The first project I worked on for Garage Games was (and is) InstantAction. InstantAction is basically a game console, similar to Microsoft’s XBOX, or Nintendo’s Wii, that you can load up in your web browser. Launching in early spring of 2008, InstantAction now boasts more than 2 million registered users from all around the world.

The InstantAction console is a complex AJAX web application. Though the application is built upon many technologies – I worked primarily with HTML, CSS, Javascript, and some PHP. I worked between the web design and the development teams to integrate our designs into the web application.

One of my first projects was applying the styles to the InstantAction messaging system panels. From there I moved on to build the layout and styling for the various game interfaces. Each game had it’s own interface in the web where the user could configure the game settings (such as level and game mode) and chat with other members of their party, before launching and playing each game.

I also helped build and integrate InstantAction’s store, game leaderboards, as well as social media and community features.

Though I primarily worked building HTML and CSS structures, I also had the opportunity to illustrate an avatar set which users could purchase.

InstantAction was a great opportunity to work directly with other designers and developers to pioneer a cutting edge web 2.0 game platform.

Here are some of my other Garage Games web projects:

• PlayLegions.com (My portfolio link.)
• PlayLegions Facebook (My portfolio link.)

This image was created when I was experimenting with a technique for creating concept art.

The technique involves creating a series of Hi-rez abstract scenes on differing layers in Photoshop. Once you have drawn quite a few of these abstractions, you begin turning on and off layers and changing their blending modes until you have something that you think looks interesting. Then you zoom in and start moving around the abstraction and start taking snapshots of interesting scenes (selecting and saving). Once you have quite a few of these snapshots – you open then separately and start developing an image from the abstract. Sometimes an idea works out and sometimes you end up abandoning it. The great thing about this technique is that often you have many abstracts to try out. If one doesn’t quite end up looking like what you had in mind, you have many others to try.

You can see the abstract that I started with by clicking on the small thumbnail on the top right.

Originally, they were going to embroider the old camp logo on a speckled gray sweatshirt and give those out to the staff for the year. I knew that no-one would wear them…

The Impact Staff at Camp Harlow was comprised of mostly high school and college kids. The camp talked to me about what they were planning and asked if I had any suggestions. I replied, “give me a couple hours, I’ll get right back to you.” I took their existing logo for the summer (that summer’s camp theme was knights of the round table) and greatly simplified it. Then I distressed the image and added some custom illustrated. I brought the idea back and everyone immediately loved them. It’s my favorite sweatshirt too.

Can Flash be used to create high quality, low file size, images?

The answer is yes! I found out that Flash is actually an excellent tool for illustrating vector graphics. Here, I illustrated an oriental style sailing ship. I drew this image from scratch.

The First Baptist Church women’s logo is where digital painting and logo design meet.

The head of the women’s ministry talked to me about coming up with their ministry logo. After hearing their tag line, “Reaching out to Serve, Growing in Faith, Nurturing Friendship,” I felt that perhaps some sort of organic and natural imagery would fit and we decided on wheat. I also thought the logo would be more powerful if it had a hand-crafted nature to it, so rather than use a photograph of a wheat field, I painted one digitally. In this case I used Corel Painter IX.

When the First Baptist Church approached me about creating a logo for their kids department I started sketching out ideas immediately. The first thing I thought of was a tree house.

The reason I thought a tree house would appeal to kids was because it was something fun and exciting that wasn’t necessarily connected with school. As it turned out, everyone enjoyed this logo – even the adults.

I illustrated this logo, along with two other seasonal variations, by hand using Photoshop. I thought having seasonal options would really excite the kids. I had a great time drawing in little details into these illustrations. You can view details of each by clicking on the thumbnails in the upper right.

Nothing says “solid” like strong contrast.

The new midschool logo for FBC needed to be simple, yet strong. I illustrated several version of the mountain with trees in all sorts of arrangements. Finally, I decided on a two color asymmetrical approach, and a look that would stand out on clothing as well as other formats. If you click the thumbnail in the upper right you can see a detail of the logo and its usage on shirts and the midschool website blog that I also designed.

Nothing says “solid” like strong contrast.

I ran across the online challenge to create a concept for the missing Memorial Day logo and had an idea. I’ve heard it said that for soldiers in the middle of a war, often it’s about the men and women that are fighting beside you. With that in mind, I thought it would be nice to illustrate a couple of soldiers helping carry one of their wounded friends. I also attempted to match the style of Google’s other illustrations.

I submitted my concept to the competition and it was chosen out of several hundred and posted here. The image was subsequently posted across several blogs that were discussing the topic.

Believe it or not, I illustrated this image on a 15 minute break. I have thought about refining the illustration, but honestly, I’ve actually come to appreciate the “sketchyness” of the original drawing.

The Disciplines of Grace journal was a challenge that brought together my illustration and design skills.

I had the opportunity to design this book from the ground up. The pastor of First Baptist church simply conveyed that he was thinking of a theme that included thorns. That was all I needed. A large amount of custom illustration was required for the various pages as well at the cover artwork. I enjoyed this project as I learned a great deal about the publishing industry and had the opportunity to work with various printers and editors. The book turned out nicely and was well received throughout the church.

This journal coincides with The Disciplines of Grace blog that I also designed.