Don't Call Me Scarface!

The latest installment of OtherWisz posterdom is for the upcoming Punky Reggae Party 2 at the Mohawk Place. This event features some great local punk bands (Wolf Tickets, Chosen Ones, Rockas) with a ska/reggae bent all wrapped up with WBNY's DJ Universal.

This poster is probably one of the more colorful pieces I have created in a while drawing on the red, green and gold of traditional reggae graphics. The client wanted something including, and I quote, "punk rockers, dreads, and speakers speakers speakers!!!"... so did I listen to the client..? Not exactly. Instead I used Don Letts! I figured since Don was using one of my posters in his movie, I would put Don on one of my posters (read post below). Seemed fair enough.

The Formula- how it was made....
I "found" a cool photo of Don and blew him out, bit-mapped him and started to build up around the event title. I have no idea why I am so drawn to this western-circus font, the Rosewood Standard, or why it even works here, but for some reason it does. I think because the font has that old-timey poster feel to it, juggle the individual letterforms around and it lends itself well to a party atmosphere. The rest of the text was set in one of my favorite chunky rock font, Poplar Standard Black. I don't know, maybe I need to start using some different typefaces..? You tell me.

I was dying to use the 2-Tone guy and by balancing him with the Circle Jerks dude-- we had both the "punky" and the "reggae." I then added the ska checker board at the top and bottom to frame it. But I wasn't ready to call it day and something felt like it was missing.... I wanted to get some of the aggression and violence that the rastas, punks and ska dude rallied against when the Punky Reggae movement was born in 70's London. So a spray-painted, bloody splat seemed to work just right. By layering it behind and on top of the corner pieces of art, I got some messy depth.

Some fine tuning at this point included pulling an ornament from the typeface and offseting it on top of the jumbled characters. I took the same ornament and placed it over our main man's glasses to add to his 'death stare' with an implied set of daggers. I gave him a golden yellow halo, and we we were just about finished. As per usual, with any OtherWisz rock poster, I had to add a few stars. I started to "over-star it," and the client asked me to pull back a bit on the stars... I think it was a good piece of advice.

BONUS BEATS- the above snapshot was snatched from a photo taken at the Mohawk Place last week and it shows my poster hanging in it's natural environment. Rock on!