One of the things I enjoy most from my T-Shirt business is the graphic design.  I like trying to be creative, or visualing something in my mind and then trying to put it onto paper… or the computer screen.  My uncle is a talented artist and when I was young, he taught me a lot of different techniques and mediums for creating art.  I remember carving things out of a block of wood.  I actually still have a scar on my chest where I accidentally stabbed myself with an exacto knife when I was about 10.  But don’t worry, I have fully recovered.  I remember making a sclupture out of plaster of paris.  He taught me how to create stained glass art.  And of course we would draw a lot, using various things such as pencil, pen & ink, charcoal.  I even remember one point where I was going to get rich selling these rocking chairs we made out of clothespins.  We mass produced them for a short while, and then the demand dwindled.  I’m still not sure what went wrong.  But anyway, those were some fun memories.

I don’t get to use my creative art skills much at my day job.  So I really hadn’t done much art since I was in college, which has been a long time.  I think that was one of the main reasons I wanted to get into making T-shirts, so that I could actually feel like I was creating something artistic again.  I have enjoyed that.  I also try to get ideas and inspirtation from others in the same business, so there’s a discussion board I often read that deals with sports uniform logos.  And there are a lot of graphic designers that will post their creations on there for others to rave over.  One day, I thought, hey why can’t I post some of my stuff.  I like being complimented as much as the next guy.  So I did.  And I got a lot of compliments.  I was feeling pretty good about myself, and then I started looking at some of the others artists on there.  And even the terrible ones would get comments like, “Awesome job man!”, or “Yeah, that rocks!”.  At that point, I began to wonder maybe my stuff really isn’t very good.  Or maybe there is just always somebody that will like any kind of “art” people throw out there.  One guy on the discussion boards asked for somebody to create him a logo for his team, the Carolina Cyclones.  And here is what was posted as a possibility.  I’m thinking it was done as a joke, but I still got a good laugh out of it.  You can always find somebody that likes your “art”.  I’m thinking we might use these jerseys for our next softball season.