It's been awhile since I've had the opportunity to play around with collage elements. This was a medium that I used heavily in my younger days as a punk poster/flyer maker. Since I've been getting more aquatinted with digital illustration, I've pushed it aside for more modern conveniences. For a recent project, I decided to try my hand at combining the two. It's really the best of both worlds here. You get the ease of manipulating images through a digital realm while still maintaining that hand crafted cut and paste look.
Here is a poster I made for an upcoming show that some friends of mine are putting together. When they asked me to be on the bill, I took it upon myself to create the poster. This poster was actually a strong departure from the inspiration that I had originally picked out. That happens a lot with me. I'll see something really cool and plan to rip it off to a complete tee. But somewhere during the process I began to shift towards something totally different. The outcome is usually nothing like what I set out to steal. I suppose that's a good thing though. It's all just visual experimentation in the end.
So with this piece, I scanned in a picture of a model I had found in some 60's fashion magazine. What I like about this process is taking a small picture, scanning it in, and blowing it up. It reveals a lot of those grungy halftone patterns that completely drive me crazy. The more the better. Then I illustrated some green slime, created a comp for the text, and manipulated the original scan just enough to take it to another level. After implementing a few elements such as texture and color adjustment, it was ready to be slapped on the the social media outlet of your choice! ….or printed and distributed among various record store windows and telephone poles.
As a side note, the image of the woman was pulled from an old sewing magazine from the 60's. When I was about 21 or 22, I had a job working for Goodwill. It was awesome. I was able to go through a bunch of old junk and take whatever I wanted. I scored some amazing stuff working for that store. Someone had actually donated a box full of old magazines from the 60's and 70's. Normally we'd throw those out, but I hijacked them and took them home. Those magazine fueled a ton of art projects that I made through the following years. This was before I had an access to a computer so I would cut and paste images and type right out of those magazines. It's a practice that I miss sometimes.
Anyway, Here is the color version as well as a black and white xerox version. I actually sort of like the black and white version a tad more. If really only for the fact that it creates a a very stark and effective flyer. It's rough and grungy for sure, but holds a special kind of charm.
