New favorite technique

So my new favorite thing to have in my projects this quarter is handwritten type. I have 2 books that show incredible examples of having hand-made items in your graphic design, so I've been trying to utilize it in a lot of things i'm working on.

Mostly i'm using it in my entertainment design class. We are designing 2 album covers, a show poster and 2 pieces of merchandise for an assigned band. I was given Dismemberment Plan which was a pretty successful indie rock band that formed in the 90s. They have a unique sound and really creative lyrics. I wanted to convey the fact that they were a self-promoted independent band and that they have very iconic song lyrics. I decided to use handwritten type to show that they kind of hand-created their image and include song lyrics and song titles to show their importance.

I love the effect of hand-done type but it takes forever! I always think that I am going to get so much done at once and then it takes me twice as long to accomplish things! I have to write it out in pencil, go over in it different markers, erase the pencil, scan it all in, change it to greyscale, adjust the contrast and levels in photoshop, move it to illustrator, live trace it and then adjust the settings so it looks write and THEN work on coloring it how I like. I've gotten used to the process but I am still surprised by the time consuming aspect of it.

I started with the logotype of the band. I scanned in the different parts I wanted in the look I wanted:

Then I got it vectorized how I liked it and this is the final result:

I did the same thing for the single cover that I am doing which will be 12X12 like a record cover. I wrote out most of the lyrics so that they will overlay a picture of Boston in the winter (the single is called the Ice of Boston). Here is the first scan:

Then I converted it to illustrator

Then I moved them to be layered over the picture. This is the direction I've been going, but probably not the final version yet:

I am also doing 4 cd covers that are going to go together in a box set. Basically so fans could buy all of their studio length albums together. I decided to create grids on the covers like the logotype and then every space would have an icon or the names of a song title. Here are some of the original scans:

And here are the near-final versions that include the front and back covers:

These will eventually be printed on a cardboard-like material. I am also using hand-done type on the show poster I'm doing. Which I think I am going to screen print so I'm really excited about that. I'll probably end up screen printing t-shirts as well. Anyways, more to come later!