Stationery in progress

Keeping continuity in mind, I wanted my my entire stationery to reflect my logo. If my logo is simple and straight forward, then my stationery will do the same. Since the main part of my logo is the shape of the bean I wanted to repeat that shape throughout my stationery. The letterhead originally just had a rectangular border, but that didn't relate back to my logo so I began to play with curves. First I had them located at the top and bottom of the paper and then I thought to try them on the sides which lead to my idea of creating the shape of the bean. I had the curves outlined in brown at one point which made the letterhead a little cramped so Paige suggested I get rid of the borders and see how that would look.
Onto business cards, I wanted to incorporate the bean as well but with just the initials. I thought by bleeding it off the edge the viewer would still be able to relate that particular curve the initials created to my logo. On the back, leaving that negative space at the top immediately draws the eye to the most important thing, the owners name, which I enlarged and put in color. Contact information is important as well and I put those in color too, but I decided I was going to put them both in brown since that green did not come out well in small font.



While in the process of working on my stationery over the weekend I also began to experiment with different types of paper. I like to collect a lot of old magazines and memorabilia, and I came across an old scrapbook I bought off ebay a few years ago. I noticed that it had a lot of empty paper in the back, and I immediately thought I could try this paper out for my stationery. I loved the sepia tone and the quality wasn't too bad but since the paper is older than me and my parents, it tears very easily, so thank goodness there's a fair amount of sheets for me to use for mistakes like that.



I cut a few sheets into 8.5 x 11's and did a test print on my computer for my business card. I kept my fingers crossed since my printer is unpredictable and I didn't know how it was going to handle the new paper, but hey the result was better than I thought it would be:



I also found a few variations of brown cardstock paper at Michael's Craft Store. These had a smoother surface than the scrapbook paper and didn't have as many little specks. My printer happily accepted this paper as well. Here was the new letterhead without the brown outline and 2 new business card ideas.



I want to do two since both business cards are aimed towards different audiences. The first is for professional use, mostly for other companies, corporate,etc. The second, which is my favorite, is geared towards the general public and would most likely be handed out in the store.

Business card 1:


Business card 2:


This is currently where I am at so now onto the envelope!

I. Am. Out.

Been working all weekend improving my stationery and watching Night of the Iguana. Now its time for me to cure this lovely headache!

The cocoa bean lost weight

After critique, I took a looooonnnnnggggg look at my logo and I realized though it has a distinct shape, the sides were not evened up. It was also suggested by my classmates that I fix the bean's "N" so that it would be much easier to read. The tip of the "N" use to be pointy but it wasn't matching up with the ends of the A, so I made it flat to balance it out. Also, the letters in the previous cocoa bean were too bulky so I decided to scale them down.

So last night I printed and sketched on the print so that I could work off what was already in the computer instead of making an entirely new sketch.



Oh and I have decided to eliminate the word "final" from my vocabulary so I'm going to call this the DEFINITE possibility :)

Taking just a little break from logos

I began working on an illustration for "The Bad Seed" I based it off an illustration I had made for it a couple of months ago but I never got around to using it.

Just to give ya a little idea, the story is about a little girl named Rhoda.

She has blonde pigtails and plays innocent to everyone around her, including her mother, who starts to find out just how evil she is.

(I couldn't decide which color I liked so I'll just post both)




The sketch


Note: The movie is perfect. Patty McCormack as Rhoda is amazing!

The Grand Finale

Worked on colors in class yesterday. I wanted to keep it to 2 colors since too many colors would be unnecessary and would take away from the image. I based these colors off the cocoa bean pod which usually comes in a variety of yellows, green, browns and reds. The bean represents the outer shell and the cocoa beans are the interior.

I found it.......Again!

An entirely different look from the previous post. I had been working horizontal with the bean all weekend, then an idea came into my head to try it vertical. I not only wanted the letters to create the image of the bean but I also believed the closeness of the letters would reflect the sense of security and warmth one gets the minute they walk into the café.

These were quick sketches. Just trying to get the shape of the bean down:

(Excuse the eraser left overs)


Then I went back and made a cleaner sketch to be scanned into my computer:


After our in progress critique, I placed my sketch in Illustrator and traced using the pen tool and WAH-LA!

Yep, good times!