Update 10th March '16

I'm not sure why I had such a hard time colouring my phrase, but I ended up simplifying my letterforms and using a tutorial by Dina Rodrigues to clean them up in photoshop. It took quite a long time, but it definitely helped me when I image traced them in Ai.

I ended up with this vector image which I'm really pleased with:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 1 - student project

I played around with some colours but wasn't pleased with the textures, so I took Jamie Bartlett's class, Misprint: Smart Texturing in Photoshop, and ended up with these, which I loved:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 2 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 3 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 4 - student project

I then came back to my original vector image and tried out a few colour options. Finally, I used some texturising techniques I learned from Andrew Fairclough's True Grit class and Simon Walker's logo design class. I also changed the canvas size because Instagram.

I think I'm finally done with this phrase (plus the last few weeks I've been thinking, it should probably just say 'cray'. Here is my final illustration:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 5 - student project

Thank you!

Lex x

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Hello,

My name is Lex and this is my first official Skillshare project.

I'm using this project to improve my idea generation and adobe illustrator skills. I'm doing some hand lettering classes, but they can be quite monotonous, and I need something creative to work on whilst I learn about letters and it would be good to not have to start from scratch with digitizing when I'm "done" with my lettering classes.

I've managed to get the project up to the final sketch phase. I've done some inking and digitizing experiments, because I knew I would have trouble realising what is in my head with my lack of adobe skills. Once I know what I can do with illustrator, I can redo the inking phase.

Initial ideas and thumbnails:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 6 - student project

I went with 'Embrace your Batshit Crazy'.

Batsh*t Crazy - image 7 - student project

Some sketches I found in my sketchbook that inspired me:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 8 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 9 - student project

I'm new to lettering, so I'm not expecting my letters to look great, but I do know I want 'Batshit' to be quite traditional and decorative, but the other words will be a plain sans serif block style. I thought this would be a nice contrast, but also, I don't want too many styles going on.

I took a few of the thumbnails to sketch phase.

Batsh*t Crazy - image 10 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 11 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 12 - student project

Bottle top design that inspired the batwing/spiderweb effect:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 13 - student project

Decided to do some more thumbnails. The layout I decided to go with was more of a mixture of all of the three sketches.

Batsh*t Crazy - image 14 - student project

I tried out some different letter ideas and eventually found myself with these:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 15 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 16 - student project

First draft sketch:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 17 - student project

At this stage I thought I was going to make the letters 'CRAZY' with a 3D drop shadow effect. However, I'd been looking at skillshare projects (from various classes) and came across somebody who had done this with same word. Which was a little horrifying, but I guess people like to write the word 'Crazy' in a crazy style. So, I'm sticking with the line shadow, although there are still similarities with their word.

At this stage I realised I had no idea how to realise any of this in illustrator, which will make it tricky to ink. I made a rough ink of a letter and played around. I think it looks a little childish and I ran into lots of problems, but it helped me get a feel for things and so was useful.

Batsh*t Crazy - image 18 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 19 - student project

Back to sketching. This ended up being my final one:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 20 - student project

I don't have a light box and my patience has started to run out, so at this stage I went straight into inking on to tracing paper. As I said, I've got to the stage where realising what is in my head with illustrator is tricky. So I'm anticipating I will reink again once I've learnt a few more tricks in illustrator. Here is the inking:

Batsh*t Crazy - image 21 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 22 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 23 - student project

Batsh*t Crazy - image 24 - student project

A big problem I had is lining up the two scans. I'm not sure why, but they don't align, even though they're from the same sketch and were placed in at the same size. So, in my final image, you'll see I've just removed one of them.

Another problem I had was having to use a stroke to outline the letters as drawing the outline looked awful (see the 'A' I tested out earlier). I think this will cause me problems. I'm also not happy with the shadow lines being so close to the letters. It is obviously nowhere near to being finished, and I think I'm going to have to go back and forth between inking and digitizing a few times yet. If you've read this far, thank you! If I get any further with the project I will update.

Lex.

Kitty Fantastico

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