Beer Label Brainstorming
26/September/2008
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.
Benjamin Franklin
Recently while checking out the micro-brew choices at the local grocery store I was thinking how great some of the label art is. It really runs the gamut in style from classy to humorous with a lot of the art having a nice hand crafted, painterly look. I would assume that’s to reinforce the hand crafted image of the beers themselves, a marketing strategy to help distinguish the small guys from the Buds and Millers of the world with their nondescript, corporate looks. In any case, there is some great stuff here. I especially like the pieces that describe what the bottle contains with their landscape paintings or characters. So much cool art with an adult beverage thrown in - kind of like a wine and cheese gallery opening for Joe Six-Pack.
Anyway that got me thinking about creating some label art for a micro-micro-brewer friend of mine. I started with the name, “Honey Bock”. Sounds good, no idea what it would taste like. Wikipedia tells us that Bock beers were historically brewed by monks to celebrate special occasions such as Easter. Today Bock beer is most often associated with spring and the labels often depict a goat, a reference to the German translation of “bock”.
So with “spring” and “goat” in mind I started to draw and wound up with the sketch on the left. I wanted to break away from drawing a regular goat and played with some animal caricatures but decided a Pan character would work even better as a reference to both spring and a goat. The bee is obviously a connection to the “Honey” component. The character ideas are ok but they are very static. Sketch 2 refines things and improves the movement. Pan now sports a springtime flower necklace in place of the strap across the chest and I lost the traditional Pan flute, giving him a medieval horn instead. Figuring the bee reference was strong enough, I ditched his honey drip from sketch #1 and gave him some instruments as well. With more animation the’re both in celebration mode.
As far as the background goes, my plan was to work within a shape which at this point I’m thinking may be something slightly amorphous. Maybe a smoke shape or a flowing design along the lines of a Mucha poster. The art would then be usable on a variety of further background colors and textures.
Next: It’s time to play with a little color.
Benjamin Franklin
Recently while checking out the micro-brew choices at the local grocery store I was thinking how great some of the label art is. It really runs the gamut in style from classy to humorous with a lot of the art having a nice hand crafted, painterly look. I would assume that’s to reinforce the hand crafted image of the beers themselves, a marketing strategy to help distinguish the small guys from the Buds and Millers of the world with their nondescript, corporate looks. In any case, there is some great stuff here. I especially like the pieces that describe what the bottle contains with their landscape paintings or characters. So much cool art with an adult beverage thrown in - kind of like a wine and cheese gallery opening for Joe Six-Pack.
Anyway that got me thinking about creating some label art for a micro-micro-brewer friend of mine. I started with the name, “Honey Bock”. Sounds good, no idea what it would taste like. Wikipedia tells us that Bock beers were historically brewed by monks to celebrate special occasions such as Easter. Today Bock beer is most often associated with spring and the labels often depict a goat, a reference to the German translation of “bock”.
So with “spring” and “goat” in mind I started to draw and wound up with the sketch on the left. I wanted to break away from drawing a regular goat and played with some animal caricatures but decided a Pan character would work even better as a reference to both spring and a goat. The bee is obviously a connection to the “Honey” component. The character ideas are ok but they are very static. Sketch 2 refines things and improves the movement. Pan now sports a springtime flower necklace in place of the strap across the chest and I lost the traditional Pan flute, giving him a medieval horn instead. Figuring the bee reference was strong enough, I ditched his honey drip from sketch #1 and gave him some instruments as well. With more animation the’re both in celebration mode.
As far as the background goes, my plan was to work within a shape which at this point I’m thinking may be something slightly amorphous. Maybe a smoke shape or a flowing design along the lines of a Mucha poster. The art would then be usable on a variety of further background colors and textures.
Next: It’s time to play with a little color.