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Rikki Burns I’m RikkiB, I’m 29 and I’ve been making t-shirts since I discovered iron-ons and an old screen in school. I’ve always drawn in my spare time and made my own crappy t-shirts to fill my personal craftiness requirement. When t-shirt competitions started showing up on the Internet I jumped at the chance. Then came opportunities from print on demand companies such as My- Soti, and smaller tee companies looking for different designers. I love the t-shirt design community. Emptees was great for opinion and advice. My Breakthrough Moment It was being picked up by shirt.woot.com. It gave me some great publicity, but the community at Design By Humans really got my name out there. I love them both for supporting me and the hundreds of other designers they help every day. Standing Out I’m probably a bit different from the others because I only design as a hobby - so I haven’t gone out there with my name on a NES themed YouTube video. I’d certainly <strong>not</strong> recommend against making something ‘“viral” but I would recommend making something awesome! I can only handle a small amount of design work in my spare time so I generally don’t go looking for it. It still comes to me which is probably a combination of luck and promotion from awesome t-shirt competition sites. My inspirations include Ray Fenwick, Ray Frenden, Jimiyo, Wotto, Godmachine... Their styles are different from mine, but I admire them and their attitudes. If I Could Do Things Differently I’d listen to people more. When you look back in a year, you’ll see that the designs you loved were actually pretty shitty. And you’ll recall that someone who knows told you that, but you didn’t believe them. Get all the criticism and advice you can before putting your work out there with your name on it - especially online, because it never goes away. THREAD’S NOT DEAD • Jeff Finley I’d recommend joining a community like Emptees. Get some real advice and criticism, and use it to make your work better. Criticism can be harsh so get your thick skin on before you go there... and remember that you’re better off improving your work in that kind of environment than in a real public forum. Trends Firstly, the distribution of t-shirt sales has gone from smaller stores to huge daily tee and competition websites, to print on demand. This has made it easy for anyone to be a designer, and harder for designers to get <strong>not</strong>iced. In actual design, the trends change almost weekly. One week it’s wolves, then space, then robots, then bears, then huge prints, then small prints... Case Studies & Interviews 96
Kelly Kiernan I am 21 years old and I started my clothing brand Cure Apparel in August of 2008. I’ve been plugging away at this for 2 years now, but have always had projects going on in art and music. I played guitar and vocals in a metal band throughout high school. We landed a record deal on the local independent label and put out an album. Naturally we needed shirts, stickers, and album artwork. At the time I had no idea that there were such things as professional graphic designers (seems silly now I know). I had Photoshop, so I started hacking away. As we got older my friends and I got jobs and girlfriends and the band fell apart. I’ve always been the entrepreneurial type, so I needed a project to work on. While looking for shirts that related to diabetes (I have type 1), I realized I could start my own brand to reach out to the diabetic community. I was stoked on the idea and quickly discovered that there was an entire scene of clothing companies and designers…really talented people. I studied my favorite brands and used them as inspiration to work on my own. I’m still learning every day, and still trying to bring what is in my head to reality. THREAD’S NOT DEAD • Jeff Finley My Breakthrough Moment There hasn’t been one single breakthrough moment for me. It’s been years of different realizations with surely more to come. I can say my first “aha” moment came when speaking to the owner of a Porsche dealership my mom works for. He emphasized the importance of hard work, and told me that while I’m “jerking off” someone else is busting their ass for the things I want. He stressed the importance being proactive and persistent. He made a huge impression on me. Until that conversation I never realized that you need to actively pursue your goals. If you really want something, work for it. You can get it with desire, dedication and persistence. One thing I try to remember is that defeat is temporary. There are tons of inspirational stories about people who failed numerous times and hit many road blocks before some great success. Read about Edison, Ford, or Frederick Smith (founder of FedEx). Inspirations My biggest inspirations are Jeff Finley (Go Media), Kyle Crawford (Electric Zombie), and Jeff Sheldon (Ugmonk). I always watch what these guys are doing. Case Studies & Interviews 97
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Copyright © 2011 Go Media Inc., Al
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CONTRIBUTORS Matt Wigham, founder o
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Designs for Fall Out Boy by Rob Dob
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“The Strain” by Angryblue THREA
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Your 3 Roles: The Artist, Designer,
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Keys to a Great Portfolio The most
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“Year of the Beard” designed by
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4 Tips When Contacting a New Client
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Other Tips for Avoiding Busters “
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“Great Job” by Rikki B offered
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work directly for the band - but th
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commercial nature or is for nonprof
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From what we learned, the client th
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Dave Pearson of Paint the Stars t-s
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5 Tips for Design Contest Success W
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“Eco” t-shirt design by Chris C
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Does it Sell? Another measuring sti
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How to Come up With Good Ideas? Eve
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Affliction and MMA have heavily inf
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Dan Mumford has inspired many with
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T-shirt design for Slayer by Angryb
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Organizing Layers in Photoshop Laye
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Page 112 and 113: Brandon Rike My name is Brandon Rik
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Page 116 and 117: Jon Kruse My name is Jonathan Kruse
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