Holiday Card

[steve-o]

Ok. I'm in the process of creating our holiday card. I've attached what I have so far.

The concept is simple: two dog and cat paw prints in the snow with the word "peace" written in "yellow snow."

I decided on a more illustrative, simple treatment and kept it low key so not to offend some of the more sensitive family members.

However I'm not satisfied with it. Feels kind of boring.

Any suggestions is much appreciated.

Thanks!
-Steve-O

[morea]

yellow snow, huh? I might go for a rougher font with a more cursive-y feel... after all, it's hard to break the stream and maintain any sort of typographical consistency...

at least, that's what they tell me.

[morea]

and maybe you should spell it "pees"

LMAO - I kill me!

[jm1786]

I imagine you could find a different font that would better suit the "yellow snow" theme. Whether or not making it look more like pee would offend your more sensitive family members is the question I guess.

The font as is is a pretty stardard looking font for a Holiday Greeting card...So I guess it works, but it is kind of conformist.

So my first suggestion would be to play with the font. Find some sort of "liquid" font, and go from there. Might make it a bit more exciting.

[Samakimoto Graphics]

Nice concept, I like the thought direction...

[frankster]

pees on earth! well... on snow anyway. Nice idea. I made a christmas card this year to give to relatives at home, but it's waaaaay busy and fiddly and probably wouldn't go down to well on the forum.

[distruktor]

I made a christmas card this year to give to relatives at home, but it's waaaaay busy and fiddly and probably wouldn't go down to well on the forum.

i like fiddly. ^^^




Steve-o, have you tried mutliplying the yellow text over the snow image? might make it look more like the pee has soaked into it :D

EDIT: on second glance it seems very purple for snow as well.... unless its just my screen. Like the idea though.

[captain spanky]

yep, take of the keyline on the prints, blur the edges slightly and 'multiply' them to look like they're impressions in the snow. :) i like it tho :)

[xplod_ldg]

and maybe you should spell it "pees"

LMAO - I kill me!

Like this idea. About the yellow..I don't know. Doesn't do it for me. Maybe the shade of yellow is not good. Try it in white though.

[martyng]

Yeah, I'd 'whiten' up the snow, give day light, rather than night light.

[PrintDriver]

Reverse and repeat your paw prints. Unless your cat and dog both really do have two left feet, LOL!

[steve-o]

Guys,

glad you like the concept, and thanks for the suggestions. I hope to work on it this weekend and post a revision.

The hardest part of it was finding a composition and font size that that balanced the image.

PD, yes. I did notice the two left paw problem. :) I will definitely fix for the card.

Thanks!

[nele]

Try using this color for your writing: #6b6c7e and then add some shading or something like that.

[Kool]

Reverse and repeat your paw prints. Unless your cat and dog both really do have two left feet, LOL!

I don't know about your's PD but my cats does have two left feet. ;)

[popejoydesign]

My cat and both dogs have two left feet too! That's so strange! :)

[(gra-ph!c-D'sig-nah)]

I am assuming this is still a draft because the lines in the paws are not connected at the ends. I see small tails in the dog prints! My dog and cats have two left feet tooo! If it is wrong I will cut the extra off!

[mattbing]

That's one talented dog and cat combo.

[MisterClips]

Interesting concept. If you want it to look more real, you could add perspective so it looks as though the cat and dog were walking off into the distance. Blue up the snow so it looks like it's lit by the moon and use a rough font for "Peace" to make it look more like it was created by an animal.

Here's a rough I threw together to illustrate.
I'm sure you could do much better.
http://www.misterclips.com/images/cardsample.jpg

[Ms.O]

Interesting concept. If you want it to look more real, you could add perspective so it looks as though the cat and dog were walking off into the distance. Blue up the snow so it looks like it's lit by the moon and use a rough font for "Peace" to make it look more like it was created by an animal.

Here's a rough I threw together to illustrate.
I'm sure you could do much better.
http://www.misterclips.com/images/cardsample.jpg

Yes! That's what I was thinking, but didn't now how to say it. And the yellow should, if possible, look like it's not laying on top of the snow, but sinking down in somehow....like real pee would....

And the snow needs to be lighter, imho.....but I like the bluing up.

[frankster]

It'd be easier for the animals if you let them do joined up hand writing and I bet there would be a few splashes and a small puddle at the end of the last letter. Or is that too gross?

[1ooScreamingTrees]

I hope to work on it this weekend and post a revision.

Drink a six and head outside. If there's snow on the ground, pee in it. If not, it's going to take a lot of very tasteful photoshop work to get this to look anywhere near good.

I'm serious...go pee in the snow. or i guess you could drop water on it, but peeing is more fun.

[morea]

hey Steve-o, I saw this today and thought of you... so I took a photo, in case you might want to use it for a reference.

http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/8367/trackslu5.jpg

[Fredonia2k]

and maybe you should spell it "pees"

LMAO - I kill me!


Pees on Earth

[Fredonia2k]

The prints on the bottom should be larger than those near the top.

[Fredonia2k]

http://www.centens.com/peace.jpg..

[BrentonMailman]

it all looks too cartoon for me..im not even seeing the footprints and pee in the snow concept.. The dark outline and lack of texture in the footprints makes it look like cement to me.

And isn't urinary snow typogrophy usually deeper looking and thinner than this??? That would have to be quite the stream :) ... And it's a little 'perfect'. Perhaps a few little mistake drops?

neat concept though

[1ooScreamingTrees]

And isn't urinary snow typogrophy usually deeper looking and thinner than this???

Good observation. I believe a scientific analysis of urine level depths in freshly laid snow is in order.

Get peein!

[wienerdog]

Maybe, instead of using text, you can use Photoshop to brush in the yellow text on a screened layer with some transparency to make it look more like authentic "yellow snow."

Using a font creates a bit of a disconnect between your great concept and execution.

[budafist]

Yikes! isn't it a bit late now?

[steve-o]

Yes. The card went out today. I implemented some of your suggestions, but I never got it exactly how I wanted it. I begged the wife to hold off on it until next year, but she insisted I was being too picky and it looked fine. Plus people were asking her about the card, and we couldn't go "generic".

We'll see how it is received, but here's the lesson learned:

When I decided to create custom holiday cards for family and friends, I set one criteria -- that the concept would be something I could create through photography. Due to the absence of snow, I could not accomplish this with the camera. I tried coming up with other concepts, but this one kept lingering, so I decided to go for it using a more "design/illustrative" approach with very limited time to spare.

However, I'm not a designer. I'm an editor first, then photographer, then musician. I deviated from my chosen medium.

I think this year's concept is much stronger than last year's (attached), but last year I stuck with photography and created the card in like 10 minutes.

[morea]

there's no better way to learn, Steve. I'm sure your card looks great. :)