More Shows!!

Holy shit...I had the best time last night. I watched Say Anything for the first time and I was literally blown away. I have never been so excited at a show and never enjoyed myself so much. The crowd was amazing and Max was telling us how this was the best show he has ever played at and how he has never seen such an amazing crowd. I think the venue helped out a lot, I have to say El Corazon is the best venue I've been to yet, its a much smaller venue which yields a more intimate experience. I probably sound gay right now (not that there is anything wrong with that) but Max was everything I thought he would be and then some. His voice is amazing and he gets the crowd going with his amazing attitude and he is hilarious. He also pantomimes what he says in his songs for example: when he sings "got your scars on my wrist..." he pretends to cut his wrist, very much like I do when I sing along to their music(not sure if that came out right, I do NOT cut my wrist). They played a lot of songs from Is a Real Boy and In Defense of the Genre including: Alive with the Glory of Love, Yellow Cat/Red Cat, Wow, I can get sexual too, Woe, The Futile, Slowly Through a Vector, Its a Metaphor Fool, Admit It! (which they closed with, seriously so epic). From In Defense they played: Spores, Have at Thee!, This is Fucking Ecstasy, Shiksa, Baby Girl I'm a Blur. And they also played like three or four songs from their new album coming out November 3rd(my birthdays coming up if you weren't sure what to get me). OMG I just realized they played a lot of songs...O_o I also watched Brand New with Manchester Orchestra which was cool better than the Puyallup Fair. It was at the Showbox Sodo which is bigger than I thought it would be so, like I said earlier not as intimate as the Say Anything show. Manchesters short was waaay too short which was very upsetting. Brand New played a shit load of great songs old and new and Jesse Lacey was funny as hell. What a great week, but now its time to think about school (I dunno how im gonna do that with my 21st birthday coming up).

WTF MacBook Pro?!!?

So last night I was writing a stupid long post about the shows I've been to recently and the upcoming shows I plan on going too. While writing the post my computer just shut down...I was hoping it was just hibernating but this bitch totally died. I am not motivated to re-write the whole thing, and I know only like 2 people will read it anyways.

Ay-Yo!!!

So I've been very busy with school recently and have a bunch of possible portfolio pieces that I will be posting later on. So me and my friends were messing around and said we were going to make this t-shirt business thing (basically just sell shirts with our logo on it and various designs). We came up with the name Elephant Empire...sounds sort of lame at first but when you look at the logo and shirts I hope you guys change your minds. I got a lot of inspiration from one of my favorite clothing brands The Hundreds (check them out!!www.thehundreds.com/wordpress/). Elephant Empire apparel is inspired by Seattle lifestyle and the designs will reflect todays growing fixed gear scene along with the skateboarding scene. I'm not gonna lie, but if I could I would love to create not only sick silk screens but also possible denim, wovens, fleece, outerwear, headwear, and accessories. I got a lot of ideas floating around my head just need to get them on paper. My friend Alex Paek will be showing me the ropes on silk screening and he will hopefully get in on some of the designs. I also plan on doing some collabos with my guys ALKR and Joctobr. but gotta start from the bottom and work our way up. I'll be posting some more designs later. Btw, I need to work on my HTML cause this png is not the size I want it to be click on the image for a larger view.

WHO WAS THAT GUY!?

Hello, sorry I haven't posted in awhile (all 5 of my followers). A lot of stuff has happened, my first 'term' (no longer called quarters cause they are one week shorter) was ridiculous. Like I was doing before I did the whole four classes, but the whole one week less thing killed me. This was officially my worst term ever, I had my least favorite instructor for two classes and I got a D in one of them which was a photoshop class. I could talk about why and how much him I hate but I'd rather not. Other than that I learned HTML which I really enjoy doing I will post one of them up so you can all see. I recently got my bicycle ^.^ which im way too excited about and converted it to fixed. I will be taking photos of it eventually just trying to figure out where and when maybe tomorrow?...I finally have some stuff to put in my portfolio which I will definitely post soon. I also played beer pong for the first time, and I must say I'm still not quite into partying too much but that was a lot of fun. So this term I will be taking 3 core classes: Graphic Design III, Web Design II, and Promotional Design. I'm pretty pumped but a little nervous, I have that same bastard teacher that I had for Web I for Web II. So yes I'm dropping down to 3 instead of the usual 4, I'm hoping to have more time to kick it with my friends, meet new people and of course check out some more shows. Four Year Strong, Set Your Goals, and Fireworks is gonna be up here in August and I'm way too pumped! Circle pits like mad! 

So here is my first portfolio piece. This is for my Typography II final. The project was to get dialouge of my choice (I chose the verse of a Modest Mouse song called Interstate 8) and using mainly type to convey a voice. I chose the Rockwell font family (regular, bold, and extra bold). I eventually plan on getting this silk screened onto nice quality paper. 

Albuquerque NM

So i've been thinking a lot about what I want to do after I graduate which is relatively soon (december, 2010 maybe sooner with new schedule change), and the way graphic designers work is usually if you don't work for a design firm or own one you most likely are a freelance designer. I really hate looking for jobs which is why I would really hate being freelance, but thats probably what I should do. If I make a lot of money i'll have someone look for work for me to do...not. So I have been thinking about where I'm going to live after I graduate. Should I stay and kick it in the Emerald City or move back to the Land of Enchantment? I like both a lot I have more friends in Albuquerque, but are my chances of getting work as a graphic designer higher in one city than the other? I guess I just don't want to graduate without having a plan. I really would like to do so much but with school and work its really tuff...I'm way pumped that im almost done but its not going to get any easier from here.

and here is the original drawing of the below shirt design I don't know why the color changed but it looks pretty siiick!

Carlsbad NM

So I am in New Mexico visiting my mom and friends. There was a show the first night I got there, and it was so siick! Living with Lions, All Teeth, Highways, Through Gore Comes Glory, muthafuckin Prom Nite Girls, Holding It Down, Live for Today, Easier Said Than Done, The Bedlam State, and Unspoken Revenge. Shit was pretty sick. That was easily the biggest show in Carlsbad. People love Prom Nite Girls. I got in the circle pit and ate it...it was pretty funny. Kind of sucks cause the Albuquerque crew left the next day so I didn't get to spend as much time with them as I would've liked to...I still love them. My whole stay here is only till Tuesday because my flight leaves really early from El Paso on Wednsday(i still don't know how to spell wed. it doesn't look right to me). So pretty lame spring break but at least I got to see most of my friends even tho it was so short lived. So this is the ESTD shirt.

Lawls

So its been a while since I've posted. I just finished up my finals and barely passed one of my classes the cher project didn't get the best grades...the mock up turned out nice I am actually gonna remake the mock up with an artist or show that I actually enjoy and take pictures and post them eventually. Here I have my Illustration class final which I think is pretty siick! I also did a shirt design for Easier Said Than Done a Albuquerque pop/punk band. I'll post that eventually too. So I am leaving to Carlsbad tomorrow, i'm way too pumped cause I get to see Prom Nite Girls last scare, along with like ten other bands which is effin insane. Sucks cus the Albuquerque crew is leaving the next day...But I also get to spend time with my other bros. Im gonna try posting more I swear. I wanna make a series of kick ass babies.

Past couple of weeks have sucked ass

Midterms were this week and shit was intense...still have one more to go. I have some pretty good stuff that I need to post but I am waiting for my instructors to give them back. I have been working a lot. They started doing this thing at Best Buy where if you sell a protection plan or magazine subscriptions you get a gold or blue star...It feels like kindergarten which is pretty funny. shitty stuff aside I went to this weird show with this guy from work. It was Funeral for a Friend, The Sleeping, Emarosa and This Is Hell. I went mainly for This Is Hell, but there set was only like 4 or 5 songs crowd sucked too. I picked up a pretty sweet 2 screen poster though. Emarosa is one of those bands that suck when you hear there records but are pretty good live. The Sleeping was sick, singer looks like Vince Vaughn, they were really fun and that made me want to go pick up a couple of their albums. Funeral for a Friend wasn't really that good, and I was tired by then which didn't help out. The singer was pretty funny I think mainly because of his accent. I plan on making it to more shows this year. Im gonna buy tickets to go watch New Found Glory, Bayside and Set Your Goals.

Heres a list of music I've been listening to

Band-Epic Track:
Right Away Great Captain-Memories from a Shore
Two Tounges-Try Not to Save Me
Wild Sweet Orange-Either/Or
Glassjaw-You Think You're Fucking John Lennon
The Good Life-Keely Aimee

So one of these days I am gonna start my sketch a day blog, where I post one sketch a day for as long as I can. I got the idea from the dudes at Joyengine.com just something to sharpen my shitty drawing skills.

EPIC CHER

This is a project for my Digital Layout & Print Production II class. I talked about it earlier but I just barely got started. I hate Cher but i think this is gonna turn out alright.

"Can you read the bottom line for me?"

So I got new glasses (as I mentioned before). I had a headache for the first few days along with me seeing kind of blurry I thought maybe I was just adjusting to the new lenses. Its day four and shit is still blurry. I am pissed I have to go back and take another eye exam...I hate when they ask you which one looks clearer...1?...or 2? sometimes they look exactly the same! F**k!

Kick Ass

My new frames came in. Its the weekend even though I work everyday I still get to chill. I went to this comic bookstore for the first time and its pretty sweet. I bought issues 1-3 of Kick Ass and it is pretty insane, along with volume 9 of The Walking Dead, very depressing volume I was shocked when he was talking to no one on the phone...zombie apocalypse must be pretty intense on the psyche.

Pointilism...

Pointillism-a technique of neo-Impressionist painting using tiny dots of various pure colors which become blended in the viewer's eye.
This is an assignment for my Illustration class. Create a stamp depicting some sort of American history, I chose Jackson Pollock for he is a famous American painter. I could have used any medium I wanted to as long as it was black & white. I chose pen. I am okay with pencils but the size of the picture had to be 5 times the size of a stamp (3.5in x 4in). I chose dots because they take up less space...I don't know why it came up sideways.

Won't you feed on me?

I love Renaissance looking banners...this is actually a symbol that comes already with Illustrator CS4. I just used live paint and filled it in with my favorite colors. The hand I just traced a photo and I typed in REEKS on a curved path. It looks like something that would be on one of those Famous shirts...unfortunately.

What you thought was the starting point of the wrap actually ends up being the end.

-Micron pen on paper/digital-
Yeah...I will post some more yarn drawings...its really fun and random to draw. Click image to see the entire drawing.

Customer Service Specialist

So I've been working at Best Buy now since November 1st (my birthday) and have enjoyed my time there. I love my co-workers and its better than my previous job (mcdonalds). Of course like any job there are always unfavorable things that happen, and at Best Buy its cheap customers. Being a Best Buy employee gives me a pretty good discount, but when someone I don't even know ask me for the employee discount it drives me insane! I don't even give my good friends my discount (sometimes i'll take a percentage off) so what makes these people I don't even know think that I will give them a discount...pisses me off.
Tax Exempt- I didn't even know this existed till I worked here. This one gentleman from Alaska bought a DVD for $7 something, I had to fill out a tax exempt form for this a-hole and it only brought it down like 63 cents...people do this every day and they are only saving like a couple bucks. Other than that, I can't complain theres all kinds of shawtys too, I be breaking neck all the time.

I Love Illustrator!

I just wanted to show some of the things I have done in Illustrator.
- The first one was an idea for my crews version of Coachella. The idea was to Renaissance looking my friends wanted a more hardcore bro down feel. Basically it was a three day weekend in a house with ten dudes in it...I love my friends. I will post the version I went with eventually.
-This one here is an idea my friend Tim came up with. Pretty self-explanatory. myspace.com/promnitegirls-This was for my Digital Layout & Print Production I class in which I had to create a direct mailer for whatever I wanted to I chose one of my favorite magazines. I like my little characters, they look funny.

Reeks Today

So I have recently just started my third quarter (I think I said that in a previous post) at IADT-Seattle. I just wanted show everyone the classes I am taking:
-Multimedia I- In this class I will be learning how to use Adobe Flash, and for those of you who don't know what Flash is it is basically a program for making flash animations for websites.

-Graphic Design I- You think I would've already taken this class...here we learn basically some history of Graphic Design and what it is. In this class all of our projects and assignments will be hand-rendered. I'm pretty excited for this but the teacher I have is very young and I don't think she has as much experience as some of my other instructors in previous classes. But who am I to judge?

-Digital Layout & Print Production II- One name...Cher. We have already been assigned our midterm project in which we must create the packaging for Cher's "Collectors Edition" 3 disc and Autobiography DVD which holds everything she has done since the beginning of her career till today. There are probably 25 people in this class and we all got the same artist...I understand where he is trying to get at where in the real world we don't get to choose our own clients, but this is ridiculous he could at least randomly assigned four artists each artists having four concepts.

-Illustration- I'm am very excited for this class, the first day I found out that my instructor was inaugurated into the League of American Illustrators (or something like that) just recently which makes me feel like I will actually be learning something. However she talks really fast and rambles...I'm an asshole. So in this class for the first half of the quarter we will be doing hand-rendered comps of our assignments. And for the second half we will be learning Adobe Illustrator which is a vector-based graphics software (type in vector based into google and you can see numerous samples of vector-based graphics). I have been using Illustrator for almost 2 years now I'm not as proficient as I would like to be but I know my way around.

So that is my class list, my schedule is:
Mondays 8:00 am-10:45 pm (first 3 classes)
Thursdays 8:00 am-12:40 pm (last class)
Each class is about four hours long with a couple of breaks in between, I really like this because it gives me a lot of time during the rest of the week to work and do homework like should be right now but instead I am writing in my blog which no one even reads.

Photography

So as a Graphic Designer I should have some designs, however haven't had time to post as often as I wanted to. So here are some photos I shot for my final project in my Digital Photography class. Fortunately I had an amazing instructor who was very knowledgeable on the subject, unfortunately she no longer teaches.

http://i245.photobucket.com/albums/gg50/reekersmonky/final_w_text.jpg

http://i245.photobucket.com/albums/gg50/reekersmonky/final_no_text.jpg

The jpg of them was very discolored so i used the direct link. So I want to talk a little about these photos, these were both for my final project which was called Staged to Sell, we needed to shoot photos of a product or a service that would be used as an advertisement, one with text the other without.
I think the bamboo tablet works very well, it looks a lot more serious than other ads that I have seen for the bamboo line of tablets. With the lighting of my ghetto studio it gave the tablet a really soft spot light toward the bottom of the tablet making it look very epic. The text I used worked out even better than I thought it would because it is basically labeling the product "An Extension of Your Creativity" I like it. I also looks as if it is waiting for you to pick it up and play with it.

As for the Chucks, these were a lot easier to sell as they are easily recognizable. I basically used the same lighting from the other photo but took the photo from a different angle. The light gave the the shoelaces a really rough texture which looks awesome. I used an old pair my own I didn't want to use new shoes because old ones just look better. Overall very epic.

About Reeks

I just want to tell anyone who stumbles across this page a little about where I come from and how I ended up here. I moved to Seattle from Carlsbad, New Mexico where I graduated high school and attended a community college for two years. I was unsure of what I wanted to do so I took a bunch of gen. ed. classes my first year. I found out that the school started doing teaching media productions and did a year of that. This was when I discovered I really enjoyed graphic design. I had to get out of that town, all my friends had already left to Albuquerque. I considered moving to Alb. but had a change of heart and moved here. My father lives about two and a half hours away and is helping me out while I live on my own. So I just started my third quarter at the International Academy of Design and Technology-Seattle...(sound like an asshole right?) I am going for an AA in Visual Communications which is basically a mix of graphic design and media classes. So far it is a lot fun, but also insanely stressful. I am enjoying school a lot it has changed the way I see things, for instance I now notice things that I never noticed before i.e. photoshopped photos, awful movie edits, good advertisements and horrible one.

So I am having fun for now, but I am contemplating moving to Albuquerque. I like it up here but I see myself getting more inspiration and ideas from my friends back in the Land of Enchantment. But until I finish my Vis. Comm. AA I will be up here in the meantime.

It's a New Year

resolution- a firm decision to do or not to do something: she kept her resolution not to see Anne anymore.

I haven't made a resolution since I was in 6th grade, and even then I never kept it.