Getting To Guidos



For a gift for my folks one Christmas, I made a game about growing up in our house and neighborhood. With some help from my sister and a little elbow grease and design time, "Gettin' To Guidos" (the local grocery market in my neighborhood) was born. After cleaning out Dad's apartment in the city, the game is now with me. For those who grew up in the same neighborhood, the game does a pretty good job of what it was like living there and what it was like what I almost named the game, "Growing Up Johnson." Hope it's fun for folks.

Score!

After some back and forth, the folks at The Connecticut Whale paid their tab. They have also promised me a jersey, which I think is great. I hope all the folks that went to The Whale Bowl had a good time and continue to support your hockey team!

S

A Whale of a Tale

Here's something both good and, well, kinda too bad.

I was a huge Hartford Whalers fan. In their last season in Hartford, I designed a third jersey for them (It’s below). They were great about it and sent me some tickets and had me to a game, expressing how much they liked it. Alas, they ended up moving that year. The only person besides the Whalers' staff that saw that sketch was a colleague of mine.

When the new group wanting to bring Whalers hockey back to Hartford was in town, that colleague connected them with me. What a chance for me –– creating a uniform for the team in Hartford!

Things went pretty well in the process at first. Lots of back-and-forth of what they wanted, lots of sketching, designs, and artwork. I thought we were going great –– I did what they asked and more, and they used almost all of the work I did. The thing is, they just didn't appreciate it enough to pay for it.

The worst part for me wasn't the lack of payment, it was that another artist was allowed to take credit for my work –– with the Whale's blessing – his work is here. It's disappointing and unfortunate.

You can see the path of my work and the even the logo I created for the Festival and outdoor game they are having in East Hartford. It's a pretty shady way to treat a long-time fan.
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Whale of a Tale: Art

Whale of a Tale: Art

The first concept

The first concept
Oops...here's the first prototype. Forgot to post this one from 1996.

Fully Loaded – I can't stand not to have anything I might need to get the job done, hence the heavy pack I carry. The order is like this – My laptop, work laptop, water, USB light, USB fan (the train gets hot), notepad, card adapter, cards, card adapter No. 2, video adapter, USB drive, USB drive II, driver's license, food, laser pointer, mask, USB II drive, firewire drive, three USB thumb drives (20, 10, 4 gig) USB 2 cable, digital camera, ID, tissues, iPod Touch, lollipop, earphones, allen wrench, Apple ear buds, safety pin, house key, flashlight, pencil, pen, USB drive pen (like a spy!), camera cable (TV or USB), train table, umbrella, aspirin, Park map, mints, strips, rubber bands, post-it notes, Shure earbuds (a gift), camera battery charger, eye drops, subway schedule, handiwipe, sdhammy cloth, phone ear piece, phone case, Blackberry, Blackberry earbuds, iPod (20 gig), photo permissions, business card (work), personal card, lighter, suntan stick, hand gel, lip balm (one to give away - no sharing!), first aid kit, sewing kit, and Bagu bag.

Food for thought

Food for thought
This is a concession stand I designed for the Eastern League affiliate of the Minnesota Twins – the New Britain Rock Cats. I wanted this to look classic – so the players and diner name (my suggestion) seemed appropriate. I thought this came out nicely.

The logo pins for the 2006 Games in Turin, Italy. I was looking to do something retro, something that looked like the travel posters from the 40s. There were different color variations of these. This is the color they selected for the final set (the four shown here).

The pins from the 2006 Games were very popular, so AP decided to increase the number of marketing pieces. After designing the first few, I brought in some rendering from the graphics we created for members. A shout out to Mike Sudal for some of his designs.

Branding

Branding
The assignment here came to me as "they want loons and a lake in this one," but the name had a very smart "2.0" in it. The two don't really go together, so a designer/manager needs to make a decision in these cases – "what's best for the brand?" I thought the "2.0" needed a gel look, and the year needed to be in there, too. I figured I'd combine the two and try and make something that worked across all platforms, but still looked cool enough to inspire the participants. Getting the year in there just fit right into the design.

INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS

INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS
AP people do amazing work every day – and some of it rises above those great contributions. That's when Beat Of The Week was devised. This is the print and PDF version of the online site used to announce the winners.

LEAGUE LOGO

LEAGUE LOGO
We have a pretty fierce basketball league – which demands a equally cool league logo.

MY FIRST BOOK

His parent’s have tried everything to get their sighing son to smile – but nothing works. Then, when mother comes home and announces she’s expecting, that’s just the ticket to make her young son beam – a SISTER! It’s a rhyming children’s book. Click on the book to read it at full size.

Letters Page

Letters Page
This was a quick, one-night illustration I did to show people how to get letters published in a newspaper. I still want to animate this in Flash because it'd make a really neat motion graphic.

Prepared to purchase

Prepared to purchase
A quick illustration for a piece on making the most out of your one-day trip to the mall – everything needed to keep the motor, mind and body running through the day.

FASHION STATEMENT

FASHION STATEMENT
Every summer I see women come into the office clad in sandals, long skirts and short sleeves. Office fashion doesn't leave a man much room for comfort. So I thought, what if men has some of those seasonal niceties in their closets? Low cut shirts, open-toed shoes and something that had the classic look of the little black dress. I am still waiting.

Sox-Yanks race

Sox-Yanks race
This was in illo for the race between the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees for first place in the AL East.

Illustration for story about what monsters may lie in the closet – always exasperated by Halloween.

FEATURES/FOOD LAYOUTS

FEATURES/FOOD LAYOUTS
Every year we send out some cookies recipes. This year, they made seven different cookies, so I thought a "week of cookies" indicated a calendar approach. The headline was simple.

characters

characters
One of my children's book illustration styles – a favorite of my son Wyatt.