While LaunchDM Creative Nick Belcher and I were brainstorming new ideas for a blog series, we came to the conclusion that we both wanted to do something that would force us to think a little more abstractly and push our creativity. Thus a blog series was born! And this blog series would be named, “Random Words”.
The concept for said blog series would be simple enough in nature, use a Random Word Generator to give us a random word, then create a single graphic on an Instagram size canvas, using that word. The “rules” end there. We are free to visually interpret the word however we want, within reason of course. We wanted to leave this series as creatively open as possible to let our ideas, personalities and experiences flow freely. We thought this would be a way to get the creativity flowing and give us a good excuse to maybe try out something new. Plus our readers of Fresh Paint will get a little more insight into some of the creative minds here at LaunchDM!
as·pir·ing
/əˈspī(ə)riNG/
adjective: directing one’s hopes or ambitions toward becoming a specified type of person.
For the first Random Words post, I received the word “Aspiring”. For me, this word always makes me think of the song “Young and Aspiring” by one of my all-time favorite bands; Underoath. I started listening to Underoath when I was about 15 and have followed them ever since. In April I was lucky enough to see them again in NYC on the “Rebirth” reunion tour (they were previously disbanded since 2013), which is actually where the background live photo was taken.
Since Underoath is a grungy, post-hardcore, metal band, I wanted to create a graphic that was fitting for their fast, loud, distorted and experimental sound. Using the photo I took at the April show I attended, along with the iconic album artwork from “They’re Only Chasing Safety” (the album containing the song “Young and Aspiring”), I converted the photo to black & white, then added blur and film grain for texture. For the type treatment, I wanted to do something unorthodox and experimental. So I created a text box, then put each word on its own line to reside on and justified the text alignment.
I had a lot of fun working on this little project and was really happy with how it turned out! Being “cut loose” to design something different and stretch my legs a little bit is always awesome. Stay tuned for more “Random Words” posts in the near future!