Revisions

Making art for other people is a process. You come up with an idea, they love it, you proceed to a concept. It is at exactly this point that all hell breaks loose. It's just part of the process, but it can be a lengthy one. Clients can be fickle, and change their minds on a whim, because hey...they're paying for it. So usually artwork goes through many revisions and possibly multiple artists before it is ever approved for final product, no matter how cool it was to begin with. Here are some steps/ concepts up to final art for a shirt you can currently buy at Margaritaville's online store and or in the Orlando store. It may be available in other cities, but I've been too lazy to check up on that.

So theres a Buffett song called Saxaphones that contains the line "we used to hang out in a funky little bar, they call it the shipwreck lounge." So I thought lets make a piratey shirt (because hey, pirates have been hot for a couple years now) that incorporates this lyric into a design that features a typographic treatment for "the shipwreck lounge" that would maybe appear on a bar sign. Great, so I start by drawing out the type for Shipwreck.



Next I bring that into illustrator, do the rest of the type, and start screwing around with a composition and elements that are piratey, but still Jimmy Buffett. I don't know what's more Buffett than booze and a guitar, so I go there.



At this point, it can still use some work, but it's good enough to show for an idea. So I get feedback, and initially the guys at Mville didn't believe me that this shipwreck lounge lyric existed. So I'm told to take it out. I'm also told to make it less piratey and more lighthearted. Not in those words, and this feedback is also coming through several people in a chain of communication. That brings me to the ridiculous beachcomber hat that in the end I'm glad got shot down...




At this point, by committee (ask any artist and they will tell you how awesome working that way is) it is decided we need a different tag line, a ship wheel, make the booze less prominent. After double checking it out, the "shipwreck lounge" logo is back in because turns out I did my homework and it was actually in the song. No filligree because it's too girly, and maybe a different banner, and for kicks, throw a map grid in the background too. Now to be fair, I thought this version wasn't too bad...



Now wait a second...what were you thinking with those kick ass pirate pistols! We can't have guns on a shirt, no matter how cool they look. So take those out. Oh, we also want to throw in the tagline "Livin and Dying in 3/4 Time" and fit that long word that you love so much "margaritaville" into the design somewhere. (in case you had not counted, the word margaritaville has 14 letters in it. 14) Make it so it has another layer for flocking, and get rid of that ridiculous hat on the skull. Oh and we decided booze is ok. And bring back that other banner...



Now to be honest, at this point, I've ceased to care about this design. I was excited about it at first, but now I hand it over to another artist. Who goes through several revisions (2 to 3) and then on finally to my buddy Mark. He also goes through several revisions, including "the skull looks too happy. Even though early on we were afraid to do a piratey shirt to begin with, we need one that doesn't looks like it's smiling" This comment made me LOL. All skulls look like they are smiling. But whatever. Which brings us to the final version of the shirt, which contains elements from all three artists. My original typography and booze bottles are still in there, so I contributed to about only 1/3 of this design. Usually when something is designed by committee and passed between multiple artists, the final product is less than good. But in this rare instance, I think all 3 of us really liked the final product, and so did the client.