2 Weeks and 2 Printings in Counting

Welcome, welcome to my poor ignored little blog space. They say that the key to having a successful blog is keeping active with it. Updating one's status often. I'm far too lazy for that. So, here we go, what's new?

Well, to start, I've had 2 tee shirt printings in as many weeks! Last week, Monday, March 12th, Ript Apparel printed my Dalek Barista shirt "Caffeinate!" I don't know if it's right to say how many I sold, so I'll just say I did very well that day. I also got rave reviews in the comments section which only helped to bolster my ego a few more notches. So, of course that was great as well.

Teefury.com has also accepted my Caffeinate shirt for sale but I haven't been informed of any sort of print date yet, so stay tuned for that.

Next came me finishing a very old design. Last August, I had this idea of combining the Hunger Games with the game Hungry Hungry Hippos. I did most of the work for it and then one day gave up on it. I say on it for a long time. Then, after digging through some old art file archives I pulled my design. I couldn't believe I had stopped! It looked great to me. So I finished it.

This is what I got. I subbed it to the fine folks at Woot! and awaited their response. By the way, they have gotten much quicker when it comes to reviewing submitted artwork. I received responses on everything I subbed in the past month in less than a week!

Anyway, Woot! loved my idea, but hated my shirt. They said that my composition is boxy and won't sell well. They also told me that my comic book style simply doesn't sell well at Woot! So I was bummed out. Then, I asked a fellow artist and good friend of  mine Wenceslao Almazan if he would like to combine forces and illustrate the idea all over again. He did, and this is what we got.

Wences shows real genius when it comes to illustrating with simplicity and conveying the message with ease.

So we sent this one off to Woot! and got a response 3 days later. They choose to print the design the day of the premier. Sales on Woot! are public knowledge, so I can tell you that on day 1, even though the website was down all night until 7AM, we sold 3607 shirts! As of right now we are in the 3800's for shirts sold. I'm thrilled. Wences and I get to make some good money on this idea, and we get more recognition for who we are as artists. By the way, on that note, please check out Wences' work at www.wenceslaoalmazan.com. Working on a tee shirt with him is like co-directing a movie with Stephen Spielberg.

In non-tee shirt news, I redesigned my business cards. I wanted something fresh, light hearted and sleek. In doing this, I get a new logo as you can see by the pic. I will be re-designing my website of course, but I don't feel like going through all that trouble just yet.

Also, I took an IQ test as a Christmas present. I always wanted to know what my IQ was because I'm a pompass son of a bitch. Gift Republic sells a great intelligence exam kit through ThinkGeek.com. Anyway, took the 2 hour exam and got a result of 138IQ! I told my mother I'm a terrific under achiever. Even the number 138 is an underachieving number as 140 would be genius, but 138 is 2 points below it. As you can tell, I think extremely highly of myself. I know it's a turn off for a lot of people, but it's just the way I am so deal with it.

Thanks for sticking with me and checking in! Maybe if I updated more often, I wouldn't have to take a whole 40 minutes out of my Saturday to write such an epic post.

I Haven't Blogged in FOREVER

Hello fans and friends. I haven't really been designing tee shirts so I haven't been blogging. All I can say is this is going to change in t-minus 28 minutes (when I'm done with my episode of Fringe.) as I've made a commitment to work in my studio every single weekend on SOMETHING.

I've got lots of ideas and some exciting shirts to come. I even have a shirt that has been sold and will print at at least 1 major online shirt dealer in the coming month, and possibly 2! I'll keep you folks up to date on all of that soon enough.

In the mean time, I have plenty of work to do, and of course Walter hasn't solved the mystery just yet. So, here are some pieces I have done since I've been away from you all.:

You'll see this one for sale soon!

2 New December Designs Available In Time For The Holidays!

Some News

Who do you talk to when you can't talk about some things? I just found out that all 4 of my Goodjoe entries lost to 2 friends of mine. On the one hand, I'm thrilled for my 2 friends. On the other hand, I'm extremely disappointed... and heart broken to be honest. I fought tooth and nail and promoted my heart out all week and a good chunk of my weekend to get as far as I did. According to the contest, I came in 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th places. In my opinion that's a fantastic spread. But, because 2nd place is a staff pick, I guess the staff didn't want anything from me. I just really can't go into a rant among my friends on facebook about how upset and disappointed I am. I figured here would be safe because nobody reads this stupid blog any way.

What is really getting to me is how much time I spend drawing and designing shirts only to get turned down by everyone. I've had 2 prints this year... only 2. And so many people I know who can't draw in the least get printed all the time by doing things like ripping off other people's work. It's insane. I'm just distraught.

In any case. I do have a design entry for Tshirtcontest.com's Slogan Tee contest tomorrow. Tshirtcontest is a site a friend of mine opened recently. Hopefully some website will want this tee someday.

Beware of Dog

Final Design Comp

Well folks, this will be another blog entry where I walk you through how I designed this shirt. I just completed this about an hour ago and am totally in love with it. I've submitted it to Woot! as a daily entry and have my fingers crossed on a printing.

There is no pop reference in this shirt, and really the concept kept changing. This design really came out of nowhere and is a perfect example of something that was created just because it was in me. Read on for the walk through. You may find the story behind this design entertaining!