Pabst and Presidents!

August 20, 2013April 10, 2015 | Erika Schnatz

It’s been a bit since my last post, mostly because I was doing some last-minute illustration work on this guy:

It was entered in a Pabst art contest here in Portland at the lovely Grand Central Bowling. The winner was determined by voters, so I was very fortunate to have many of my friends stop by and drop their tickets into my envelope – I won the contest and this image will be transformed into a billboard in Southeast Portland! How awesome is that?!

I’m excited that so many people will see my art! I’m going to brag about it like crazy, since it’s not everyday that your artwork becomes a billboard (unless you work closely with a marketing department, I suppose).

So yay! Here are some images of this work in progress:


The rough sketch that started it all!

The line work for the illustration!

After the PBR cans were colored in (minus the white logo)

All done!

I should have taken some close-ups of the cans – there are many details packed on those cans. Once the billboard is up, I’ll be sure to take more detailed photos!

Readin’ with Sasquatch

July 30, 2013April 10, 2015 | Erika Schnatz

Here’s the final art for my Powell’s tote bag submission. I really liked it, but it didn’t crack the top 10. Since a very similar idea did make the top 10 (and was way less cute, in my humble opinion) I have a feeling my design was passed over because I didn’t make the Powell’s logo big enough. Whatever! At least I got a nice little portfolio piece out of the contest.

More Sasquatch!

July 25, 2013April 10, 2015 | Erika Schnatz

I’ve been thinking a lot about the Sasquatch because he’s the main component of an image I created for a tote bag design contest at Powell’s books. Here’s my linework for the submission – next week I’ll upload the color version (which is looking pretty adorable so far!)

Travel

November 15, 2012April 5, 2015 | Erika Schnatz

Last fall I created a series of illustrations so I could throw together a stop-motion-y video for a Southwest Airlines competition to win 30 million rewards points to fly wherever I wanted. I love to travel and thought I threw together a fairly convincing and creative presentation as to why my broke AmeriCorps butt should be able to jet across the country on a whim, but they didn’t pick my video. (You can still make things right, Southwest!!!)

I was pretty bummed that I did all that work for nada, but you all can view some of the pieces I created. Maybe I’ll try to throw the video up on YouTube or Vimeo or one of those places. I wrote a children’s book-esque script to go along with the video and narrated it myself and used iMovie to edit it all together because I have lost whatever Final Cut abilities I gained in college.

I’ll shut up and show the pictures.

That’s supposed to be me. Broke and living in Portland, Oregon. BUT HAPPY!

Then I discussed driving across the country in my tiny little car to serve in AmeriCorps because I am an amazing, selfless person.

This is a really weird combination of images: Cleveland’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and a geyser (Old Faithful if you’d like) from Yellowstone, because I saw both of those things on my drive across the country. It’s kind of surreal and I really like how it turned out even though it makes no sense without explanation.

Hey, look! I don’t have enough money to fly anywhere and go on tropical vacations.

Like 99% of Americans.

I explained the awesome things I would do if I was able to fly all over the country for free.

You may notice that I love alliteration.

I tried to tug at the heartstrings of the soulless marketing folks who didn’t choose my video. I talked about going back to Philadelphia to visit my family because I missed them very much. That’s a pretty accurate representation of my Pops.

Then I did a little stop motion bit of the ridiculous amount of flights I would be able to take with all those reward points. I even made the airplane look like a Southwest plane. Because I have a crazy awesome eye for detail!!!

Then I cleverly brought it full circle by using the first image, but I changed the words on the sign! Brain-explosion-inducing, I know.

So those are some pictures. I made them with patterned paper, markers, watercolors, and Mod Podge.