[Music] [Aaron James Draplin] Okay, you guys. We've been playing this [CURSING] for 17 months.
And, okay. Before I get going, I need to issue a gold bond alert for the Broward County all the way up to the very edge of the concentrated evil that starts at Mar-a-Lago.
Let them sweat it out. Those pieces of [CURSING].
Hello? Okay. Things are going to get a little weird here. I got to go quick to get a blast through a bunch of stuff, but I am going to be going back and forth between the cushion of my PDF and then getting weird in Illustrator to show you guys some tips and tricks and one thing I learned this year. Okay? Okay, so my name is Aaron James Draplin. I'm a graphic designer. I live in Portland, Oregon. I am 50 years old until tomorrow.
Just relax. So hot. I've been wrestling with some big hairy questions.
Old dog, new tricks. Okay? But I've been wrestling. Listen, more social media.
Likes, clicks, flicks, the flimsy [CURSING] skits. How do I make this line talk to this line and talk to them? More loot. Relax with the pricing structures. Do a logo for 100 bucks as viciously as you do one for 10 grand because we're lucky to do this [CURSING], right? Okay. Just hold it for the end.
Bigger and bigger and bigger, more revenue, more sick of this [CURSING]. Who's got the most? Who cares? We're alive. We're here together, you know? The bigger the jobs I get, the more heartbreak there is. That's just the reality of it. So I'm trying to be creative with how much time I have left, whatever that means, and to keep learning, and use these awesome tools they give us here to enjoy making stuff. I love meeting all those awesome people from Adobe Illustrator because I got to live a life on this software the last 25 years. Next time you go to your insurance agent, look at what they're using on their computer. You know what I mean? I'm so thankful for that. So to come here and celebrate all this stuff, it's pretty cool. Hence, old dog, more junkin'. Listen, how do we continue to move forward? This is problematic. But always looking back, but I don't want to go back to 1960 when my friends got messed with, or women messed with [CURSING], yesterday, this morning. But I don't want to go back to 1952 because of what but there's certain things that have been lost that were graphic treasures, and they just have a certain charm and a certain craft. And we have lost some of that because, well, I don't know, there's a plug in that'll just fill [CURSING] in for you now, right? But when you look at these things and you savor some of these moves, people used to draw. They used to sketch and think. Call me whatever but some of those creations were just incredible. So I collect these things, I learn from these things. I understand that America changes so I don't want to go back to a scarier time. But something like this, that tiny little graphic on that little person Fisher-Price doodad. Just take a look at the moves. It's beautiful to me. And we're losing these things. We're losing these things, the clever quality of that. I am a Illustrator person. I spend 99% of my life in Adobe Illustrator. And the idea that those moves when you go rebuild those things, when I rebuild that stuff on my Instagram, there's no money involved. I just want to savor something that I found in the bottom of a junk bin, right? And learned a lesson from. So savor the incredible clever moves by the folks who are long forgotten and the toys you had from when you were a kid or a comic book or whatever you're looking at out there in the world. Old dog, more drawing. I've been analog, slowing my life down, trying to enjoy random accidents in my field notes, sketching, making notes, making lists on the plane down here, drawing on the plane down here. This is how I do it. There's Leigh just trying to enjoy her chowder and things take a little turn for the worse.
She's not here to defend herself, as lovely as she is, but I'm working on it. I'm working on it. But the idea that I can't control this and this is not a drop box link that's getting beat to hell. No, no, no. I can get close while we're paying for coffee that asked for 35% tip in Portland, Oregon. But look at my rat nephew, Oliver 13, 14 years old, a little bit of spice approved by my little sister, Leah.
Look at my buddy, James here. My buddy James from Knoxville, Tennessee. James Spears, everybody, talking about sovereign citizens and [CURSING]. And I'm sketching along. They're a good looking, man.
Family. Old dog, cool mom. See, I love my mom, right? Look, that dog smells like a salmon that's been out for about a week.
Little mini. Won't look at the camera.
This is my dad in his old little junk garage, right? And see, when I go home now in the summers in Michigan, job number one dictates that I have to clean out my dad's garage for my mom. And you cry your eyes out. My dad used to call me and say, "Aaron, I was down at my workshop this morning." I said, "How to go, Dad?" And he goes, "Well, I was digging around. Guess what I found?" I said, "What's that, Dad?" And he says, "A wall." By the way, hour one of seven starts now, but I'm home with my mom and I'm making garage sale graphics. My buddy brought a Star Wars [CURSING] out. We sold some Star Wars stuff. There's an opportunity to make a graphic there. There's no money involved with any of this. But I was painting signs because you got to guide the people into this estate sale for my mom, right? And then I do the tent sale and then things quickly go off the rails and I got a couple swearies going, and then I'm threatening people to come in. And then I tell my mom you talk to job number one. You look at her sideways and I'll mess you up, that kind of stuff. And then Kelly's our favorite neighbor, and then Joe was the guy asked about prices. That's my mom's advocate for all these old signs and [CURSING]. My dad, he knows, he's like estate sale guy and I'm painting and I'm going crazy and I'm having a blast and at the end of the estate sale, this group comes in and just takes everything away. It was just amazing. My mom, job number one. But here's the deal. That was fun to paint. What did I learn from that? It's okay to paint dumb hands. And there's no directive. There's no footlong brief here. I'm just enjoying being alive and getting weird aberrations.
You do whatever you want on paper and having fun. I just got to put these in an art show a week and a half ago in Portland. That was awesome. Things are so scratchy down here.
It turns into these little stickers. You guys remember The Pointer Sisters in the '80s? Who remembers that, right? Well, these are called The Pointer Brothers. And you can point up or down but you'll find that at the merge table. Old dog and these are my little tricks. Okay? Some little tricks. So this one's called edge-to-edge precision. So okay, here we go. I don't know how it's going to work. I'm going to get my [CURSING] together here because when I go to here, I say, "Okay. Some of this going on here." Here it goes. Okay, I'm going to try it. Now, Brian, if something goes bad, just guide me. Okay. Old dog, couple tricks. Now this is from little hacks and things that I have learned from Illustrator over the years to help me have precision, we'll just say. So what I ran into here is there's just something with the multiplying inside-- That's your Photoshop file. It's a black and white TIFF. Those are four boxes. The photos are masked into each box. And the idea is, you can even see it happening right there. There's a little bit of a line that happens. And I started to notice it in the PDF right there. But what's interesting, mathematically, those things are touching perfectly edge-to-edge. And yet, it's maddening and I'm going crazy and I'm doing this stuff and I'm trying to get it to snap and sometimes it turns off and sometimes, I have to get this record done. That's one of the inside panels. But here is how I ensure on a plane somewhere, when I can't get the damn thing to work, how I use the computer to my advantage, okay? So let's just say you have a blue dot and an orange dot. And the problem is you're trying to get that orange dot to just perfectly touch edge-to-edge. Now sometimes that works when you do the little Command-U and you've got that on. Sometimes it snaps to a pixel and you end up with some of this [CURSING], where it's just a pixel over and you thought you had it right or your hand hit another little click or something.
Here's the hack. Grab one, bring it down below, grab the outer edge here, drag it across, grab that little guy, snap it back, instantly aligned. See, now you're using what my machine allows me, this program allows me. I don't have a bounding box inside my field notes, right? So the idea there is that's just this quick little way to get things to mathematically and now it's a known-known, we'll just say, okay? Now another trick I can use to try to get those boxes that were giving me a hard time, right? Now the idea is, it's really simple and it's like, listen, I know someone's teaching 1,000 little things and little clicks and reels and stuff all over the place. I'm not going to try to market this stuff. There's a lot of ways to do this stuff. But it's like, check this one out. If I'm having a hard time getting those all to meet, here's the hack. Grab that one Command-C, Command-F, color it something different, right? And then just grab it and rip it up to that corner and where that thing touches right there, that's where you align to. Now that means that is mathematically perfect. And I can trust it. Because sometimes when I'm doing some embroideries or whatever I was doing something was a pixel over, I missed it and then it embroiders with a little bump or something, right? So I know these are tiny little things. I know this is not the most exciting but the idea is I want to share these little funny things with you guys while I got your ears because now that is mathematically perfect, right? So this really works for anything just to review. I can't get that thing to nail that little spot. It's doing it again right now. Rip it down. You can do a tiny one. You can do a long one. But see that little, that plane right there on that edge, that's mathematically touching. So I'll go check my document when I'm done, just to make sure things are lining up. And sometimes this is just the quickest way to do it.
So that's something that I run into. Okay, now I'm going to go back. Let's see if this works now.
Okay, go back to the Command-L.
Now this one's called The Orbit. But before we jump in, using nature, if you boil all of us down, we're just cells. You keep going further. It's just bits of energy. You keep going further and you get to the [CURSING] end of the universe or whatever it said, I don't know, something. And you go to Pennsylvania and you see a couple of these Dutch hex signs, man. Life's good. I got this puzzle at an estate sale for a buck, a couple bucks. That box alone from 1973 or something, the year I was born, is absolutely stunning. These pagan things and good, well wishing for crops and stuff, how do they make this stuff? Well, I mean, I know. I've got the book and stuff but I am forever inspired by beautiful things made by regular people, right? Farmers and Amish people, people who aren't concerned about Gaussian blur and [CURSING], I don't know what I mean. But, of course, had to make my own. So when I went and spoke in Central Pennsylvania, I got the pretzels and the sweat and the dander and the beard and all that [CURSING] and there it is. But I made that using this orbit trick.
And see, armed with this now, once I figured it out then this [CURSING] starts to happen. Precision and things meeting edge-to-edge and beautiful geometry when thing click around, right? And all of this made by this orbit trick and this bad little Randy also. So if you guys-- Bunch of people already bought the watch, thank you so much. Fair priced. We're in our sixth edition of that thing. Listen, when I went to Europe and I found out they were selling for 400 bucks from Carhartt and I only sell them for 90 because it's a fair price, we get them for 45, they sell for 350 in [INAUDIBLE], Berlin or whatever the hell it is. Well, hey, hey, fine. But you can get mine for 90 bucks over there.
But when I designed the watch face and I sent that to Timex, some guy big leagued me and said, "Just give me the five. We do the file." I used to make watches for Nixon Watches, snowboard brand 2000, 2002, 2004.
I know how to make a watch face. I was trained. I was taught using geometry, using this orbit trick. Okay, okay, okay. So this guy is an interesting thing because you're just using the power of the circle. Now it's going to take me a couple seconds here, okay? So let's just see if we can do this.
Okay, now check it out. Let me go grab this thing right here.
Okay, so if this is the orbit, okay? And we understand that you're using the power and the precision of the circle, if you go and you make another little, that's the watch face, we will just say, okay? There's a watch face. Now understanding what this thing does and the way it can work for you, there's the first little nick, right? We'll just say. Now just on purpose, I just push that thing off to the side because what I want you to revel in here is the power of the precision of centering these things perfectly up. Because we know now that that thing is perfectly centered using the program and using what we can't do on paper. So I'm going to go and I'm going to bring that thing up here.
I'm going to bring it down to some proper size. That's that hour mark, right? So there it is. Now here's the orbit trick, right? You grab the piece you want to rotate. You grab the outer orbit here, right? Am I grabbing that thing? There it is. And you grab that piece, those two pieces. You're going to rotate this thing using math. 12 hours, 12 divided by 360, 360 divided by 12 is 60, 60 or whatever. 30. So hot up here.
Okay, 30 degrees. So you copy it. Now what you're doing now is you're using that orbit to rip that thing around. Command-D dupes it all the way back to noon, okay? So now that we're there and we understand how we're using that little orbit, you go back in there, you got to quickly make the little minute marks, right? So let's just go down. We're just going to barracuda this thing real fast.
And then understanding what we're doing, you grab one of the orbits, and you say, 360 divided by 60 is 6 degrees. Negative 6, copy that thing. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. That's those first four seconds, right? One, two, three, four. So get rid of that first one. Once again, the same principle. Grab these little guys, group them, grab one circle, and then rip it around. Negative 30. We'll go the other way because you're using the power of the orbit. Did I do it? I can't see because my-- There it is. There it is. There it is. Got a weird glare here. It's all right. Okay. And there it goes. Command-D, Command-D, Command-D. And I just built those things using math, precision, and the orbit, right? Now that's using some-- I mean, it takes a long time to show that because when it starts to get fun and weird is when you have something that really is disparate. It's like now I know that we have things that are lined up. Let's just jam that thing right there and just say, all right, here it is. Here it is. Here it is. Plop, okay? We grab that outer orbit, right? There it is. Come on now. There it is. Okay. Do it again. Now let's just make the math something, I don't know, 20, maybe, okay? And then jam that around and we're making that sun that is beating down and Aaron Draplin trying to walk back to the hotel, right? Now what I want you guys to think about, of course, in this moment is just the power of that circle. So when you get into this and you say, "Okay, I got to go real quick now because people are watching and we're waiting and you're wondering and I hope this is of interest." But to go and say, "Okay. Quickly, quickly, quickly." Let's go 30, copy, and let's just go rip around. Because what we're really looking at is we're looking at these two pieces of pizza right here, right? So check this out. If we jump up in there and I'm going to go make some stuff, right, and just plop some things in there. And the beauty in this-- See, here's the thing. I teach this to 18-year olds in college and I teach it to 48-year olds who are burned out and stuff too. I know the feeling. I'm right there with you guys. But see, understand the power of the circle, if we're going to make a pizza, maybe, understand the power of the circle here. Let's just make sure that all of these things right now, before we do anything let's just screw them up a little bit. And let's just make sure that all of those are perfectly centered, right? Cool. Because now when we start to go rip this stuff around, I'm just going to go real fast. If we take this one, go Command-C, Command-F, we grab that circle and we use our Properties tool to flip that thing over. Where'd it go? Can't see it click. Sorry. Command-C, Command-F, we flip it over. That is mathematically perfectly on that side. That's a little flip trick right there. If you continue to do that again, let's just go through a couple little jims and jams in there. I don't know. And you're going to get a little bit of color, a little splash of color in there. Because here's the thing, if you think about those incredible hex signs, that's all that is. You make one leaf, you get it nailed, you get your math right and you rip that thing around. So once again I got to go quick here. Command-C, Command-F, grab that guy, flip it over. There it is. Grab all, let's put one more just for fun down there. Now we grab all this stuff once again and understanding that this is one-sixth of this, right? There it is. Command-G, grab the outer guy and rip it around real fast. Depending on what you put in, you can make a pizza, you can make a mandala. What I'm trying to show here is the precision that we overlook, but just simply for play. Just go make something. You can put a name in there. You can put type in there. You can make a pizza. You can make incredible, exquisite like-- You got to be careful getting into these folders and [CURSING] up here live because things just get-- I'm putting in a hotdog that is not good. I don't know what-- Let's see, I did that hotdog mandala. A couple people grabbed one today. That was awesome. Thank you for your purchase but that's the hotdog mandala, 60 degrees. That's all that is. It's just meant to be fine. I got to get out of that. That's just dangerous.
Okay. Now back to this PDF. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. Old dog, more color.
Going junkin' and seeing these kinds of moments, it's the best [CURSING], I just feel better looking at that, right? Life is weird. PDFs and emails and screens are just [CURSING] your dry, just blah. But playing with this stuff is just beautiful to me and it's a reminder that color can explode on a page. They're not going to let me do this for my client. I know. I know. But when it's just me warming up on a Monday morning and I'm making these little fun things, these have turned into patches, and goodies, and stuff, and things. And a lot of it, it's all math. All of it's math, really. Even the colors. Just to get the rhythm of the colors to rip around, there's a technique for that. And see, the beauty of this, that's one continuous line. That's like some weird program stuff, but I have that in my mind to go build that, take some layers and some things and that's the challenge just to get going because if I ever needed that for a client, it might not be my style. Now I know how to create that effect for someone, right? So I've been making these things just for fun, just to lift the spirits. I'm just more and more and more, I just want to make things that delight myself, and maybe a couple of fellow humans. Because here's the thing, that hotdog mandala, seven-year-olds love that [CURSING] and I'm cool with that. That's awesome, right? Now okay, I'm going to go real fast. Because if you go back here, Command-Tab. Okay, now check this out. See, when I'm building one of my sunray's posters that is a perfect yellow, I design using the math in mind. Because if we're looking over here and we're seeing how these things stair-step down, the idea is simply this. Instead of just going and using that little eyedropper tool like a broken cinder block, just thud and get some shitty number out of a GIF or something. If I find out you people are using decimal points inside your CMYK values, we're going to have a problem.
That's some real nerd [CURSING] in front of 500,000 Adobe members. Just round it up to 55 instead of 51.27, just disgusting.
But here's the trick. Here's the trick. Because I want to make that math beautiful, I want to make my posters beautiful and I don't get to do that with paint, I get to do it inside here using CMYK values. Somewhere I have to pick a pantone. But see, the idea is now just check on what I'm going to do here. Okay? I got to find my little CMYK. Okay, where's the color? What am I doing wrong? In fact, just don't worry about me. Look at that value. Yeah. See? Okay. See. Watch, watch, watch. Just bam! And look at that [CURSING]. 3.63, 74, just disgusting. Exhibit a little craft, humans, okay? So we had a nice 0, 0, 100. Check this out. I'm going to go fast.
The first one, understanding how the math works, 20 points plus Command-D, up to 40 and you're stair-stepping that thing up to whatever color you want to get, 60, right? We're using the stuff to our benefit because the reason I have to do this stuff is when I go to my screen printer, he's not worried about a pantone as much as he's worried about, "Oh, one drop of orange, two drops of orange, three"-- That's a little more his speed. Because it's a translation just to get that beauty. See, the funny part about this, when you use that eyedropper and this little guy's a little wonky, you see the difference, right? So my eye, the sickness of me trying to make this beautiful spectrum on a Monday morning and trying to get that turquoise perfectly wafting over into the greens or the other way into-- You know what I mean? You know what I mean? I use math using that, right? So yesterday in the workshop, we were talking with the youngsters about this. That's how you walk acid green or we'll just call it light green up to Kelly green. You just put a little bit 20 points, 20 points, 20 points, 20 points, etcetera. So whatever the colors are, however you're trying to do things, if it's 0 to 100, go 33, 66, 100. You're using the math to get that value because you'll notice it around. You'll notice that when you're just trying to have this precision, okay? Okay, let me go back to the PDF here. Now is this working? You guys, okay? Everyone, okay? Okay.
Now this is a big one. And see, the next eight things I'm showing you guys here, there's no money involved. Those aren't clients. I just like Paul Giamatti. And I like shitty little hands called manicules.
I'll never be in a band and I'm not tough enough to be with those death metal guys. By the way, I used to go to relapse records in Portland, Oregon. You guys know relapse records. We got any metalheads here? Okay, okay. Just relax. Relax.
You go to relapse records, evil. And I go in and I walk in and there's a kid sitting there. He's got black jeans, black shirt, the Lemmy Kilmister bullet belt around his waist. And I walk in and I go. Aaron Draplin here, everybody, a bit of a warning. I'm wearing colors other than black. These $8 Target shorts right here are turquoise. And, sorry. And the some kid named Scuz, heavy metal. So I'd like to mess with those guys and go make some gnarly Norwegian blacken metal and saying middle age because I'm getting old, right? But all of this stuff, it's exhibiting the same little crusty things I'm showing you guys. How to draw, how to align things, how to use precision in your work, just for delight. But what happens when you get to go use that on the job? That's what we're talking about, right? So those last eight things, when I go on the road and I say to people, who here has just made something for fun in the last couple days and no hands go up, I mean, I get it, man. If I'm at some corporate situation and they're all trying to get out of there by 5 o'clock, I adjust what I'm saying. But if it's a bunch of rat kids who are 22 years old and a couple hands go up, I'd say, "You guys, come on, man. This [CURSING] is fun." You know, this stuff isn't just a job, right? Now there's a kombucha company called Boochcraft and I got to do a mark for them a couple years ago. And along the way, we did this little guy. It was about droplets processing and all those stuff. And along the way, they said, "Hey, could you isolate that guy for us out of there? We want to use that as its own little thing." So I did. And what I want you guys to watch right now, I'm a try to do it fast, is how I built that thing using math, right? So I can walk all the way through. I can just do it live. I'm going to try to do it live, okay? So just check this out. Now up here in my symbols palette, I'm going to grab a little one of these little guys, and so we can just see what happens here. But here is the thinking, okay? Here's our target. We want to nail that thing but the math is what I'm most interested in, right? Okay, I'm going to go fast. It's going to get ugly. Here we go. Here's the deal. To understand that's an equilateral triangle, I'm already working with nice precision, right? So to keep on moving here and to go and flip that thing around, I'm going to get just dirty because I can't go and measure that exact whatever right now. But here I am and I'm going to rip this thing up, just to get that nice stroke width going.
Okay. Call it there. Cool. Fine. Let's check it out. Now when I go off and say, "Okay, how do I isolate?" And what we're going to talk about is we're going to talk about designing with subtraction. I mean, how do you get to that thing? How do you go make that little sliver? So here's how I do it. I'm going to take that thing right now, Command-Y. That's just an outline at this point. I'm going to go and make it an outline and watch what I'm going to do here. I'm going to use the machine to our advantage, okay? Ready? So what I'm going to say here is I'm going to go Command-C, Command-F. I'm going to color that thing. I'm just going to copy that line knowing that's a known-- Whoops.
Knowing that's a known-known or make it yellow. We're going to bust it up because that's the plane that we want to be working on, right? That's the plane.
So let me get back down here to something a little bit smaller. Because understanding just that little maneuver right there, we're where we need to start with, right? Because then when I go and I say, "Okay. Here I go off to the side and make another piece," we're always keeping-- Vectors are free, right? Keep track of your [CURSING] because if you have to, if you screw up, you can go back a couple steps, right? And I say, "Okay, let's just start right there." Woah! Dupe that guy and let's just start right there. Because the properties of what I'm about to do here is you're using math and you're using that sheared little thing. And I'm just going to go isolate this little piece right here. I want-- No, you can't see it.
I want that piece on the inside, right? There it is. Okay. And grab that. And I want that little guy right there. And I'm going to go, "Oh, it's hidden in my little thing." Sorry. Yeah, just turned 51 trying to get through this click, you know? Fun, huh? Okay, okay. So that little piece right there, get rid of this.
We are designing by subtraction. Now here's why.
Now just take a look at this. Oh, I'm going to go grab this over here. I'll bring it down below so we have a little more room to work with. Okay, this is just white ink.
See it? That's just subtracting. Now the versatility of this is what's beautiful. If you take a look back here-- Well, maybe I got a little ahead of myself, right? So the versatility, understanding the plane that you're on, where you started, we started on that edge. I just grab this edge and zip it back. We're getting a little closer. We're designing by subtraction. So okay, now we can go freestyle. Now I'll just show you what I was working on. Rounding the bottom, thickening it up, outlining it into a shape.
Here it is. And then I add a little jim-jam. I can thicken it. I can make it really thick. That's what it looks like down below because that's just that one same piece, or you can get really cool and do little things like this, or do little things with a triangle. But see, the idea is versatility with just these really simple shapes. Because if we go out here right now, I know I was marveling at it yesterday.
Behold the logo for the Chamber of Commerce or whatever the hell it was out there. Do you guys see it? I didn't quite get a photo because I had to pay 17 bucks to get some shitty cab back to-- Whatever it was. A guy was yelling at me because it wasn't $40 fare, whatever. Fun. But I remember what that thing did in my mind. I'm just going to bring it to life right now as fast as I can using Adobe Illustrator because it was just beautiful and stunning. And I think it's on my Florida poster. But here's the deal. There's one part where you actually get to use subtraction on that thing and it looked something like that.
And if you go, there it is. But someone goes, "No, no, no, drop on, drop on." I live down here and that thing is actually only three bars. And it's like, "Cool." Get rid of one, space those little jim-jams out and you're getting a little closer to where-- I mean, do you see the versatility here? I know it's a simplified design. But this is like astounding to me because when I go build logos and things and stuff, this guides me along. This precision guides me along and offers versatility in the moment, whatever, really fast. Okay, I got to get going here.
Just think about this. Because I watch youngsters and it's all additive. I take away by adding a point and doing something and it's like, just remember, this hand with some white ink over this hand, now I have four little nubs just that quick in the thing. When you're building out your stuff, keep it live because if the client says thicker, thinner, this, that, you've got all those parts and pieces at all times, right? That's how I teach how to build logos and make the things I make and what friends make and we trade notes and all of this, hopefully, healthy stuff. Okay, back to the old PDF. Old dog and then some way new tricks. Now I know I said something about this blob thing because I've just been sucked into a couple of these cool things where you probably have all seen it, but to do it live and just to say, I had to open my heart. And the kid points and all that stuff and whatever they're doing and then does this little trick like, they do it so fast, they do it so gross, and you can't keep up and it's to the music and it's going ape [CURSING]. And just remember, this to me is just absolutely gorgeous. When I saw this thing and Brian Wood is a buddy who showed me. He said, "Draplin, try these. Show these." We were trade notes on things. By the way, ten other people did this trick. But here's how it goes. Grab a couple things, anything, type, shapes, couple of blue dots, and make sure that that is a compound path, right? So Command-8, okay? Now over here, we're going to go and we're going to do our little offset path. And going to go, let's just go a nice round number, I don't know-- Let's just say, a quarter inch. Cool. Make it round. Make it round. Round. Okay, now before you touch anything else, hit OK.
You come over here to your Effects. Let me close this up. I don't know if I just screwed it up. You hit your Effects here. You do it again using the Effects, Offset Path and you go negative 0.25 inches and you round that thing, right? And look how that thing's reacting. When I move this little guy away-- Wait, did I do it right? I did it wrong. Uh-oh. We're going to be here for a couple hours. Everyone, just everyone, relax. We'll get it. It's going to be whatever it takes, bill me, okay? Command-8, let's just go, there it is. Is it Command-8? I thought it was. Okay, now we've got it. Let's go off the Effects guy here. Path, Offset Path, 0.25 inches Round. There it is. Don't touch anything else. Effects, Path, Offset Path, Apply a New Effect, negative 0.25 inches. We're almost there. Someone kicking that-- There it is. Now watch how this little jim-jam reacts.
So you haven't seen it, have you? You guys, come on. Like, it's so-- Imagine with some type.
So this is out there. Go find the person. There was this youngster from Thailand. This girl, some talented young lady. Awesome. There's a guy named Ogzeet who just kills it, who kills it. If he's here, come to the booth. There's a selfie pit.
That's amazing to me. Because, of course, my mind-- I know you can't say it up here in front of all the people, but we're in Miami. On the way down here in the customs, I had stickers duct taped to the inside of my leg like National Geographic. You don't even go through the international but it was just for fun. And I was like cocaine, whatever, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, you can't. You got to be careful with all the Adobe [INDISCERNIBLE], NDAs and [CURSING]. But the Gold Bond Gangsters, or the Gold Bond Goliaths or something, I don't know, but it's like, I just want to make some Gold Bond and just make a cool little logo that just says the Gold Bond Galoots and make a little thing because right now, you guys ever seen a chinchilla with the powder? Leigh does the whole bed and then just whips me around a couple times and I'm off to go sign [CURSING] all day with all of the youngsters. Sorry. Okay, we got to get moving. Okay, okay, okay.
Go find this and learn this little thing because I'm an old dog and I learned a new trick. And I can't wait to start really using this thing. It's one more for the quiver. That's the beauty of this, right? Okay? And I just implore you also, we're never too old to keep learning and I get to use that thing. Old dog but a pretty little smoochy little gumdrop named Leigh, right? When I look at her, isn't she cute? And there's-- Look at this little sweetheart. And then I do drawings for her but I can't wait to use some of these new techniques and things and go learn new things and use it for the little things that she makes. These little nasty, I call them feminine products one time and that didn't quite work but-- Feminine little nasties, we'll just say little things. And she sells these funny little things to cool little stores and there's a new bite me patch, and tough as snails, and get free, and I just got to say, what a lucky girl, saddling up to that. But I say during the-- Where the [CURSING] are all the AV guys? Number one at these things. Don't mess with the AV guys in the back there. They're all snickering back there and going, "Never again. These guys will hire anybody." That's what they're joking about right now. But I just got to tell you, I've seen better heads on a nail.
Old dog, new record.
Who here is a Superdrag fan? Yes. But I screwed up. I screwed up. I thought they were pretty boys in '96 and '97. I like The Jesus Lizard, and the Butthole Surfers and Pavement and all other [CURSING] and these guys were on the radio and I screwed up. They run MTV and I just screwed up.
And I got to go see them do a reunion tour a couple years ago in Knoxville. By the way, my good angle is from here out. Thank you. Thank you. So much media.
Because you always get the one where you're going.
But I met the band and I got to apologize and say, "I screwed up. I screwed up. I thought you guys were pretty boys." I screwed up with Nada Surf. Remember Nada Surf? That's a good band. But I thought they were on MTV. That's I like, I don't know, whatever.
So they hit me up and they say, "Hey, do a poster for us." "Oh, all right." "Thick lines." "Yeah, yeah." Four bolts for four guys in the band. All right. Okay. And I get to come clean and make up for myself and get to work for John and these guys, I mean, the sweetest bunch of Knoxville boys, incredible talent. We're all on the same age. I'm 50, John's probably 49, and just incredible people. Brandon's probably 51, maybe. Okay. But we hit some zenith or did we? And then John starts hitting me up and I'm a fan, and he's sending me new songs. And I get to see the creation of these new things. And I need to see this because I want to feel like even at 50.5 years old or 51 tomorrow, that I can make vital things or things that are dumb or fun.
Because he did and is, and I just find that really interesting. So I dig in and I get down to work. And I start doing some, "Oh, Jinx!" Let's do some psychedelic stuff and we got some this is all just vectors. Give me a couple of portraits and I'll redo the portrait-- And we show these things. He just isn't feeling it. He's got a different vision in his-- Of course. Now remember, that hurts but that's our job. Keep moving. It's my job to deliver for these guys. John's not quite feeling it but in the nicest way, he, "Aaron"-- My job is to get back on that horse and let's keep going. So I do these crusty little sketches just to say, what do you think? What if it's just gestures of 'cause he's like, "When I did this, I was in a dark place." "Oh, okay. What do you mean?" "Some divorce?" "Oh, okay. Okay." Some upheaval and I, "Okay, flames and brimstone and [CURSING]." And these are just crusty little sketches in my field notes into Photoshop and then color it. Okay.
And he's like, "Yeah, I like the colors." And it's like, "I wonder if I'm just making it harder." Right? Because maybe he hasn't had this process at his fingertips. He's been on big record labels and things and I don't know the guy totally. I'm a fan. I buy all the Superdrag records. I buy all the Lisa Memory records. I bought all John solo stuff. All awesome.
'Cause things are just getting weirder and weirder, I'm just drawing and just throwing it out there. Because if he likes this crusty little sketch, imagine when I actually spend some time, right? I'm not an illustrator. You know how I know? Because they always come up to me and say, "Yeah, yeah." I'm not a typographer but I made a typeface called DDC Hardware and you go to these type conventions and this one guy always comes to me and he goes, "But Aaron, but what is it?" I go, "That's a poster." You put it on the wall. They're flat. Because what is all of this [CURSING]? And he goes, "But Aaron Draplin, you're not a typographer." And I would say, "No, no, no." I say, "I'm profitable." I'm not an illustrator but my hand can hold the stylus on my Fresco.
So I go all in on a collage for John because maybe he'll like a collage. And I just go crazy and I do this whole thing. This is all with old junk from Popular Mechanics and things and stuff and things and [CURSING] I scan in and stuff I find in the ground and whatever else.
Which leads to this. John likes that little guy in the middle. Oh, falling through space into the fire.
And I show him a comp and he just goes, "That's it." We make the record cover. Bingo. So that turns into the vinyl and that turns into the inside. It guides the entire thing. They have a special edition vinyl, the CD. They even made tapes.
Yes.
I mean, I didn't make any money on this. I didn't make any money on this. I don't care. I'll give him money to make the cool vinyl. Why are we alive to make a bunch of money on [CURSING] and get bigger returns on logos that you should only get a-- I don't know. We made the tape together. Remember that collage that didn't quite work? Those became mini singles for the first four singles 'cause it hearkened back to the simplicity of that cover. See the type? And then we did all the singles. So that came out for two months ahead of time, every two weeks, another single. Awesome. [CURSING], yeah, John Davis. Thank you, John Davis, for bringing me along and allowing me [CURSING] to do work for a [CURSING] hero. What are we doing here? Are we just here to make a bunch of money for some people who have like, I used to rent all this big goddamn loft thing in Portland because I thought that's what you're supposed to do and then you see a guy in a Range Rover. And I was like, "[CURSING] man." I built my studio in my backyard. You saw it last year. I built my studio in my backyard. I got a 10-step commute. The money goes to me, and Leigh, and John, or whatever.
Look at the size of my head to his.
And by the way, you guys go get the [CURSING] record, it's great. Sorry about the language, but it is great. Old dog and mystery mining. Now we're on the downhill slope of the talk or keyboard crazy. Couple of years back, I'm talking to a buddy and I say to him, so what's it like being 50? Because I'm 48.5 or whatever the [CURSING], and he's 53 or whatever you-- He just says, "I'm growing things." So what are you, a designer? What are you talking about? And he says, "When was the last time you cleaned your keyboard?" I was like, "I cleaned my keyboard." You're happening... Just one... So I couldn't wait to get home from the road.
Say what? And I went digging. And that first yield was just amazing.
I don't know what it is but all of you laugh now. You got it. All the AV guys back there snickering at me, I can hear them breathing, turn over your keyboard on Monday morning and you're going to find a big pile. And by the way, if you just one little finger swipe, it's about 14 calories.
If we keep going, it just turns into an ice cube in Alaska. I don't know what I'm talking about.
Okay. Who heard the [CURSING] last year that I did? Okay. I got to work for Chris Stapleton, old dog and a long beard. I got to make a logo for Chris Stapleton. I got to make his record. I got to do the ad mad for Chris. Stared him down in the backstage, beard on beard.
And then last year, remember when I got to tease this? I got to do his new record last year and this is what it looked like. And I couldn't show that part but this has been out for almost a year. It came out in November of last year. John's record was, I think, about 2,000 pieces. And then for Chris' first outing was 160,000. I think there were over 200,000 pieces of vinyl. That's the Stapleton difference versus a buddy of mine.
Both of the art is so meaningful to me but Chris is terrifying. 30,000 to Amazon, 30,000 to Walmart, 30,000 to Target. The other bunch to record stores all over the world.
We had to do all the singles. It was everywhere.
And these are the same techniques I'm talking about. But the privilege of working for a Chris Staple and to see that thing, to put that into my record wall right in the Springsteen Zone was so cool.
And the reason I show this is because that is not supposed to happen for someone like me. I'm okay. I figured out a way to make it in the muck. It's all right. There's nothing wrong with any of that. But when you get to go work for the big leagues and you bring small league values to those guys, which is like how to shave down things, how to understand your pantones, how to mix those things in a way that's easy for the printer later on, I don't even know if they noticed it but that's the only way I knew how to do it because I had no budgets and I knew how to use one and two colors lethally.
The book continues to sell, 13th edition. What? But this makes sense because I'm a nice guy and I'm lovable. And I went out and we did three book tours or 150 shows, Leigh and I. One time Leigh said to me, "Listen, [CURSING], I'm not eating out of a bag this week. Little bag from a drive thru, honey." And making friends all over Hell's Half Acre because if you want to come get a selfie in the selfie pit and you want to go weird, I'll get right in there. I'm here to make friends. Just a little kiss, just disgusting. But the close proximity, I understand because I love my dad. And when I would say goodbye to my dad in a parking lot in an airport, I'd get right in there.
Now everybody just understand because when I did this a couple eight years ago, my dad died yesterday, 11 years ago. Oh, all these, you'll dig the knife in. I'm worried about how to not sweat in Miami, but my sister put a post up and it's like, I remember 14 years ago, I put this picture up and this woman, "That's it, Aaron Draplin. We're done. Any man who's kissing his man or his dad"-- We are a nanometer apart right there. Just get in the shot. Muff on muff, get in the shot. You don't. It's Photoshop. And then we laugh, and I kiss my dad goodbye. I kiss my dad goodbye my whole time but we just have fun with this stuff. Anyway-- Old dog, new site. We got a new website coming pretty quick here. Look at all the Rock&Roll sections took me an entire month. Chris is on there, Dinosaur Jr. is on there, my buddies from Recall Seven are on there. One little CD, it's all on there.
I showed every record I made. There are 400 logos. Some made me nothing. You can filter that. Some made me lots of money. We'll figure it out. Everyone has a big beautiful logo to show the moves and show the connections and show the lines and the subtraction and all that [CURSING]. You're going to see all my posters in one little place, right? All the hats in one spot. The hats will be at the shop tomorrow in the merch, but they're a little late. There's 180 patches.
Sure it's about selling stuff, but it's also about all the junk that I'm going to load on there. I want it somewhere for posterity. Old dog, new-ish work. Let's get you out of here. I just got to work for Pearl Jam, became a tour T-shirt. We went and saw the show at Wrigley with 41,000 people.
Pearl Jam. Insane. Got to make a stamp for America.
I'd like to remind everybody that this is dedicated to my buddy, Phong and his family from Vietnam. They are a family of immigrants that came over here a bunch of years because we are a nation of immigrants and that's what this stamp was for.
Because they tried to attach a bunch of this [CURSING] Lee Greenwood [CURSING] to it. No, no, no, no, no. Come on in. Get to work. We make it a better place for everybody, not just those who can afford it, right? Hotdog mandala made-- Look at the precision.
So hungry. Haven't eaten in 11 minutes.
Remember how to get the things lined up, you guys? Remember? That's it. That's it. Simplicity. Look at how the leaf touches half of the orange.
Beer cans, pizza everyday, blood sugar.
I'm working on it. I'm working on it. Okay? Don't worry. Things getting a little thin with their sugars. I'm going to be this guy's size by the year 2049. Okay.
[CURSING] for Marc Maron.
His buddy Dean Delray, who's a dog named Gertie, did a little sweatshirt and merch for this comedian guy, Dean Delray, awesome guy. Thing Festival. I did some illustrations. I'm not allowed to be an illustrator.
Phish, not quite my jam, but good people. They helped all those people in Vermont a year ago. Really cool. Got to do a bunch of graphics.
We got a whole package, the dice package. And my favorite part of that dice-- I love to gamble, you guys. Once a year, all the planning and all the bullshit and I go throw it all away. Look at those beauties. Those are over at the merch table. Throw your whole life away. We'll play a little Cee-Lo later on. But come and get one of the Procrasti-Die, where if you're in the middle of a project, throw that die and just hit on-- Land on that, delete the files, ignore the emails. Hey. We're letting the universe dictate our career. Come again. Just as we got a pile of them. Come grab one, damn it. My baby sister who does my nails, I made her logo for her. I think we might have one of her clients in here somewhere. I think we might have one. I don't know. I met a gal today that knows my little baby sister who I held when she was nine. Or I was nine and she was a bit a day old, baby Liam.
I had a little beard when I was one. I don't know. Records, pressing at Third Man Records. Stuff for NASA. This requires science, and empirical evidence, and logic, and reality. So please look into it.
[CURSING], can you [CURSING] believe? Please vote for Kamala.
It's just-- I'm afraid of that piece of [CURSING] because look, what he's done. What a scourge. And scientists are just trying to get people to think that the world is round. Serious. I mean, it's funny, but it [CURSING].
Goggles for Smith goggles. Posters for Jason Isbell. What a sweet guy. Met him in the backstage. Smells so good.
A fuzz pedal. A poster for Tenacious D, when the band asks to be on the meatball, you do what the band says. When the band asks for the little artifact to be a certain artifact, you just lean into it.
I'm just working for the band.
I got to go to South by Southwest. Look at all the guys from industry, Tony and Bart hanging out.
Two years ago, we weren't allowed to go to South by Southwest because Aaron Draplin is not a poster designer. But turns out, no one wants to buy 19-year-old Death Cab for Cutie posters anymore.
And we offer things that have color and fun and I don't know. But what a privilege to go. When they ask you to do the corn maze, you do the [CURSING] corn maze. Okay? Look at Leigh on the big chair. Okay. Old dog, bull dog, real fast. My favorite band in the world, Dinosaur Jr. I just did a new T-shirt for him. Drawn, drawn, drawn in my field notes. Look at that. And I saw J in the backstage the other night and we had a J Mascis sleepover the other night but those photos are undisclosed. But he spent the night in the backyard shop because he didn't want to get a hotel. My hero. Old dog, DDC Sneaks. Here's something that's coming. Where these guys over there, we're presenting the new molecule for oxygen.
I made my first skateboard deck, a tribute to the transitions. That's coming pretty soon and it gets comes in three different colors on the top sheet. Final thoughts, you guys. I'm in the backstage with a bunch of people that are good looking until I show up. And then everyone's pretending, man, we're just going to keep on going up, and bigger, and more, and this, and that. And life is this. And graphic design is going to be this. And I get to meet these people who don't quite understand that maybe their zenith was a couple years back. It's okay. And then they're nasty to me in the backstage sometime. Hey! A couple of years ago.
Wherever my dot is, I'm going to push it to there because I got to be creative on the way up and I'm going to be creative on the way down and I want to understand that this was improbable at best to be up here with you guys, much less make a life and a living in this stuff. I mean, amazing. And we're going to be okay with that process because I'm excited for what that's going to be. You know what I mean? That's coming.
So thankful for the life I've carved out in graphic design. I look forward to continue to learn new [CURSING] and use it from here on out. I implore all of you to do the same. This is not just a job. We are lucky to be here. We're lucky to be alive. You're lucky to do this for a living. Wait. Get-- I'm not supposed to do the hard sell. I don't know where it is. I don't know where it is. It's out there. It's somewhere, I don't know. Old dog, new tricks, you guys. Thank you. This one's for my dad.
I kicked her [CURSING] in scrabble, four games this summer in the afternoon and she's still pissed. Okay, we got to go. Come to the merch table. Come hang out. Thank you. Thank you.
[Music]
