One of my favorite types of projects to work on as a visual designer has been vinyl record sleeves. As any snob can tell you, there is no finer user experience than getting a cool record. It looks, feels, and sounds cool. From a design perspective, it’s great because there are rarely any restrictions placed on the design. I try to consider the elemental aspects of a band in the building of the sleeves to put their personality front and center.

For the last 10 years I’ve served as the artist for CF. Stylistically they are 1980s melodic hardcore punk music, but delivered at an absolutely frantic pace. Lyrically they present a wry, witty, dystopian take on midcentury American values with a western expansion flair. This inspired me to source images from 1950s commercial illustration and advertising ephemera. For my contextual inquiry I would comb used book stores and junk shops for  out of print and forgotten material of America’s old vision of the future. To keep things aesthetically consistent with the classic sound that inspired the band, I set out to create their covers as much by hand as possible. For the first few pieces, I strictly used analog materials: rub off sheet letters, tape, glue, copier machines, and cutouts from found magazines/flyers/catalogs, and sci-fi pulp novels that I photocopied within an inch of their life. Over time I allowed myself to evolve into some computer composition, but only because I never learned how to work with actual film sheets for color backgrounds. The material is still hand ruined.