CRAZY 4 CULT: BACK IN LA

Gallery1988's most anticipated annual art show, Crazy 4 Cult, is back in LA this year for it's 8th installment. I've had the pleasure of contributing to the last two shows, both in New York. It's their biggest show each year, and it's awesome to be in the lineup as a regular!

PAST C4C CONTRIBUTIONS

Army of Darkness and Clerks. Both way up there on my list of favs. For this year, I wanted to continue to design a poster that incorporated the movie in a clever way (like Ash on a playing card and Jay an Silent Bob reenacting American Gothic).

I decided to do something a little different and create a poster that could be used inside the universe of the movie. Aliens is a perfect Scifi Action movie (with some horror elements) that I have always been a huge fan of. For this kind of cheeky, meta poster, Aliens was perfect with all it's catch phrases, cool weapons, xenomorphs, and mostly because the Colonial Marines are just ultimate badasses!

SKETCHES

As usual, the design process started with loose sketches. I wanted the design to fit in with the 80s vision of the future, so that meant 45 degree angles! Notched out corners on everything! The content I decided to include consisted of weapons, xeno life-cycle, and xeno physiology. This poster is intended to resemble something that Weyland-Yutani would pass out to the Colonial Marines as preparation for their mission. After all, it was a little more to handle than your average bug hunt.

RESEARCH

A lot went into making sure the details were as accurate as possible. The guns had to be exact, the xeno had to be anatomically correct, and the language had to be on point. So I pulled images from xenopedia (yes that's a real thing) and I watched the movie like 8 times. Seriously, the art direction and practical effects make this movie incredible. Lots of inspiration to pull from.

DESIGN

Here are a few shots of the process. I went from sketches to wireframes, then I just started filling in the shapes one by one. I experimented with different color combos, but the original was the best—gotta love that slimy green!

THE FINAL DESIGN

The process was a labor of love. Those damn guns took forever to make, and even longer to prep for print. Totally worth it, though. The final design was full of fun movie references and garish color and cool-ass aliens. This is definitely an example of me designing something that I would personally hang up. Click on the final design to see it bigger.

The movie is non-stop iconic quotes, sweet futuristic technology, killer weapons, and creepy alien fun! I wanted to make sure my design captured that.