I kept things relatively quiet on the blog for the past week in order to keep attention on the Haiti relief effort. I want to send out a huge thanks to all those who ordered posters over the past week to help raise money to be donated to the Canadian Red Cross. In total, $1,187.02 has been raised, which surpassed all of my expectations.

I really appreciate all of those who brought attention to this effort, notably Applied Arts magazine for bringing people together for such a good cause. Thanks so much, everyone.

The republic of Haiti was hit with a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on Tuesday, January 12th. Most of the necessities of life, such as food, shelter and water have been reduced to near nothing and the poor country is now struggling with rescue efforts and the dispersal of much-needed supplies and aid. They have very little to work with.

For the next week, artists like Chuck Anderson are donating all money they make from selling their wares to the disaster relief fund to help Haiti, and Signalnoise will be doing the same. 100% of sales from the Signalnoise Store for the next week will be donated directly in support of Haiti. I will also include an 11 x 17 poster version of the ‘For Haiti’ design. Please note, the photocopied photograph used in my design was originally taken by Maggie Steber.

Big thanks to the following for their orders and support:

• Ramon Thompson
• Andreas Ellwanger
• Emilio Bellu
• Brandy Byrd
• Franz Jeitz
• The Remakers
• Luke Desroches
• Allison McCarthy
• Daniel Yankowsky
• Melissa Mercado
• Jonathan Mitchell
• Mathieu Cristinziani
• Andy Heckathorne
• Aaron Irizarry
• Matthew Hayashida
• Derek Hartley
• Jeff Simpson
• Cameron Duthie
• Dan Andriciuc
• Andrew Fallon

It’s easy to feel separated from things like this based on geography, but it doesn’t mean we’re not all in this together. Every bit counts. My heart goes out to you, Haiti.

Please note, all posters will be shipped out of Halifax next week, starting January 25th.

To kick off the new year in form, the kind folks over at the Tuts+ Network asked me to design a commemorative 2010 poster. I am always in support of those people and websites who help out designers and developers on all levels, and the team over at the Tuts+ camp constantly exhaust themselves. They run VectorTuts, NetTuts, AudioTuts, the mighty PsdTuts and a plethora of other art and tech sites. So of course, I jumped at the opportunity to help out such an admirable bunch.

Additionally, Tuts+ are having a giveaway on their site where you could win one of 10 copies of the 2010 poster. Swing over to the Tuts+ 2010 contest post to see all the information. I created a wallpaper set of the design to download for your computer or iPhone, all of which are available on their website.

I love having an open-ended ticket to create a design, which was exactly what the team requested of me so long as it said “2010″ somewhere. After doing some research on sci-fi publications from the 70s and 80s I took some heavy inspiration from Omni magazine covers. Omni had a way of creating interesting yet vague imagery, something that left a lot to the imagination. I wanted to strike that vibe for the Tuts+ crew, I even modeled the type after Omni’s title treatment.

Initially, the design didn’t come together as quickly as I thought it would and the original attempts had me on a completely different course of action. Check out these early type-based versions:

I decided to ditch the entire concept and start from scratch, I wanted to do something more striking than a stylized number. I went back to the sketch phase and started working out another concept, and one involved an ‘exploding astronaut’ which later became the Abduzeedo anniversary poster. A big thanks to Sean Hodge over at the Tuts+ Network for being so cool as I fumbled about with my concepts in my search for the right one. You rule, man!

Swing on over to the post on Tuts+ for your chance to win one of the 2010 commemorative posters, and why not grab some wallpapers while you’re at it. Happy New Year!

Fabio Sasso and the bang-up team over at Abduzeedo are celebrating their 3rd year this month. 3 years is a long time of sharing inspiration, tutorials, advice and design news around the web and the team shows no sign of letting up. Fabio asked me to participate in the celebration by means of a poster giveaway, and since he has been an amazing supporter of me and my work for a few years now I am hugely honored to be a part of the big event. Shown above is my Abduzeedo 3rd Year Anniversary poster.

The inspiration behind this one is fairly simple: 2001: A Space Odyssey mixed with the Star Trek movie posters by Bob Peak I posted last week. I spent a considerable amount of time building the radium lines in this design, and the PSD file topped 1.4 GB near the end, probably my largest yet.

The massive giveaway is underway with lots of amazing prizes including three copies of this poster, so swing on over to Abduzeedo for your chance to win.

Happy 3 years, Abduzeedo! Here’s to many more.

Here is a recent poster design I created for the Nike Track Nationals event. I had a great time working with the folks over at the mighty Nike, they wanted something bright and explosive to kick-of the event promotion.

This was a challenge as I was hired to create a design surrounding all of the elements they supplied me with, including the logos and photographs. My designs is typically more simplistic then this, so it was an enjoyable deviation from my Signalnoise work as I massaged the elements into the concept. I had a great time developing that colorful pixellated background.

As with most of my posters, I went through a few different versions before landing on what Nike was ultimately looking for. Here are a few working concepts as I explored:

Thanks so much to the team over at Nike for this project. Lots of fun. You can also swing by Niketracknationals.com for more information about the big event.

Here is a poster I designed for a friend’s fundraising rock show in support of local independent radio CKDU FM here in Halifax.

This poster started just over a week ago when I began experimenting with an organic multicolored background to see what sort of effect it might hold. I documented it a bit on my Twitter as I built the overlays, and kept chipping away at it on my own time.

Here are a few different iterations of the design as I progressed.

For some reason, I’ve been wanting to design a poster with a giant polar bear for over a year now so when Tiina approached me to design a poster for this event, I thought it was a good opportunity to sneak it in. I wanted this to look Canadian, and there is certainly some Scott Hansen and Mike Orduna influence here with the wildlife and spray effects.

I will be adjusting this design over the next little while before it is made available in the Signalnoise Store. The show is happening on October 10th at Rock Garden here in Halifax.

Here is my newest poster design for the kind folks over at the International Year of Astronomy camp. This time in promotion of their upcoming event entitled Galilean Nights, celebrating the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei looking to the cosmos through his telescope. Here is a quick synopsis of the event, happening October 22 – 24:

“This new IYA2009 Cornerstone Project is called Galilean Nights and will see amateur and professional astronomers around the globe taking to the streets, pointing their telescopes to the wonders that Galileo observed 400 years ago. The project’s focus is sidewalk observations of gas giant Jupiter and its moons and members of the public will as also be able to observe the Sun, our own Moon and many more celestial marvels with the own eyes, much like Galileo did 400 years ago.”

This is the second poster I have designed for the IYA2009, the first of which being for the 100 Hours of Astronomy event that happened this past April. I wanted the new poster to stand along, yet have elements relating back to the first.

So, be sure to aim those telescopes skyward in October to observe the tiny ink drop our planet resides in. Space is the place.

Hello Halifax! A friendly reminder that my pal Sean Jordan, the Wordburglar, will be playing a show tonight (Aug. 8) at the Seahorse Tavern on Argyle Street.

As I mentioned on my Twitter this week, I have a few copies of the above poster and will bring them along to give away. Just say hello to me or Sean to nab one :)

Hope to see you there.