New Robots AZR-0 Joining The Curio & Co. Familiy

This is the first color illustration for the AZR-0 robots along with some close-up details.

I've been working on the logo for a couple of days and here are some of the different variations.

1000 Times Vol.1 - 1000 Times Franks and His Friend - 1000 Times of Fun

I was thinking of using the titles 1000 Times of Awesome, but that was way too pretentious, this is not a movie trailer.

We got the books (Frank and His Friend Special Collector's Edition Vol.1) from the printer on Wednesday, and we'll be putting the finishing touches on them over the weekend, meaning we'll be embossing the certificates and adding the Curio stamp of authenticity in the back of the book, yup hand stamped (obviously I'm a masochist) .  We're looking forward to doing that, it will really bring things together and give a good sense of accomplishment, plus it's relaxing work, and no brain teaser.

This production run was of 1000 units, still published by Ringer Publishing but the contemporary 2013 Ringer.  As a matter of fact we updated the logo of the company.  The back story is that the company bought up other smaller companies and grew since the 1979, when it published Time for Frank and His Friend.  For those that know it we introduced Ringer in 2012 as the publishing house of Time for Frank and His Friend, a .  Of course our good friend Melvin Goodge also make an appearance in the book, along with a easter eggs, for the ones that know our products.

I really enjoy doing graphic design as much as doing illustration, type face design or anything else that is in the end visual.  That's why we started Curio & Co., it's a good excuse to do research and use all aspects of visual communication, as well as dealing in entertainment.  Everything we enjoy in one package.

I try to spend as much time as I have available on details, and updating the Ringer Publishing logo was imperative for this publication, a small detail that creates continuity in the Curio World and ground the product in reality.  The design choices of the logo should also help tell the story of Ringer as a company, where it was and where it's now, hopefully that come comes across.  The title of the book show help filling in the blanks.

As I mentioned in the previous post we'll be talking about our development proces at this Comic-Con Panel:

Genuine Fakes: Making the Artificial Real

Thursday July 18, 2013 7:00pm - 8:00pm 
Room 32AB

From comics to movie monsters and authenticity to alternate universes, how "real" does a fake need to be in order to be believable? Cesare Asaro (creator,Finding Frank and His Friend), Kim Hutsell(Steampunk designer and prop maker, founder of the annual Starburner Awards), Luke Khanlian (special effects creature creator, Alien Resurrection, Starship Troopers), Peter Maresca (editor, Sunday Press Books), and Kirstie Shepherd (author, Gadabout Time Machine User's Manual) discuss how to get the details right when creating a believable fake world. They'll be looking at what materials say about an object and how those materials can be manipulated to create the suspension of disbelief.

The Curio World of Curio & Co. - Updated

Making fakes is what we do, and to make a genuine fake, we need to know where things come from, and specially how they are connected to what we already have.  Every decision needs to follow a thread in order for that world to makes sense.  This is pretty much, my approach to design in general, I repeat to my self quite often: if it doesn't have a reason it doesn't belong there.  I had to kill many designs with this approach, but in the long run the product is more cohesive and the people respond better to it.  In college the line was, you got to kill your darlings, I'm sure many of you have heard that before.

We used to start by developing and idea and see what it grew in to, now that we have the foundation of  what we call the Curio World, the ideas that come to mind are already connected to this skeleton.  Having created the brands, their personalities, and their back story, it's easy to make the initial decision of how to connect things.  Let's say we were to come out with a vintage Spaceman Jax comic book, would it be published by Ringer Publishing, who also published Frank and His Friend? Or, would we feel the need to create a new publishing hose for that project, or maybe just a subsidiary or Ringer?  In this case it would have to be a subsidiary, with a similar name to but different logo.  Obviously it would be easier to say Ringer Publishing does all the books in the Curio World but that would not make things feel real.  After all Penguin Books is very different from Phaidon or Taschen.

We'll be talking in more details about this subject at one of the two Comic-Con panel we organized, it will be an open discussion with different type of creators from movie monsters, books and products to, steam punk props:

Genuine Fakes: Making the Artificial Real 

Thursday, 7/18/13, 7:00p.m. - 8:00p.m., Room: 32AB

From comics to movie monsters and authenticity to alternate universes – how “real” does a fake need to be in order to be believable? Join Cesare Asaro (Creator, Finding Frank and His Friend), Kim Hutsell (Steampunk Designer and Prop Maker, Founder of the Annual Starburner Awards), Luke Khanlian (Design Engineer on the 10,000 Year Clock and Special Effects Creature Creator, Alien Resurrection, Starship Troopers, The Green Mile), Peter Maresca (Editor, Sunday Press Books), and Kirstie Shepherd (Author, Gadabout Time Machine User’s Manual) for a panel discussion on getting the details right when creating a believable fake world. We’ll be looking at what materials say about an object and how those materials can be manipulated to create the suspension of disbelief.

Curio & Co.'s Spaceman Jax Gets Reboot

Many, many properties in Hollywood are getting reboot.  In the studio we constantly joke about how quick a property is turned around.  And if the reboot fails in two years time it's attempted again, until success is achieved.  Not even a week after it's release, and the new Superman's success made the decision for the studio's heads to fast track the sequel for a 2014 release.  They're already behind schedule before they started.  Given my little experience in the industry rushing a movie into production with such a short production schedule and such high expectations can be, at best, a nightmare of a project.  But I'm digressing.  We were talking about reboots.

Reboots: we started to think how about rebooting a fake animated TV show like Spaceman Jax and the Galactic Adventures? How would that look like? Who would do the project? I set out to update the logo for the reboot and made some teaser poster designs, and here they are.

A quick disclaimer, obviously these are just simulations of how the property could look if DC, Pixar or Disney were to do a "reboot" of Spaceman Jax.

Curio & Co. - Plasticash Credit Card - Where Credit Is Due

In the Curio World things are sometime just a bit different and in some case the same, gravity still works.

We've been working hard to introduce more and more brands in our Curio World, brands that we are weaving together to create this fictional alternative universe full of crazy pop culture and make believe.  Ringer was the fake publishing house for Time for Frank and His Friend, Bunchy is the soft drink, and Oberpfaffendorfer makes frozen foods; they all help tell our story and let us have fun with the ads.  Now we are also adding on Plasticash for credi cards.

So starting our next show we'll also accept this Curio World credi card, if you can get your hands on it...

The above mentioned ads will be added to the shop by July, but we'll have prints with us at the shows.

Curio & Co. - Bunchy - The Soft Drink

In the Curio & Co. universe, Bunchy is the soft drink of choice.

I'm presently working on an ad for this soft drink, as soon as it's done... I'll post it.  For the time being here is the logo I made for it.

Happy weekend.