The process

Per my lovely seester's request, I am going to share some images of my design process on the banners in the previous post. It's fun to look back and see where it all started! I can't share every little step (that would require its own blog), but I can share a few bits. Hopefully it will give you an idea of how I work, and maybe inspire some potential designers out there to try new things! ;)

The first two images are examples of elements I pull as potential pieces to the puzzle. My "image options" folders are always stuffed! I place and delete images faster than you can say "Sally Sold Seashells on the Sea Shore." That may be faster for some than others. :)

Anyways, I usually have an idea of the imagery I want to use, but I am constantly surprised by what does and doesn't work, so I like to gather together quite a variety. For example, there are 53 images in my "textures/watercolors" folder for this project. Some are purchased, and some are hand-painted and scanned in (see Chris helping me paint here). This first image is a purchased floral illustration (left), spruced up by placing a watercolor texture over it and make the texture a "clipping mask" (right). Can you see why the possibilities are endless??

This next image is an example of two of the watercolors I painted and then scanned. As I said before, I had 53 total images in this particular folder, so there was a lot to work with!

Here you can see two original sketches that didn't make the cut. I thought I wanted to use some cool branch silhouettes (left), but the result was sort of japanese, which is generally great, but not the look we were going for. The other version (right) was too pastel / soft / easter-ish / feminine. We decided we really wanted the colors to pop like crazy to avoid those very things!

In this final image, you can see a progression of the layers that make up the final product. The first image is the base, made using two or three textures layered together (this is where I begin playing with "blending modes" in photoshop, which determine how one layer interacts with the layers under it). The next two images show how things change as I continue to add more textures to the base. The fourth image includes the addition of the building and leaf photographs (first I made them monotone images — i.e., one-color images — and then once I had them in context, I played with their coloring and saturation); and also the floral illustration (mentioned above). I ended up using the floral illustration in white (without the textured clipping mask) because it stood out better that way. And then lastly you see the final touches: the borders, the "tag" graphic, and the SPU logo. Voila!

It's kind of a lot of information, and there are a lot of steps I'm skipping over. But that gives you a glimpse! Any questions, class? ;)