So, this is nothing short of incredible! Made with Brushes for the iPad and a lot of talent.

I haven’t visited the Concept Ships blog in awhile and wow, a re-visit there never fails to inspire me. Studying images like these teaches me a lot about composition, mood, and color. Lovely, lovely stuff!

No doubt the majority of you are already familiar with Cameron Moll’s beautiful new type poster Colosseo. In case you aren’t, this project took roughly a year to create and is a complete re-imagining of the Colosseum using type. The final piece is letter-pressed and available for sale. With the launch of this poster Cameron created this short film showing it’s trip through the presses as well as a brief interview of himself talking about the project:

I swear every time I see a film shot with a video-capable DSLR I want to buy one.

Cameron is also on Dribbble and released sneak peeks at his progress on this poster. Creating something like this boggles my mind, mostly because I don’t have the patience to work on something for this long. In fact I had the opportunity to meet Cameron during SXSW and when discussing this project he asked if I would ever consider doing something like it and without wasting a breath I said “No.” I love details and all, but this is outside my comfort zone. That’s why I commend Cameron for having the vision, doing the research, and sticking with it all the way through to the end. It’s extremely admirable.

On a related note meeting Cameron was a real pleasure. This year at SXSW I made it a point to connect with colleagues I admire and have been intentional about getting to know online over the past year. For whatever reason when I meet people who are well known and respected in our industry I brace myself for whatever ego I may encounter. Cameron was easily one of the most genuine and laid-back persons I met at the conference. Easily. We didn’t get a chance to chat long, but it left an impression on me.

In fact that one experience was just part of how pleasantly surprised I was overall at how welcoming and friendly everyone was I met during those 5 days. Maybe it was the good weather, free drinks, or the tacos from the One Taco stand…or maybe I was just unnecessarily wary of my fellow geeks. Regardless, I had an absolute blast talking to so many people that I’m already ready to roll for SXSW 2011!

So here’s to another year of virtual conversations & collaborations with those of you I now know in person and those I have yet to meet. Cheers!

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted any work by Scott Hansen. As usual I love these posters. You can tell that his style has evolved a little with the use of silhouettes and more simplistic, negative space compositions, but still beautifully vintage as always. I also love the last one with the split photographs. So inspiring!

And on goes my fascination with concept artists and matte painters. This example is from Jesse van Dijk, a concept artist from Amsterdam. This painting is from Project Indigo, a personal project depicting a vertical city “…situated on a huge pillar in a ‘cavity’ in the sea; possibly an inactive volcano crater…” Jesse shares his conceptual process and illustrates how inhabitants located towards the top of the city would be able to rely on natural light more so than those located lower who would need to use artificial light such as oil lamps. I love these kinds of details.

Again I’m inspired, and with my new Wacom and reading materials I’ve obtained through a coworker I’m now closer to actually exploring this style of art. I’ve even jotted down a couple of notes for a possible beginner project, but I’m still far from anything near this level of quality or even understanding what it takes to get to this point. Still, it’s fun to revisit the fundamentals of fine art, which I’ve allowed to grow stale over the years since college.

Martin Ansin’s work has a beautiful illustrative style as you can see in this detailed view of his Taming Light poster for “…a group exhibition featuring painting, photography and illustration inspired by the films of Stanley Kubrick”.

I’m unclear as to what a “handdrawn audioresponsive video exploration” is, but that’s not stopping me from fully enjoying this beautiful video by Gwen Vanhee.