I’m hoping body armor comes back into style- because this girl looks awesome. This style of fashion is both functional and nicely designed. This artist is a heavy metal rock musician from the UK who wanted to convey an image of her self on the cd cover that reflected her musical persona. Every now and then a design project comes along in which the client has a very specific image in mind and it’s up to me to visually replicate that idea. I worked on this design job for over a month. It took longer than I expected but it also turned out better than i expected. The client basically gave me a photo of her face and I came up with the rest of the body and background. I used photoshop to compose this piece out of a collection of photos. It’s not as noticeable now, but the figure pictured above is made up of 5 or 7 different humans, including arms, neck, ears, face, breast, legs, etc.. they’re all body part photos taken from different humans. I felt like a mad scientist. Design-wise these kinds of projects are difficult because you’re asked to combine a bunch of elements and make them look like one cohesive piece. I started by working in grayscale (this helps make all the elements look the same because they’re only black and white) I then tailored all the body parts to fit the correct size and lighting, after this I added color and overlaid textures and filters to make it one happy design.

Hello again readers- check out my latest design for a heavy metal/death metal musician from Spain- that’s right their rocking out over in Espana to. Actually I’m working with a few metal bands from Spain right now- there must be some kind of heavy metal rock renaissance going on over there or something. The name of the band is “Cautiva” and the album title is “Human”- I developed a few different cd cover options for him before he chose this one. He was pretty specific about what he wanted. When it comes to Art directing there’s a right way and a wrong way- luckily working with Cautiva, he new the right way- and he brought out the best in my skills by challenging me and being open to my ideas as well as having some ideas of his own. I came up with the cd cover concept above after pondering the meaning of human suffering and trying to condense it into it’s essence in a creative way. The imagery is morbid and very bloody but also intriguing by inviting the viewer to look closer and observe what actaully is happening in the art. The human hands are protruding from within to shed the battered shell of a human child with a dauntingly insidious face, representing the idea that we’re all human on the inside regardless of the facade we wear, what experiences we’ve been through, etc. We’re all the same at our core- Human. and valuable at that- as humans we have intrinsic value- regardless of how shattered we are- we can’t be robbed of our worth. Example- if you take a twenty dollar bill and crumple it up, step on it, rake it through the mud, spit on it, urinate it on it, etc… I bet that twenty dollar bill is still worth twenty dollars and you can still go out and buy a nice meal with it.
Also above is the traycard art for this cd package design- the humanoid inside the box assumes the fetal position as life sticks more swords into his existence. Below was the first cover design I submitted that was not used- however the client liked the art so much he still wanted to use it- so I used it on the traycard.

This design is for a christian rock band- the concept is that the hands are tied but are also creating a shadow puppet of a bird spreading it’s wings- conveying the album title “escape”. The hands are meant to be Jesus’ Christ hands. The aged textures and colors really solidify the setting of this design.

This blue beast cover illustration was a second cover design option that was not chosen- I had this image in my head when i read the album title was escape- although it looks there is little chance the running man will escape this over grown cookie monster. I created the illustration using adobe photoshop and my digital wacom tablet pen. Enjoy

Fernando Medina, Christian Art, Christian Design, Christian Rock, Graphic Design, Sci-Fi Art, Photoshop illustration, Illustration, Art, Cover Art, Album Art, CD Art, Aurora, IL Artist, Chicago Artist, Illinois Artist, Graphic Design 60505, Illustrator 60504, Designer, cd design.

Check out this photo I converted into a cement statue- I used a few textures and filters in photoshop to create this effect. It took me a little over an hour to do. Basically I cut out the angel from the photo, grayscaled her, cleared out her eyes to make them look a solid color, applied some cement/granite textures over her and set the layer to multiply or overlay- i don’t remember which one exactly, then applied the rusted/aged cement orange in select areas, added the column on which she sits, and a falling feather to insinuate she recently was real or will become real very soon, and finally added some breaks and cracks to give it an aged effect- vuala! you got your self a c-ment angel.

I welcome any questions or critiques- thanks for stopping by.

Graphic Designer © 2009 Fernando Medina, Fernando Creatice art. cd designer, cd design, cd album cover art, Graphic Design 60505, Illustrator, illustration, Photoshop illustration, Rock and Roll CD cover art design, rock cd design, angel design

This is a logo I was working on for myself- Fernando Creative. It’s still not finished but I’m pretty happy with it so far- I might ad some other design elements and patterns, etc. The green tint was a happy accident- I intended it to be blue and gold- it’ll probably end up that color in the end. I used a combination of adobe illustrator and photoshop to create it. I like the logo because it has a real presence and you can almost feel the weight of the block letter- it looks dense and insinuates how Fernando Creative can be a real presence in helping others through creative services i.e. illustration, graphic design, etc. I welcome any compliments or criticisms.

© 2009 Fernando Medina. Photoshop illustration, logo designer, logo design, logo, graphic design, Graphic Design 60504, graphic designer, Chicago Graphic designer, chicago suburb graphic designer, corporate identity.

I recently designed this cd cover for an upcoming album release “A Collectors R&B Dream 1968″. From left to right: James Brown, Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder. It was kind of surreal to work on a project containing such musical legends.

Fernando Medina, Christian Art, Christian Design, Christian Rock, Graphic Design, Sci-Fi Art, Photoshop illustration, Illustration, Art, Cover Art, Album Art, CD Art, Aurora, IL Artist, Chicago Artist, Illinois Artist, Graphic Design 60505, Illustrator 60504, Designer, cd design.