People of the Woods is a tiny local apparel company focused on creating naturally inspired apparel for camping, hiking and other outdoor activities. This design began as a collection of simple acrylic paintings of silhouetted trees. Extensive care was taken to simplify the design as much as possible for usability, but also retain enough detail so that the rustic, naturally worn appearance wasn’t lost.

The Challenge

Travis wanted a rougher, more worn appearance to the logo. It took me some time to wrap my head around this, since I’m typically working with more smooth, polished design concepts. After that, the hard part wasn’t creating it, but getting that worn, roughened look without making it impossible to read at smaller sizes.

How I Helped

After working with some of my usual artwork styles, it was pretty clear that I wasn’t quite grasping Travis’ vision. We sat together so that he could draw out what he was envisioning at various stages. Once we nailed down the bits that were troubling the client I got to work. I pulled out paint and brushes and started painting tree silhouettes. That’s when we really started making progress.

What I enjoyed about this project …

It’s not very often that I get to paint for work. I might get to sketch something in pencil or do some marker work, but let’s face it, what I do is digital. It ends up being completed on a computer. It was nice to sit on the floor like a kid and experiment this time. I also enjoyed the challenge of getting all the little details just right so that Travis could use it however he liked without having to tweak it.

Where you can support Travis…

Find Travis on Facebook  at People of the Woods and order yourself a cool shirt I helped him design here.