“Meet the Mayfarers” is a webseries that chronicles the story of an estranged, dysfunctional family who is forced to live together for one year in order to get their grandfather’s massive inheritance.

The first thing I did was re-watch the entire series. After that I worked up a couple of quick sketches. The client (writer/director/actor/creator Todd Norwood) approved the sketch and I started drawing. A couple of the characters didn’t work right away, but some adjustments were made and the poster was finished!

I spent more time on patterns and textures this time around and I’m happy with the results. The printed posters arrived the other day and the colors are perfect.

You can check out the webseries here.

You can purchase one from here.

Sawyer reading on the beach.

These limited edition bookmarks are signed, numbered and available at LOSTblog.com for $10 a piece.

WFNX did not explain anything other than they were looking for a Muse concert poster. I didn’t know the size, whether it would be screen or digitally printed. No details. Since I am such a fan of screen prints, I decided to design with that in mind.

After a couple of sketches, I fired up the computer and started working. My initial design didn’t capture the feeling that I was looking for, so I put the project to the side for a little bit. While doing image research for a different project, I was stuck with the inspiration for this poster. After that, the poster came together really quickly.

The music of Muse is powerful and uplifting. I wanted to convey something inspirational. Not because of their band name, but because of brightness of their music.

Most concert posters that I see don’t use the band’s logo. I spent a lot of time coming up with the logo for this poster. My biggest influence for this text was Brad Klausen’s poster work (check it out when you get a chance).

After I sent in my submission to WFNX, they posted it, along with a few others, on their site. Unfortunately this gave other artists the chance to see early submissions. Many of the posters that were submitted looked like the album cover. Lots of photoshop effects. Very glossy. I can understand why these might make a good Muse poster, but not necessarily a good concert poster. My hope was that the powers that be at WFNX would recognize this. And in this world of anonymous internet comments, it was very evident that many WFNX visitors did not see my intent.

But WFNX did because I was selected as one of five finalist. I was told to show up at the TD Garden an hour before the concert with two copies of my poster. The five finalists (plus our guests) were brought into a waiting room. Christopher and Dominic came in and picked the winner. It wasn’t me, but I was fine with this. Just the fact that I got to show people my art was enough for me. All along, I had felt that the eventual winner was my toughest competition.

Afterwards was an amazing concert. To anyone that enjoys concerts, I highly recommend seeing Muse as soon as possible. It’s an experience.

This is another poster that I designed for fun (the first one was my LOST poster). This time I chose to commemorate another of my favorite shows: Mad Men. If you are not watching this show, you really need to start. The season finale of the most recent season showed exactly how TV shows should be made.

For this poster, I kept a type of running diary. I set up a unique Twitter account to discuss the issues that I encountered while drawing this poster. Originally I named this account @JM_MadMen but I have recently changed the name to @JimMacLeod_Art as it will continue to be my “in progress” Twitter account.

I also set up a TweetPhoto account where I could show people the progress of the drawing. It was an interesting exercise to show some of the mistakes that I made and then corrected. There were plenty of times when I would post a picture, but I’d continue to work a smile, or a glance, so people got to see the early drafts of the drawing. Hopefully the final outcome is better than my initial attempts.

For the layout of the poster, I wanted to make sure that Don was big and the first thing that catches your eye. The show is centered on him and the people that revolve around his light and darkness. Almost all of the characters in the poster are looking to Don. Harry is looking in the other direction because he is often on his own page. The second largest character on the poster is Betty because she has become a central part of the show, though this may be changing. The poster is anchored by Sterling and Cooper sitting in Cooper’s office on the couch. While everyone is looking at Don, he isn’t actually looking at anyone, just giving the illusion that he’s involved.

The one thing I wanted to make sure of was that with Twitter and TweetPhoto, I didn’t show too much. I originally worked in black, white and grey tones. Also, I never showed how the characters fit together on the page. I was giving a taste, but I wasn’t showing the whole poster. Once I finished drawing the characters, I stopped updating the pictures on TweetPhoto. I couldn’t show too much without giving away the overall plan.

As for the colors, I originally looked at vintage 50′s and 60′s advertising. (I know that Mad Men takes place in the ’60′s, but it’s the early ’60′s and there is still a strong ’50′s influence in the characters and their work. When you think of ’60′s art, it’s usually the later, psychedelic art. None of this is present in Mad Men yet.) I then turned to ’50′s and ’60′s movie posters. This helped me to nail down the color scheme. My original drawing had three tones. 100% black, 90% black and 80% black. These three colors (Navy, burnt orange and light tan) are further apart than my original grey tones, but I like the final result. There were a couple of areas where I changed the tone from mid-range to light (Betty’s face, Roger’s suit, etc.) and I think it works better.

The dot patterns, floral prints, plaids and other elements help to add dimension to a flat, three color drawing. There are no plans to get this printed up. But if there were, I’d use an off-white, cream colored paper. Hopefully these fine elements are visible in this jpg.

I was originally drawn to Mad Men because I work in a marketing/advertising agency. While my agency has next to no resemblance of Sterling Cooper (Draper and Pryce) I was drawn to the line “They can’t do what we do, and they hate us for it.” It was a line that Don said to Peggy while he was trying to sum up advertising and motivate her to create better, more meaningful, more effective work.

Google introduced me to Standard Deluxe down in Alabama. They were able to take me through the process of getting the poster printed. After nailing down the pricing, I sent them an Illustrator file with the three colors in separate layers. I also told them the PMS colors that I was looking for.

A couple of weeks later I received my shipment. Unfortunately, there was an issue with the printing that Standard Deluxe quickly fixed. The reprint enabled us to correct a color issue, as well as getting the right type of paper stock.

I was very pleased with the final piece. Reviews of the poster have been somewhat mixed online, but I expected that. I don’t take it personal because everyone is an anonymous art critic online. Many LOST fans have been very nice in their reviews of this poster. And I am very appreciative of their kind words.

This project was originally done out of love for the show. A positive reception to my art has inspired me to work on other, similar projects. But for now, you can purchase the poster in my store.

This past fall I spent a lot of time designing, developing and building an updated website for Sentinel Benefits and Financial Group. They were going through a re-branding and it seemed like the perfect time to update their website.

Their previous website had become bloated with too much information, making it hard for customers or potential customers to find what they were looking for. Sentinel offers so many investment and insurance options that it was hard to cull through all of the information. This is where Single Source, the agency where I work, came in.

After a few attempts to create the architecture, it was decided that we would build four separate sites aimed at each of Sentinel’s targets. Members (subscribers), Employers, Advisors and Investors would have their information right at their fingertips. For example, there is no reason why an Employer would have to sift through information aimed at Advisors.

While we were hammering out the architecture, I also started designing and building the site. At the same time, Single Source hired a writer to clean up all of the content that was on the old Sentinel site.

Knowing that some things (the logo, navigation, etc) had the potential to change, I fully built this site using CSS. After the site was mostly finished, I went in and added CSS style sheets for IE 6, IE 7 and IE 8. I waited until the end for this because if I did have to adjust something, I didn’t want to adjust the CSS sheet AND the three IE hack style sheets. Plus, there was a separate style sheet for each of the four areas of the site.

An interesting note, the flash animation that appears on the front page of each section is the result of a miscommunication. I had originally envisioned something completely different. But I wasn’t there to present my design and it was presented as an “iTunes-like” animation. One of those little “mistakes” that ends up working out for the best.

Another obstacle we encountered was that I wasn’t able to actual work on the client’s server. Because they have very sensitive materials on there, they have significant firewalls in place to protect their customers’ information. I built the site on one of our test servers. This later lead to additional testing once we handed the site over, but we were able to make the launch date. There were a couple of things that needed to be tweaked after the launch, but I was able to work alongside a very helpful IT guy at Sentinel. My general experience with IT people hasn’t been great, but Brad helped to change my perception.

I’ve never worked harder (or longer hours) on a website, but the information I learned during this massive project has changed the way that I build websites.

On a personal note, my wife was the true MVP of this project. She didn’t complain that I was getting home around midnight for two and a half months. We found that by the time she got to work, I was just starting my commute. She would call me from work and we’d be able to chat for about an hour. Judging by my cell phone bill, AT&T was true beneficiary of the project.

It was a fun exercise to reminisce about my time at Twins. A great time working with friends that I miss.

Have a read at APennysWorth.com

Since one of their primary products is windows, we needed to ensure that this would be a clean, bright website. The main feature of the website is the galleries that showcase all of the products that JB Sash has to offer. With that in mind, we worked out the architecture, breaking down the site by products, and then by brands.

We knew that the easiest way to show the many photos would be to use XML Flash galleries. This lead to one of the most difficult parts of the entire process: picking the photos. The account executive tracked down hundreds of photos from the manufacturers. JB Sash then picked out the best photos to be displayed on the site.

As if the galleries weren’t difficult enough, they also feature the ability to email the link to a friend. I set up individual forms for each gallery that a viewer could use to send the link to whomever they wanted. There are also several places on the site where a viewer can fill out a form and set up an appointment with a JB Sash representative.

Another area of the site that has garnered a lot of view is the video section. I wasn’t directly involved with the video testimonials, but those turned out well. It was my responsibility to get old VHS videos up on the site.  It was a bit of trial and error, but eventually I figured out the many, many steps involved.

All of these features are there to help gather sales leads which should, in turn, lead to additional sales.  Within the first 24 hours people were already submitting requests.

Once you take into account the number of photos on this site and all of the additional forms, this ended up being a large site. The client was great to work with and they trusted where we were going with the project.

First off, this obviously has nothing to do with the Lost posters that are currently coming out to promote the final season.

This was something that I started while the fifth season was still going on. I’ve been spending a lot of time admiring poster art, and I wanted to design something that might be cool enough that I would consider hanging in my own house.

I started off with a quick sketch of how I wanted the characters to be collaged together (if I can find that sketch, I’ll update this post with a scan). After spending a lot of time scouring Lost fan sites, I found the right photos and Photoshopped them together. I then brought it into Illustrator and started drawing over the photos. Some photos had to be swapped out while I was in the drawing phase (low contrast, not enough details, etc.) This art style is a combination of a style I developed while designed some MLB Player Caps a few years back, and my original love of comic book art.

For the most part, I used the pen tool. There are certain areas, like the hair on the women, where I used my Wacom Tablet. Unfortunately, there was no easy way to get Hurley’s hair right. There were areas where I took liberties, especially with some of the characters’ gazes.
Once I finally finished getting the blacks right, I started adding color. Originally I was working with red, but it started to look to violent. I switched it over to green and continued adding texture, patterns and general schmutz all over the poster.

After that, I started experimenting with different color combinations. After a lot of trial and error, I found that the best option was three different shades of green on white.
As for the characters, I tried to capture their essence. From Farraday looking at his watch, to Jin looking at Sun, to quite a few characters literally looking over their shoulders (and Ben overseeing everyone) I think this poster would appeal to any fan of the show.

Eventually I would like to get this screen printed. If I do, I’ll post actual photos.

After designing the logo (see details here) I started designing the website. My first layout was based on a wordpress blog that would highlight a few recent photo shoots. Jess didn’t want it to look so “blogg-y”. I then opted to keep it simple and design a clean website that would keep the focus on her photography. A white website with a single row of buttons that would be broken up by a centered logo would work perfectly.

The photo galleries were based on another site that Jess had seen before. She was able to find a free photo-viewer. Building it as an XML-based Flash gallery also gave her the opportunity to update her galleries when she wants to.

As I said, her previous site was a blog, so I wanted to add an area where she could post new photos and allow viewers to comment. I modified WordPress’ “default” theme so that it matched up with the rest of the site.

For the home page, I wanted something that would grab the viewer’s attention. A crisp collage showcasing Jess’ specialties would work perfectly. I usually like to design using bold colors and shapes, but this project allowed me to try something far from my comfort zone.

UPDATE: Sialia Photography has moved to a new web host/design. If you would like to see the site that I created, please click here.