DesignBrawl is the weblog of A. Craig Williams. It gets less coherent every day.

Olga Feldman

Posted: February 12th, 2010 | Author: craig | Filed under: Illustration, Inspiration | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

Super.


Sanjuro/Yojimbo

Posted: February 9th, 2010 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Inspiration | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

I came across these covers for two of Akira Kurosawa’s best flicks the other day while looking for another one of his films on Netflix. Love them.

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Adobe Illustrator: Fading Out Shadows

Posted: October 23rd, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Tutorial | Tags: , , , , | 2 Comments »

Here’s a quick tutorial where I run through using the opacity mask in Illustrator to create transparent shadows that fade out to nothing. I can remember when I first started drawing in Illustrator it took longer than I care to admit before I realized that a gradient didn’t have to have two colors (ok, it does but it doesn’t have to appear that way).


Martin Ansin’s Phantom of the Opera

Posted: October 19th, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Inspiration | Tags: , , , | No Comments »

Here’s a beautifully rendered poster for the Phantom of the Opera at the Alamo Drafthouse by Martin Ansin.759221255436155

Details after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »


The Orange Chair

Posted: October 2nd, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Freebie, Illustration | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

I’m not sure what I was planning to do with this drawing. I’m pretty sure I was just drawing it for a screencast that I ended up not using. Anyway, I’m giving away the .ai file in the hopes that somebody has a use for it.

orangechairHere’s a link to the .ai file.


Quick Color Matching in Illustrator

Posted: September 25th, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design | Tags: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Here’s a really quick way to match a color to an external source (like a paint chip). I used to have to do this a lot when I was doing architectural renderings that were then printed to a large-format Epson 9600.


Striped Dress Vector

Posted: September 24th, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Freebie, Illustration | Tags: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Here’s an illustration done in Adobe Illustrator that I ended up not being able to use. All of the texture and ruffles are done using the stripes, not with a gradient mesh.

striped-dress

You can download the .ai file here. Enjoy.


Draw Fluffy Clouds in Adobe Illustrator

Posted: September 23rd, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Tutorial | Tags: , , , , , , | No Comments »


Tyler Stout’s Inglourious Basterds Poster

Posted: September 22nd, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Inspiration | Tags: , , , , | No Comments »

Tyler Stout consistently does amazing work. Here’s a poster for Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds that I can’t get enough of.

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Quick Highlights in Illustrator

Posted: September 22nd, 2009 | Author: craig | Filed under: Design, Illustration, Tutorial | Tags: , , , , , , | No Comments »

Here’s a quick tutorial using the Dunks that I gave away in an earlier post. It shows how to create complex highlights using the pathfinder tool. If you wanted to, sharp shadows can be done the same way.