My Design Process — Shawn Decker Art & Design

LOGO CREATION PROCESS

My steps in creating a logo are pretty typical of professional designers, and each step in the process has its own important purpose.

Torogate sketches.jpg — Step 1 is to gather information from the client and work up some quick sketch ideas. From these scribbles, I focus on a few of the best ideas.

Toro first ideas.jpg — Step 2 is working up some refined logo ideas based off of my rough sketches, and presenting some options to choose from.

Toro second ideas.jpg — Step 3 involves continued refinement of the favored logo idea. This step may involve playing around with different fonts, color or layout.

SHIRT DESIGN PROCESS

Final Shirt Design

This was a safety conference shirt design logo, featuring a superhero theme. I’ll show you how we got to this final version.

Step 1 sketches

Just playing around with some different ideas for a safety theme. The “superstar” theme is the direction that was chosen to be developed further.

First design attempt

My first attempts at developing designs based on the superstar theme. Upon review, it was decided that the design needed to be more gender-neutral.

New sketch ideas

Back to the drawing board. Same superhero theme, but this type around I tried some versions that were not specifically featuring a male character, and were more generic.

New Design ideas

These are the general-neutral designs further developed, using “superstar” and “superhero” ideas. The bottom Safety Superstar design was ultimately chosen.

WATERCOLOR PAINTING PROCESS

Here is a step by step process of one of my watercolor paintings. Starting with the pencil drawing, I add layers of progressively darker colors, and then finish off the painting with the solid black details and shadowing.

Torogate final idea.jpg — And finally, we have a finished logo!

THE MAKING OF AN ALBUM COVER

This project for a band involved illustration, watercolor and graphic design work to create their album cover. Shown here is every step of the process from the initial rough sketch ideas, the pencil and inks, to the color mockup and the finished piece.

WOODEN CANVAS PAINTING STEP-BY-STEP

Here is a step by step process on one of my wooden canvas paintings, from the pencil layout to the final brush strokes.