Custom Made emblem by Graf Paper

[CapZap1970]

Gents:
This beautiful emblem was made by Graf Paper on my request, he is a true artist. :rock:
Thank you very much GP, It's the official emblem of my U-77 from now on!!! :up:
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t1/capzap1970/screenshots/gz.jpg

CapZap

[Torplexed]

Splendid work Herr Graf Paper! :up: Did you go digital or traditional with this one?

[TarJak]

Nice work GP!

[Jimbuna]

Looks cool :up:

How are your emblems coming on TJ ? :hmm:

[SmokinTep]

Awesome...........:up:

[Brag]

Excellent work, Graf! :up:

[Sailor Steve]

Looks good!

Any chance of a close up of the emblem itself?

[Graf Paper]

I hardly know where to begin!


Thank you all for your praises. It certainly has bolstered my confidence in working with a digital medium. :)

CapZap, I'm very happy I had the privilege to create your emblem and it is a great pleasure to know U-77 will sail proudly with "Poseidon's Law" emblazoned upon your tower. :D

Torplexed, it is an honor to have the compliments of an artist who has well established his reputation in this community. :rock:Sharing you own insights and experience was a great inspiration to keep trying. My hand is getting more steady as I keep working with Painter.

Sailor Steve, I do believe Cap can answer your question on that one. It's his emblem now, as I promised, so it's not my place to post any images of it. Being the good man that he is, I believe you won't be disappointed. ;)

[WE INTERRUPT THIS POST FOR AN EGO BREAK]
:smug::smug::smug:
[WE NOW RETURN YOU TO YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED POST]

About the work:

I used the old fashioned method of pen and paper for the line work, scanned it directly into Painter in some insanely high resolution at 600 dpi, resized it to 750x750, then proceeded from there to do cleanup, retrace some lines, then add the color and lettering (Yes, I figured out how to use scale & rotate at last.). The detail airbrush and 1.5 mechanical pencil tools were used, but I quickly ditched the pencil and did most of the work with the airbrush.

The trident is entirely hand drawn with lots of cleanup and tweaking in Painter. No mirroring or scaling was used, just lots of patience to match up both sides by eye.

The shield was done entirely in Painter by drawing half, then mirroring it, and scaling down a copy of by five percent to create the border. There was lots of hand tweaking to get it looking right. The lettering only posed one problem. The typeface for the "s" in the font was fine for a heavy metal band logo, but looked nothing like an "s" and more like a dagger shaped "f". I had to letter the "s" by hand.

The motto reads "Das Meer Ist Mein Domain" as translated from English into German for me by Google. "The Sea Is My Domain" is the original motto I thought of but it seemed more fitting to have it rendered in German.

For coloring I wanted to incorporate the colors of the Bolivian flag for Cap. Although they're not an exact match for the sake of composition the red, yellow, and green is indeed there.

Having once been interested in Medieval Heraldry, it appears some of it has stuck with me over the years.

After that, I saved it as a JPEG then used Paint Shop Pro to increase the color saturation slightly, added background transparency so only the shield would show, and saved it both as a 650x650 GIF and a 250x250 TGA as Cap wanted.
__________________________________________________ _____________________

I must admit this all started out of selfish reasons. Cap liked my personal emblem for U-47, "Poseidon's Wrath" (Yes I changed the name again, but this one is more poetic sounding and will be the final change.), and wanted to know if he could use it. Being reluctant to give up my emblem that was intended to be a unique identity, I instead began discussions with CapZap and figured out a theme he liked much better.

A few concept sketches later and you've all seen the final result. Cap had a great deal of input in the features he was looking for so it's just as much his work, in a way. My hand was merely an extension of his imagination. :yep:

I just wish u-boat emblems could easily be made larger as you can see "Poseidon's Law" is too detailed to show well and I cautioned Cap such would be the case.

Cap, once again my deepest thanks for giving me this opportunity.

More to come...

[CapZap1970]

Looks good!

Any chance of a close up of the emblem itself?
Sailor Steve:
I will take a better screenie of this Masterpiece of work and post it tonight. Once again Graf Paper, I am the one who is honoured!!!! Thank you!! :up:
CapZap

[Torplexed]

Yeah...we need a closer in view. :cool:

I used the old fashioned method of pen and paper for the line work, scanned it directly into Painter in some insanely high resolution at 600 dpi, resized it to 750x750, then proceeded from there to do cleanup, retrace some lines, then add the color and lettering (Yes, I figured out how to use scale & rotate at last.). The detail airbrush and 1.5 mechanical pencil tools were used, but I quickly ditched the pencil and did most of the work with the airbrush.

The shield was done entirely in Painter by drawing half, then mirroring it, and scaling down a copy of by five percent to create the border. There was lots of hand tweaking to get it looking right. The lettering only posed one problem. The typeface for the "s" in the font was fine for a heavy metal band logo, but looked nothing like an "s" and more like a dagger shaped "f". I had to letter the "s" by hand.


Sounds like you're picking up on Painter well. You're already using it to edit.;) When I first got my copy I experimented ten minutes a night with the various brush sets just doodling, noodling and trying different widths. Then I would go over them with the various blenders brushes. Basically just to get a grip on what the strengths and weaknesses of each of them are and what future use they might have. It's a good way to get familiar with the program without the added pressure of having to create something. Eventually you develop a sense of which brushes have broad applications, and which ones are specialized....and which ones are pure fluff.:p

According to what I've read on various art forums that method your sister mentioned of taping a piece of Bristol paper or Strathmore over a graphic tablet is a fairly common method among artists who want to re-create that tactile feel of working on paper. Good call on her part there. :up: