Interview by Rachel Gottesman
Well hello Alex, and congrats on winning two Loves challenges and being printed for the 12 month club all within a few months. That's not only very impressive, it's also a sign of some serious talent!
Back in November of 2008 you vowed to create 20 submissions before 2009, and you succeeded! That's like 2-3 new pieces of artwork a week! How do you find the time to be so prolific? Do you freelance for a living or do you just not sleep, ever?
Well at the time I felt like I had been slacking with my artwork big time only because I had a ton of other stuff going on: having a family, full time job, bboying (breakdancing), and freelance. So I decided I was going to push myself and try to create 20(+1) submissions before 2009 and force myself to draw a lot more and get back into the habit of drawing at least once a day. The subs averaged 3+ on the scores so I’m very happy with that!
My daughter is almost 3 years old and is really into my drawings as well, so a lot of the ideas I had were from watching kids shows, reading children’s books, etc with her, she’s already coloring and drawing a lot.
My wife was getting a bit frustrated with me drawing all the time and not sleeping enough, so you might see me drawing that much in the near future, even though I think you should expect a lot of stuff from me!
Full time Job – I work as a graphic designer / online editor for Time Warner Cable so I don’t get to be 100% creative here, and Threadless has given me motivation to keep doing my artwork, which I have been doing always on the side just not as much as I have recently, thanks to the Threadless community.
Your work is super detailed. Do you draw everything by hand and scan it in or is it all done digitally? Why don't you tell the world a little bit about your process. Are there any trade secrets you'd like to reveal?
I've had a few people ask me the same questions. Even though I feel I’m not doing anything new I’m working on a critique right now and whoever really wants to know step by step how I do things, I’ll be doing it on there and hopefully it helps people out with their designs, even though others have explained similar process on the blogs.
There are a ton of ways to getting the same results, I think the most important part is everything I do by hand which is really hard to do digitally (well at least for me), but here is the process if you must know now:
-Sketch by hand
- Ink by Hand (I think this is the most important part of my subs, since it has all the details and main line work.)
- Scan (I scan my artwork, and clean it up in photoshop.)
- Color (Color in photoshop in layers with the mouse... Hopefully my coloring will be a lot more detailed now that I have a new wacom tablet... and bitmap halftone for some of the shading.)
- Vector (I bring layer by layer into illustrator to further clean it up.)
- Flash (I create the presentation in flash and submit!)
Is your work background in illustration or design? Did you go to school for art? If you did, what did you think of art school?
I’ve been drawing since I can remember. I was in a web development community course, and went to a community college for graphic design. I think my main background would be illustration and if I had the opportunity before, I would have gone to college for some type of illustration or art program. I used to draw all day until I would get headaches, hahaha! I always feel like there is room for improvement, so hopefully my future work will only be better and better.
What's your favorite subject material? If you could just create work for yourself from now on, what would you be drawing?
I love drawing surreal stuff, the more details the better, but my preference changes all the time. The type of stuff you see on my subs is stuff I love to draw. Even though the Loves Horror challenge was extremely fun to work on, wih my favorite sub being the big werewolf eating the deer.
Do you have a favorite artist or artists? What makes them so great and do you think their influence shows up in your own work at all?
I had an art teacher (Mr. Horner R.I.P.) that I really looked up and to and I think helped me take my artwork to a new level. Other than that I don’t have any specific favorite artists, I’m always motivated and influenced by all different types of works and artists.
How did you find Threadless and why have you chosen it as your home base for the world of internet design?
I don’t remember how I found Threadless now, but I do remember signing up and submitting some stuff and then leaving for a long time. I came back one day and sorta got addicted after hanging around the blogs, I think the blog forum is what kept me here, and the community. I always have it up at work.
You're currently organizing a new group project called "Pizza Party". Could you tell me a little about the project and how you came up with the idea?
Well after doing the 20 subs, etc etc I really wanted to get a bit more involved with the Threadless community and I saw the other two big collabs that were going on and one of the members, Spacesick, suggested the idea of everyone drawing toppings for a pizza. I really wanted to take on the collab, and just put my own twist to it and started the big Collab of the Pizza, which is still currently in the works.
If there's anything else you'd like to add before we wrap things up, feel free to say so right... Now!
I just want to say Threadless rocks and hopefully you guys will see a lot more of me in the future!
Interview by Rachel Gottesman
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