How I Did Geoff Rowley, Air Supply, & BMX Prom Dances

[Fig. 1: © Amy Hood]

So the title of this blog is a tad misleading, but there's nothing like a good sexual innuendo to drive traffic. My Geoff Rowley illustration is complete! Above [Fig. 1] is the version I'll probably get made into posters. Figure 2 is closer to the version that will be used in print. It depicts Geoff as a patron saint of skateboard donations (thus the halo) because the interview is about Geoff's involvement with the Maloof Money Cup's "Skate & Donate" program. I hope it looks good in the final layout. I did another progression shot from start to finish too [see fig. 3]. 

[Fig. 2: © Amy Hood]

It's press week again. So I'll end this fairly short post with a list of some fun/inspiring things I've done/encountered this week:

• Sexy Saxophone Guy (Courtesy of Bird Doerr): Move over "Friday" girl, this vid's going viral.
• "Black Velvet" (Courtesy of the girl at the karaoke bar on Friday night that KILLED. THIS. SONG.): I guess Canada gave us more than Bryan Adams, Celine Dion and hockey. It gave us this 80's gem too.
• "Making Love Out of Nothing At All" by Air Supply: After getting stoked on "Black Velvet" I made an amazing 80's monster love ballads playlist on Grooveshark which included this song. How I remembered it, I'll never know; I'm just glad I did. 
• Vintage BMX photos (courtesy of Jen Hood): These old pics are so cool.
• RAD (Courtesy of Chris Steblay): After looking at Jen's blog, Chris showed us this. I've never EVER used this phrase, but there's a first time for everything: LMAO. BMX dancing to "Send Me An Angel". Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Gray have got nothing on these two.
• Vintage Skateboarding & Surf Photos From Venice (Courtesy of The Selvedge Yard)

Cheers!

Amy

Listening to: Social Distortion's "99 To Life"

[Fig. 3: Geoff Rowley Illustration Progression. Click to enlarge. © Amy Hood]

Geoff Rowley Illustrations, Punks With Heart, & The Maloof Money Cup World Skateboarding Championships,

[Fig 1: My illustration of The Legendary Geoff Rowley so far. On the home stretch.]

This is an art blog, though if one stumbled upon this blog at random, they would normally not find a post of my artwork. Artwork takes time, ok? That's my excuse. And it's actually true for once since I've been super busy with graphic design work. Sometimes, however, the stars and the planets align and I get to do really fun artsy stuff for my design work. Now is one of those times. 


I interviewed Geoff Rowley [See Fig 1.], pro skater and co-owner of Flip, recently for the May issue of The OC Gazette. He's involved with this really cool program called Skate & Donate through Vans and Maloof Money Cup. They're collecting shoes and other skate gear to donate to less fortunate kids around the world, beginning with South Africa. Not only that but Geoff is working with the Maloof Brothers to help design all the courses for this years Maloof Money Cup events, and once designed and built, these cutting edge parks will be left for the enjoyment and use of the communities. How cool is that? Geoff is a little punk ass, Motorhead loving, skater kid, but he has a big heart beating underneath that ratty black metal tee. I love that about him. They'll be donating the first batch of shoes to kids in South Africa on the opening day of the Maloof Money Cup World Skateboarding Championships in Kimberly. 


Anyways, the PR people for Maloof didn't have any good photos of Geoff for us to run with the interview, so I decided it would be the perfect opportunity to flex my illustrating skills again. I was so stoked on my John Wayne illustration, and I've been wanting to do more ever since. Here's a progression of it so far. [See Fig 2.] My friends are all telling me I need to get a Wacom. Apparently it will change my life. Using the pen tool for this stuff is SO tedious so I'm thinking they're right. I could totally do these all day long. [Rolling Stone? Spin? Paste? If you're reading this, remember me for your next illustration project!]

[Fig. 2. Click to enlarge. Doooo it.]

That's all I've got for you fine folks. Oh, and go check out Alex Baird's blog! She's a journalist/music enthusiast and she scribbled some very sweet words about this blog on her's.

-Amy 

Listening to: Motorhead's "Ace of Spades"

Design Work, Art Competitions, & John Wayne

[ "Why We Love OC" Feature. Click to enlarge. ©Amy Hood ]

Here's a layout/special feature I did for the February issue of The OC Gazette. It's our annual "Why We Love OC" feature where we ask OC's finest why they love this great county we live in. It's always a lot of fun to layout, but gathering all the quotes and keeping the participants fresh is A LOT of work. Which reminds me of some other exciting news. I'll be interviewing John Wayne's widow for a piece we are doing on the American legend. It's going to chronicle life was like with "The Duke" from the eyes of one of the people who was closest to him. I think it is going to be very interesting. 

HELP A GIRL OUT!

Also, I entered a really cool looking art competition with a pretty hefty prize. Winner get's their own exhibit and $10k! It's called "A Year In Review" and it's being put on by Artists Wanted. Check out my profile here and vote for me! I entered a little late, so I need all the help I can get! http://www.artistswanted.org/amyhood

- Amy

Listening to: Nirvana's "The Man Who Sold The World"

Inspiring me right now: Coco Pitt. Check it out:

Talking With Matt Barnes on Fashion, The Killer B's, and The Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy

[ Click to enlarge. It's readable at full size! ]

Here's the interview I did with Matty Barnes of the LA Lakers for the December issue of The OC Gazette. I really like how it turned out, especially the "Firsts" part of the interview (i.e. first car, first kiss, first game...). I also really like how my layout turned out too. Short post... I know you're all thanking your lucky stars. I can't help that I ramble.

Here are days 8 and 9 of Dressember:

- Amy
Listening to: The Moulin Rouge Soundtrack

Illustratrations, Matt Barnes, and The Smart Brothers

Inspired by Jen's diamond, I made my own for use in The OC Gazette this month. It's an illustration to accompany my Off The Record interview with new Laker Matty Barnes to signify his many different facets. How about his last two games? Our bench is probably better than some teams' starting lineups between Brown, Barnes, Blake and soon Odom again. I see another Larry O'Brien in our future.

- Amy

Listening to The Smart Brothers' Heavens' Gate. They're an amazing band from SD.

Buzz Aldrin, Black Bush, and Space themed Classic Rock

[Buzz Aldrin interview for Off The Record and layout. ]

Here is a layout I did for the August issue of The OC Gazette for my Off The Record interview with Buzz Aldrin. Yep, I got to talk to the Rocket Man himself. We talked about his old hometown of Laguna Beach, what it's like to be "sitting in a tin can far above the moon" about to set foot upon it, and if he get's tired of all the "Fly Me To The Moon," "Rocket Man" and "Space Oddity" references. He was a pretty straight laced guy; very nice, but VERY smart which made it a bit difficult to joke with him as he took a few of them seriously. When a 23 year old girl from Orange County with only 80% of an associates degree to her credit interviews a world renown aerospace engineer and astronaut, a piece here or there is bound to get lost in translation. All in all Buzz was brilliant and a real class act. I would ask a question and he would start reciting his scientific jargon, and even though I was so lost as to what he was saying, it somehow seemed like poetry. I guess he's really making a case for the exploration and settlement of Mars. I wonder if he's seen the "Black Bush" skit Dave Chapelle did. "We ain't stoppin' at the moon! M-A-R-S... Mars bitches!" If you have no idea what I'm talking about, take a little trip back in time to the early 2000's when ole W. was still in office by watching this hilarious vintage Chapelle skit.

- Amy

 Listening to: "Rocket Man" by Elton John

Chit Chatting with Lauren Conrad, Off The Record, and More Delectable Design

[A layout for my Off The Record Q&A Column in The OC Gazette. Click to Enlarge.]

This will be a short post. I realized, I am a designer and I really don't post that much of my design work, so I present to you the first of many "Delectable Design" installations on this blog. Disclaimer: I do realize that I am a biased observer in this scenario and that my design may not seem "delectable" to all parties. But I'm all I've got for now! I will also warn you that most of it is editorial layout, which is sometimes a little limiting in the creative department. 


The long and short of this layout is that it's an interview I did with Lauren Conrad for my monthly Off The Record column in The OC Gazette magazine. Off The Record is my baby in the magazine. I get to hunt down interesting people in or from OC and try to get them to chit chat and shoot the shit with me for a little bit. Then I take our convo and cut and edit it and we run it as a fun Q&A. I have a blast with it. I've got to talk to some of the most amazing and interesting people. My top two have got to be Dick Dale and Ron Artest. They were great because they had no inhibitions and weren't wary of the press, so they just talked as much as I would let them. It was actually hard to get a word in edgewise! It's so much nicer when they are chatty rather than having to poke and prod for some sort of a real response. 


Lauren Conrad was one of those people I swore I'd never interview because she was "just a reality tv show B-list celeb." But we got really desperate one month for an interview so I contacted her people and sure enough they were nice enough to comply and I got to eat humble pie. Lauren is a really professional and driven young lady. I mean, she has three clothing lines, she's a two-time best selling novelist, and she's only 24. Having just turned 24 on Halloween, I have to admit that my resume looks a little lacking when compared to that.


Anyways, I also laid this piece out. I prefer Adobe Illustrator to InDesign since my design style is heavy on the graphics. I hate going between Illustrator and InDesign, so I'd rather just do all of it in Illustrator, even though it's a little slower with the text. Speaking of design, it's off to work for me. Enjoy your Thursday!


- Amy
Listening to: Phil Collins' "Can't Stop Loving You" (so cheesy, but soooo good.)

Talking with Merle Haggard, Singing Till Your Dizzy and Office Meltdowns

[Merle Haggard and legendary western suit maker Nudie Cohn, circa 1970's. © Jeff Albertson/CORBIS]

"Singing is the number one therapy. If you can get somewhere and holler for an hour and a half, you'll feel good."

Merle Haggard said this to me and I believe it. I'm that girl you see driving down the highway with her mouth wide open, belting out whatever it is I'm listening to, while you look on laughing and thanking your lucky stars that I'm in my car and not your car. You know the one. They've always got that diva scowl on. The one that says, "these lyrics are the soundtrack to my life." Sometimes they're even doing the steering wheel drums. I can't do those. No sense of inner rhythm. Despite being one of these people, nothing makes my day more than when I see another Freeway Liberace, singing at the top of their lungs as if they forgot their windows were see through; whether they're completely rockin' out, getting their bass groove on, or ready to internally combust from trying to hit those unearthly notes in their favorite Mariah love ballad. I salute these men and women. Their lives are probably 50% less stressful than the guy in the lane next to them who isn't screaming his favorite Billy Idol song. They're also probably 50% less likely to go postal on the rest of their office when their Swingline stapler gets jammed. Did we learn nothing from our high school yearbook notes? "Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching." [Author's Note: Did you know that Mark Twain is the originator of this quote? Who said Mark Twain wasn't relevant to real life.] 

[Click to enlarge.]

Here's the interview I did with the legend himself, Merle Haggard. It was fun designing the layout. My inspiration for the header was old "Wanted" posters and Country Playbills like the ones Hatch Show Print used to put out. The thing that struck me most about Merle was that he truly is the voice of the blue collar man. It's like he has no idea he's an American icon. First priority on his mind is how soon he can go fishing. That's what I love about doing these interviews - being reminded that these people who seem so unreachable and so high above the rest of us peons are just regular everyday human beings when it comes down to it. 

- Amy

Listening to: The Walkmen's "Stranded"

Jon Lovitz

When I'm not painting and drawing, I have this thing called a 9-5 job. It's hard to say what exactly I do. The title is a hodgepodge of positions thrown together with a slew of backslashes that looks something like this: Social media guru/graphic designer/entertainment editor/interviewer-columnist. I work at a small magazine called The OC Gazette, so we wear many hats.

A part of wearing many hats and having a small office is that everyone has to solve their own problems. No one's got time to help me with my problems because they're busy solving a slew of their own as they try to fulfil their job title with 5 positions and 5 backslashes. My interview column in the magazine is a one page Q&A called Off The Record where I chit chat and shoot the breeze with some of the most interesting people from or passing through Orange County. Interviewees range from The Fonz to Cold War Kids, and Ron Artest to Buzz Aldrin. We've known for some time that Jon Lovtiz went to college in Irvine at UCI, and seeing as he was coming back to Irvine for his stand-up comedy act this September I set out to track his agent or manager down to set something up. Still not sure how it happened, but God smiled down on me that day and caused his people to agree to an interview. The interview came and went without a hitch. {Author's Note: I don't think I've interviewed anyone yet who was so grateful or still so surprised he'd made it after 25 years in the biz. Such a cool guy!} Here's where it got hairy. After days of phonecalls (I was pretty sure Jon's manager's assistant was going to get a harrassment case filed against me), Jon's management just could not provide me with a headshot to use with the story. They tried and tried to find one and get it approved, but for some reason it never came through. I find this out on the day we are uploading the magazine to go to press. Who wants to read a story with no visual aid? It's like the difference between the monotonous, monotone highschool history teacher, and the cool one who doubled as the basketball coach and showed movies and sweet slide shows. World of difference.

How did we get out of this pickle? My very bright partner in crime, Sara Wilkins, reminded me that I know how to draw and how about doing an illustration. Magazine saved! I started on the drawing around 10am and by noon was popping it into the layout. It didn't turn out exactly spot on. His face is a little long, but for a two hour rush job, it ain't too shabby. I wish I took more scans of the piece througout, but here are two photos of the illustration.

[Mid-sketch]

[Finissimo]

You can find it and the interview in the September issue of The OC Gazette, hitting mailboxes and rack locations at the end of this month! There will also be an interview in there that I did with the handsome psychobilly crooner, Nick 13 of Tiger Army. If I ever need a date to a cocktail party, I'm asking him. Talk about a fountain of knowledge. He should be a professor. I'd sit in the front row and hum "Don't Stand So Close To Me" while he lectured if he did.

Alright, this post is fast becoming a delusional, incoherent rambling, so I'll sign off. Enjoy the Lovitz clip. It's got to be one of my favorite moments of his on film. So short, but so sweet.

- Amy

Listening to: Anders Osborne's "My Old Heart"