CHAIRS OF HOPE 2012

Recently, I designed this poster to help promote an awesome event called Chairs of Hope. Vandora Springs Elementary School Art Club members (and anyone else who wants to chip in) paint chairs with different themes each year. These chairs are sold at a silent auction to raise money for Relay For Life. The theme for 2012 is “Famous Works of Art.”

To find out more, please visit http://www.chairsofhope.webs.com/

Feel free to download the poster, print, hang up, or share in any way

*UPDATE*
4-23-2012

Here are some images from the event

TWO LAYNE HIGHWAY – LIVE

**UPDATE**
Video from the performance at Aversboro Coffee

Greetings,

Performing live music is one of my favorite things in life. It has become a rare occasion for me to play music in front of anyone other than my wife in the past few years; however, since the spring I have been able to reconnect with some of my musical soul mates from time to time to “jam.” Our group has been called Two Layne Highway since our first gig when we were still in high school. Originally it was a tribute to the late Alice in Chains singer, Layne Staley. We started out learning and performing Alice in Chains songs and then went on to write lots of originals. The name Two Layne Highway stuck and we still like it to this day

I am excited to announce that Two Layne Highway will be performing again at Aversboro Coffee in Garner, NC on November 19, 2011 from 3-5pm. Aversboro is run by some of the nicest folks you’ll ever meet. It’s a great place to relax and enjoy some live tunes and great beverages. I designed the poster below to advertise the event, feel free to print it and hang it up

NAB SHOW 2011

This was my company’s third year in a row getting to visit the NAB Show in Las Vegas (though my first time), and we saw an ample amount of impressive technology in the multimedia production field. The convention is overwhelming to say the least, housing booths for industry leaders like Canon, JVC, Panasonic, Sony, Dolby, Adobe, Red, Autodesk, etc. and 30,000 people from all over the world visiting for demos, speakers, and insights on new technology.

PRODUCTION EQUIPMENT

The show floor was filled with cameras, stabilizers, lighting rigs, jibs, etc. to view and try out. Some of the larger “booths” including Sony, Canon, JVC, etc. had set up stages, lighting, and even models for show attendees to demo cameras & equipment on. It’s really nice to be able to try out this equipment on real sets to get an idea of exactly how it would work for your own business’ productions. There were many different booths featuring tripods, sliders, and various other camera stabilizers including Wilmington, NC’s Innocinema where we were able to demo a new Action Products stabilizer. Also, we were able to catch most of a Vincent Laforet Q & A.

And we even got to see Kevin Smith discussing his new movie Red State.

Visiting the audio production booths, we were able to see all sorts of equipment like sound booths, microphones, headphones, stock music companies etc. To name a few, we visited Shure, Omni Music, and Whisper Room and were able to walk in isolation booths and listen to audio production samples.

POST-PRODUCTION

The post-production section of the show featured demos, speakers, plug-ins, etc. We were able to visit Adobe, Autodesk, Maxon, Red Giant, RE: Vision Effects and many more. Most of these booths had speakers demoing the products and/or teaching different techniques. We spent time listening in on some lectures/demos with Richard Harrington at Adobe in which he showed off some After Effects & Premiere techniques.

We also listened in on a very in-depth creative process/Cinema 4D demo with Rob Garrott. Rob was incredibly thorough in his presentation and it was really nice to get that sort of creative/professional insight, learning about his process and seeing the project basically from start to finish. Also, the announcement of Final Cut Pro X was huge news around the NAB Show. Go here for some nice details and even video of the presentation, it will be available in June 2011.

*Also, with the tiny bit of down time that was available, I was able to visit the Hoover Dam! Below you can view an image I created using 14 pictures taken on my Canon Rebel T2i with a 50mm Lens.

And some mountains around the Hoover Dam.

PHOTOSHOP TUTORIALS: PAGE PEEL

*Wrote this article a while back for my company and wanted to share it on my blog too*

Greetings readers,

I would like to share a nifty trick with you today in Adobe Photoshop. The page peel effect can be found in many different designs because it is aesthetically appealing. Some folks don’t realize that the technique is deceptively simple. Below you can view what we are trying to create in this tutorial. The photo is from a production with artsee magazine.

We’re going to start out with a blank document in Photoshop. Size isn’t terribly important for this effect, but I am using a landscape-oriented letter sized document (11in. x 8.5in.) at 300dpi.

Now we want to select the background (Command/Control + A) and fill it with a radial gradient of a red to dark red. To get this same look, simply make your gradient and then click from the very center of the canvas and drag to one of the corners.

Next, we want to create our piece of paper that will look like it is being peeled off of the red background. To do so, select the Rectangle tool (U) and draw out a white rectangle somewhere around the lower left part of the canvas.

The next step will be to make a copy of this shape, which can be done by dragging the layer to the new layer icon, or by simply pressing Command + J. Then we want to drag the copied layer below the original shape, and change it’s color (by double clicking the color well left of the layer) to black. It helps to be able to see what you are doing, so we’re going to turn of the top rectangle layer by clicking the eyeball to the left of its layer.

Now we need to convert this layer to a smart object by right-clicking the layer and selecting “Convert to Smart Object.” Then we can go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur to blur our black layer and make it look more like a shadow.

Next, press Command + T in order to transform this object then right-click on the image and select “Warp.” Now we are going to grab the lower right hand corner of our black box and drag it down just a hair.

If we turn the white rectangle layer back on, you can now see that it appears as if the white rectangle is being lifted from the background. It also helps to reduce the opacity of the shadow layer a little bit for a more believable look.

As you can see here, it is quite simple to make it appear as if the white rectangle is being pulled up on both sides by using the same technique and warping the bottom-middle part of the shadow upwards.

Thanks for joining me for this tutorial on the page peeling effect