Commercial 01: Sprint Mobile

Commercial 02: 5-Hour Energy

The full time lapse can be seen in the video below. Total production time was over 10 hours (give or take), but you can get the gist of it in this run through.

We started by rendering a modern Ford Mustang in the traditional ‘highland green’ color from the 1967 model Steve McQueen drove in the film. The challenge would be finding a modern Mustang that we could make ‘highland green’ without actually painting one.

We found a decent photo of a modern day red Mustang which would work well for a digital makeover. We started by painstakingly changing the car’s exterior body to match the icon green tint.

The details were important to replicate, as the “Bullitt” edition Mustangs typically come with a mesh grille (instead of the horizontal lines) and the traditional 1967 looking racing wheels. We also removed every emblem and marking on the passenger side of the car.

Small other details really helped add to the realism, such as accurate reflections in the windows of the ‘new’ San Francisco environment. The infamous “chase” scene took place in the city streets, thus it was a logical backdrop to use.

The final key art was in production for the official event program, alongside previous (real) photos of the 2001 Ford Mustang Bullitt. The McQueen family was quite impressed with final work and their show attendees were as well.

We were hired by the McQueen family to create the collateral for the event. Naturally we were quite excited, but digital assets of Steve McQueen we’d likely need aren’t easy to come by these days. This left us puzzled on how to get high resolution imagery to use in such a project. The creative brief was pretty open, so we opted to go with a stylized vector look and texturize it over several natural looking elements.

We found some lower resolution images and used Adobe Illustrator to create tonal based vector art. The work was painstaking to get the desired effect, but the final pieces lent themselves well to increased resolution. They also provided a stark contrast that worked quite well in the overall composition.

The final output was quite complex as you can see in the time lapse video above. We spent considerable time layering several natural elements to give the final art an organic look and feel.

 
The company name was initially dubbed “The Clubs Choice,” before eventually morphing into ‘Fanz.’ Our initial identity explorations focused on the concept of a fan holding a scarf, which is part and parcel at almost any football (soccer) stadium. Example here.
 

We played around with different “characters” – some of which were more aggressive, some of which were playful and cartoon like. The challenge was finding a suitable design that spoke to fans of all ages.
 

Once the concept was chosen, we then explored different alternatives, particularly for sports where fans holding scarves were not the norm. We also came up with a female variant as many sports teams have a growing female contingent.
 

Ultimately the primary brand was used in several different mediums, much of which can be seen here on our portfolio page.
 

The Los Angeles Kings leveraged different fan activation initiatives, one of which included a signed Bernie Nicholls hockey card.
 

The Kings also created an official Fanz Choice fan area where local fans could meet and take pictures with the popular “LA Kings Ice Crew.”

Stewart and his mechanic talk strategy, before the main event.

The crew chief is wearing the final design we came up with for 2012 for JGRMX crew shirt.

The final garment was a sublimated shirt on premium cotton which gave the highly detailed look without the banal look of typical sublimation.

Here you can see Stewart also sporting the pullover Oakley hoodie sweatshirts. The white base garment made a perfect platform for the multitude of logos the team required.

It was a pleasure working with the team in 2012 and we’re eager for the next Supercross season and the potential to furthering the relationship even more.

• Livery Design
• Driving Suit and Helmets
• Crew Apparel and Merchandise
• Web Development and Social Media
• Branding and Identity
• Print and Document Design

• The idea: Create a poster series featuring the team’s star players David Beckham and Landon Donovan.
• The approach: Walk right up to the players and (hopefully) impress them enough to put the files / images in the marketing brass’ hands at the team’s front office.

Being that the poster wasn’t exactly “commissioned,” half our challenge was finding a collection of images in high enough resolution useful enough to make into a cohesive concept. Given that Landon Donovan is known to live in Manhattan Beach and David Beckham’s ties to Hollywood, blending those elements together made sense. And of course, the famed Los Angeles skyline served as a great and logical backdrop.

Given the likelihood of meeting both players in the same place, at the same time, was unlikely we designed each image to stand alone on its own. Of course, included with each player’s copy was the other player’s “piece,” so the logic of the images connecting to form one composite poster would be obvious.

So now the next step would be getting the designs in front of the players themselves. No small feat considering that David Beckham is arguably the most popular footballer in the world and typically travels with security. Luckily, the team has a reputation of interacting with their fan base and we were fortunate enough to get an exclusive invite to an official team event.

Luckily, the stars aligned (no pun intended) and we were lucky enough to get in front of both players despite swarms of people. Both received copies with our compliments, and both seem quite impressed with our interpretation of their likenesses. As for whether or not it will translate into anything official – one only knows. But at the very least we have a completely unique piece of art for our office. Anything more would simply be the cherry on the sundae.

The objective was to design a line of apparel that would be used by team personnel and mechanics throughout the 2012 season. In partnership with Oakley Motorsports, we helped develop the overall look and feel for the entire line.

Here are some of the rejected concepts and explorations we developed early on. The initial ideas were based on the team transporter and livery in an attempt to match.

Of course, in the world of motorsports, the long arm of the corporate dollar is never far away and we had to revisit the ideas to accommodate the team sponsors for the season. Several revisions later, we arrived at the final designs.

Here are a few more apparel designs that got left on the cutting room floor. The all-over prints were deemed too costly to produce for the desired price point.

The team opted for a more simple, less busy aesthetic which make the final pieces both cost effective and timeless.