An Eye on the Forest

I occasionally sit-down and create a "Portfolio Cheat-Sheet" as shown above. A single page of various cropped thumbnails of my design/illustration/product work that will usually accompany a resumé or go to a client for a quick visual reference.

I've never really been a designer that focused on one style or genre (perhaps supporting my abject obscurity), but find inspiration in variance. If you poke around this blog a bit, you'll see I have worked in a variety of industries that are seemingly quite disparate.

Because of the variety of projects, I find it a good exercise to thumbnail the work to gauge where I am leaning stylistically at a given moment. Work that has just been completed, mixed with the past helps me to see the "common threads" as well as where I may want to go next.

Cropping the images, aside from just arousing inquiry, helps to keep anyone from focusing too much on what the object is verses "reading" the visual "feel". In other words... something like not focusing on the trees, but to see the forest more clearly.

-rm

12 of Hearts

Since Valentines Day is approaching, I figured I share something "hearty". Shown here is an e-gift card I designed for an Agraria Valentine's promotion using the patterns I created for their fragrance packaging during my time there as their Executive Creative Director.

-rm

X-MAS

This Christmas card was the last thing I did for Agraria. It features a variety of ingredients in the many potpourris that Agraria makes ...in, as you can see, the form of a Christmas tree. I am personally partial to the shiminin shticks.

-rm