paulsutton.us » Portfolio

Graphical Update for Logoall

Paul Sutton — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 17:01:49 +0000

Quick update to the Logoall.com site theme. The stagnant site just needed some fresh updates. I built the new theme around a Photoshop tutorial I did awhile back. I brought a little more of my style into this one, as the previous design was more ‘toned-down’, if you will. Sometimes I think I should be designing movie posters as much as I enjoy creating elaborate, intensely-graphical and fantastical scenes.

Here is a preview of the site before the update.

LogoALL before redesign

New design.

LogoALL after new graphics

Click on the image to see a larger preview on my Flickr account. And if you’d like to see a full preview. The site can be found here, Logoall.com.

HDR, Photoshop and Composite Fun

Paul Sutton — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 23:04:42 +0000

I had a little down time over the weekend so I decided to have a little fun with Photoshop, again. Seems anytime I am bored, Photoshop always remedies this ‘boring’ thing.

I’ve had some old, pretty horrible digital-camera vacation photographs stored away on my hard drive. After going through them I picked out a potentially-worthy candidate. Below is the first choice, in its original state.

Vacation photo from Rodeo Drive, California -- Pre Processing

The point of this little project was to see if I could take an uninteresting, badly-exposed photo and make it fun. First off is to do the classic Photoshop-HDR fake process within Photoshop and then adjust the tones in PhotoMatix. After quite a bit of processing, below is the result after HDR, PhotoMatix and minor composites. For those of you not familiar with HDR Photography.

HDR and Photoshop Result

After the previous step, I showed my friend Vanessa, and having an even-more-twisted imagination than myself, she started offering suggestions on elements I could add. At this point I decided to make it a full-on-composite, or manipulation. After a day and a half of collaboration, below is the result.

Final Composite

Click the image to see a larger preview in my Flickr account. If your computing with some real processing power, see all the details in its full-sized-glory.

UPDATE: Decided to take a stroll down Rodeo Dr. (via Google Street View) and was lucky enough to find this house. Thought it would be fun to compare the house to the image.

FYI, the project was done for fun, nothing at all commercial about it. Many of the elements are obviously copyright their respective owners and you may use as you’d like, aside from claiming it as your own.

Photoshop Movie Poster Fun

Paul Sutton — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 02:58:34 +0000

I was having a conversation on Facebook with an old high school friend the other day, just reminiscing and catching up. At some point on the wall-to-wall, Photobucket was brought up, (an online image storage site) and it was used in context like I had never heard it used before… as an image editing application? I guess since I have never needed to use the web site for any reason this came at somewhat of a surprise to me, especially since my friend claimed it could do photo manipulations (similar to Adobe Photoshop).

I did not go as far as testing Photobucket and its capabilities, honestly, if you know how to use Photoshop or Fireworks, what’s the point? It did however give me some incentive to bust open Photoshop and stretch my muscles a little bit. I hadn’t really done any cool manipulations lately and it was just what I needed for a lazy Sunday afternoon.

Below is the before image (of my friend) and then the results after I was done playing. This little experiment actually came from a tutorial I ran across a long time ago and have been wanting to try it out for some time… I finally found the perfect opportunity.

Photo before fantastical manipulation

Fantastical result

Logoall Web Site

Paul Sutton — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 04:25:34 +0000

A lot of internal changes have taken place at my day job in the last year, one of them being a complete restructuring of the companies objective and bringing all of the services we offer into one main brand, also know as Logoall Branding Agency.

Logoall used to be divided into 3 separate entities: WebMediaRx, whose services included general graphic design, web sites and branding services, Practice Identity, which offered pre-designed, customizable and affordable web site templates and the original LogoALL, which focused primarily on the apparel and promotions aspect of the industry.

The new LogoALL.com is now the hub of all our services and respectfully named LogoALL Branding Agency.

The new Logoall.com

Mill Avenue Directory Brochures

Paul Sutton — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 04:42:57 +0000

Two months, a 100mb Adobe Illustrator file, a computer upgrade, 50,000 revisions, and a slight delay from the print press… and the Mill Avenue directory brochures are complete!
It was a battle at just about every turn; the map alone (the 100+mb Illustrator file) pushed my 32bit XP machine to its limits, resulting in an upgrade to the 64bit machine. The fact that it will be used as a tool to aid in the navigation to downtown tourists meant that it had to be passed around many sets of eyeballs to ensure accuracy and readability, hence the 50,000 updates (slight exaggeration). Not to mention that since it was a custom cut size, double gate fold meant that the guaranteed in-hands date did not apply to this order, resulting in a delay in delivery… Nonetheless, it is complete and I could not be happier.

Mill Avenue District brochures

Sertifi Web Site Design and Devlopment

Paul Sutton — Fri, 15 May 2009 08:41:16 +0000

Got a referral from a good friend of mine (Chuck Reynolds) for a company in his home town (Chicago) needing a web site. After spending the last month-in-a-half in Illustrator and Indesign, Photoshop was a welcome change. This is concept number one for a streamlined, electronic signature company looking for a “big business” appeal and a more professional look.

This is the design before I got my hands on it.

Sertifi before redesign

May 15, 2009. Concept #1 submitted

Sertifi redesign

After submitting the first draft I received a brief email from the client and it seems as if the concept went over well with him. Who knows though, he will sit with the rest of the team tomorrow and I’ll go from there.

Additional concepts coming shortly

Mill Avenue District Map Directory

Paul Sutton — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 16:00:12 +0000

Volunteering your services to a community has certainly opened up some new opportunities and the chance to explore some creative aspects of myself that have never been challenged. I have never doubted my imagination, but like a lot of “graphic designers”, I am not naturally gifted when it comes to fine art, however… the constant use of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator for the past 8 years has essentially turned my hands into tools that with a little direction can create some pretty nice things.

The following is a very rough draft of the first proof that I will be submitting for the redesign of the map directory for the Mill Avenue District. It is only about 80% complete and will most likely transform extensively before being submitted. Updates and progress reports will be made here in this post, so check back soon.

April 15, 2009. Initial concept, layout and perspective. Concept approved.

Mill Avenue map -- in the beginning

UPDATE: April 22, 2009. Mill Avenue Directory Map nearly complete.

Mill Avenue map -- color updates

UPDATE: May 15, 2009. Mill Avenue Directory Map pre-press.

Mill Avenue District Map Directory -- as printed

UPDATE: June 15, 2009. Directories Post Press

Mill Avenue Directory Brochures

Music on Mill Branding Campaign

Paul Sutton — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 06:08:17 +0000

So, following the great feedback received from the MADCAP Branding Campaign, the client was anxious to get moving on their next effort to revitalize the Mill Avenue Districts culture scene. The next item on the block was a little project called “Music on Mill” and like all branding campaigns, the logo design was first up.

Concepts/Ideation – proofs sent

Music on Mill logo concepts

As most designers will tell you, some concepts definitely fly better than others; after the first round of proofs were sent and the reviewed, it was obvious that further communication was needed with the client. I think the phrase that was used for this set was “too Sound-of-Music-like”… ouch, I never even seen that movie!
New mind-mapping words given: urban, edgy, modern, vintage rock, concert posters and graffiti art…

UPDATE: New Concepts sent

Music on Mill logo concepts

UPDATE: Concept and Colors Approved

Music on Mill logo

Now that the logo had been established, a quick push to complete the poster to kick off the campaign was necessary.

UPDATE: Various Poster Submissions

Music on Mill poster proofs

UPDATE: Final Poster Approved

Music on Mill poster final

UPDATE: We have been commissioned to redo the directory maps (and all relating printed collateral) in the Mill Avenue District (pending proposal approval), this means many hours in Adobe Illustrator, and that’s a good thing!

Out With the Old!

Paul Sutton — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 09:09:19 +0000

PaulSutton.us was overdue for a design update and ready to utilize the power of WordPress a little more than I previously had. My last design was my very first attempt at integrating a design into WordPress and I have since learned how to work with all the .php includes instead of just around them.

Instead of using the default “Kubrick” theme I opted to purchase one of the well-built WooThemes with the beautifully hand-crafted css and xhtml of Matt Brett. This particular layout also utilizes the 960 grid system which I have been attempting to push more clients towards in an effort to move away from the standard 800 x 600 pixel limits.

There were quite a bit of internal and external modifications that I had to make plus every aspect of the graphics had to be mine (I am a designer by the way) and I also managed to get back to some grungy textures, which I happen to be a sucker for.

For the most part I think I have hit all the design elements throughout most of the theme, though I am sure a few glitches may arise now that it is live. Also, in the process of the upgrade I managed to lose a few posts that dealt with the HDR (high dynamic range) photography I was experimenting with last year (2008)… this was before I realized WordPress had an export function built-in to save all posts and content as a back-up or integrating to another CMS.

paulsutton.us version 2

paulsutton.us version 3

Madcap Branding Campaign

Paul Sutton — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 07:18:51 +0000

Every once in awhile a project comes up that gets my blood flowing. A new branding campaign recently came to me and if I play my cards right it could be a pretty big release. It is still hush hush so I cannot talk about the details but stay tuned and I will post the results.

Step 1 – Concepts/Ideation – proofs sent

Madcap logo concepts

UPDATE: – Concept Approved – color proofs sent

Madcap logo color proofs

UPDATE: – Colors Approved – graphical standards sent

Final logo with graphical standards

Sales Sheets

Madcap Salesheets

The best part of a project that gets your blood flowing is how easy the process is; when you have passion for something it aids in the ease of each step and usually the outcome is great. And though it may be a little self-serving, the idea of something I created spanning the street on a banner or gracing a storefront in neon lights tends to help the process as well.

UPDATE: - The branding campaign was so well-received we were also commissioned to brand a break-off company of this one. I will start a new post for that when I have details.

See Music on Mill