forum on the net. I was asked by the site admin - Twister to design the banner. I was more than happy to do it. He already had colors selected and I already was familiar with the site. The bottom design was the first one I did. Then I changed it a bit in the middle banner. Then the top banner was the final banner I did, which is the one that was selected. This was a fun project.

I used images from the web. Thats the great thing about designing art for the web. You can use art from the web that you can't use in print because of the resolution. I designed these in Photoshop CS3.

FIESTA! - Poster

This was something I did a little while back. It was late, I was bored... so i just made this up. None of the information is real. Its all made-up.

I found all of the images on the web and used some clip art.

I used FreehandMX & Photoshop

Warner's Rendezvous Lounge - Advertisement Design

I was really happy how this one turned out. This was for a brand new restaurant/loung that had live jazz.

I used Photoshop & Quark.

Tavano's Italian Restaurant - Advertisment Design

I designed this at work (I'm a full-time designer) for an Italian restaurant. The ad ran a few times.

I grabbed the image of the Leaning Tower of Pisa off the web. I went for simple, elegant impact. I really liked this one...

Photoshop & Quark

Madico: Performance Car Catalog Cover - 2005

This design actually has a story... goes like this. I knew a guy, we'll call him "John Doe" or "JD" for short. Anyway, JD & I worked together, JD got fired. Years later JD appeared out of nowhere. Somehow he got ahold of me. He asked if I could help him. He was trying to get a job for a car customizing shop as a designer. Are you seeing where this is headed? I arranged for JD to come by my place and he could show me what he was up to. He shows up with discs, catalogs, etc... So he says the owner wants him to design a "mock" or spec cover and based on this design, he would decide whether or not to hire JD.

So I ask him - what are yo thinking of doing. "I don't know...", he says.
"Do you have any ideas?" I say. "No". He replies.

So then I ask him if he know's what the following things are: pdf, clipping path, layers, distilling, resolution... HE HAS NO CLUE!!

Finally he comes out and asks if I will design a cover and he'll pay me... So I did. I know, I shouldn't have, but I'm not perfect and we all make mistakes. Anyway from what I understand he did get that job, he did pay me and then disappeared as fast as he had reappeared. I've never heard from him again... its been about 2yrs.

Anyway - I used some hi-res pics of a car that were form a disc, along with the Madico logo. I found a pic online of a road in Italy with The Coliseum in the background and used it. I've never seen the final catalog.

Mama's Pride - Promo Fliers

Mam's Pride is a 4-piece rock group. I did some freelance work for a promoter - TruEntertainment.

I used Photoshop & FreehandMX on these. I took a single group photo from the web (thats all I had to work with) and the rest was just imagination. I've never heard what these soud like, but they won some awards so they can't be that bad.

Street Candles Album Cover

I downloaded a "demo" of an Acapella Doo-Wop group from Barcelona, Spain. I was blown away at how great these guys sound. They are unsigned and had no artwork or anything. So out of the goodness of my heart, I designed an album cover for them and sent it to them.

Here is the reply I received from the lead singer:

Hi Mark ,this was a big surprise for us. Your work is amazing , we don't
know how to thank you, we're going to 3 radios tomorrow to record in live
too , we'll send you the programs for your enjoy!!
many many thank's friend.
Eddie "Street Candle"

Process:

I got a feel for the group by listening to their album. I also ripped tracks from YouTube, MySpace and a video to add to the album. I then searched the web for photos. Once I selected a photo I thought would work - I went to work. I used Photoshop CS3 for everything. Picked colors based on an outfit they wore in the video - white with pink. But used a dark Green/Blue color for contrast in the background. I put a transparent photo in the background of a street at night.

What do you think?