retro

Retro Illustrations from Russia

paul0v2 — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 14:52:09 +0000

Iv Orlov is an illustrator from Murmansk, Russia and his work is absolutely amazing. A mix of retro with a strong use of colors and patterns blending everything together and twisting the mind of the viewer by creating different shapes using the white space. It's like each piece never ends. Check it out!

About the author

Hi there! I'm Paulo Canabarro, 26 year old web designer - paulocanabarro.com I'm from Brazil currently living and working out of Providence RI, USA. I'm truly passionate about design of all kinds, finding and sharing inspiration here has become part of my life. If you like to know more about me or get in touch visit my website paulocanabarro.com Stock me at Twitter and Dribbble

Sponsored Links:

Beautiful Editorial Illustrations by Luciano Lozano aka. Ilustrista

marcos333 — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:31:15 +0000

Luciano Lozano it's a self-taught illustrator based on Barcelona, Spain working mainly with magazines and books. He got a quite distinctive style, since we cannot simply label it as retro as sometimes he works with traditional methods getting some really fresh results.

You can know more about Luciano at his Website.

About the author

My name is Marcos Torres, I'm Graphic Artist from Porto Alegre, Brasil. You can get to know more about me by acessing my Personal Website or by following me on Twitter: @marcos333. You can also see some of my last projects at my Flickr.

Sponsored Links:

Vintage Christmas Ads

AoiroStudio — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 18:15:24 +0000

Christmas time is a great opportunity to find time and enjoy the holiday with family and friends. Every time, there's Christmas, there's just ads everywhere we look. It got me inspired to look and share this collection of vintage Christmas ads, what really stroked me is the ads were so simple and yet so informative. Also it's also great to see the needs of people really differ from our present time.

Christmas gift suggestions: to your enemy, forgiveness. To an opponent, tolerance. To a friend, your heart. To a customer, service. To all, charity. To every child, a good example. To yourself, respect. - Oren Arnold

You can find more vintage Christmas ads by visiting this Flickr.

About the author

My name's François Hoang and my alias's Aoiro Studio. I am a self-taught freelance graphic designer from Montreal, Canada. I've been designing for the last 4 years and really have a huge passion for creative work that makes a difference in our world. If you wanna requests some posts; I can be found on Twitter or feel free to contact me.

Sponsored Links:

Retro Movie Poster Case Study

paul0v2 — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 13:33:03 +0000

Streets of Fear is the name of the movie poster and it was designed by the German; Ralf Krause a specialist in photo illustration. In this Case Study you will see step by step how this awesome retro action movie poster was done and get a feeling of how you can do yours.

For more from Ralf Krause visit behance.net/eyeofthedesigner and falconwhite.com

Case Study

Final Result

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Retro Horror Movie Posters

AoiroStudio — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 16:54:02 +0000

It's Halloween! We all have our ways of celebrating this holiday, some of us will do some trick-or-treating, attending costume parties, playing pranks, telling scary stories or like me watch some old horror movies. This is a showcase of retro horror posters of famous and not-so famous movies from the mid 30s until the late 80s. They are mostly illustrated but in my opinion are the most successful of expressing the emotions and triggering your imagination of fear.

For more information on the movie posters, simply click on the image and you'll be redirected to IMDB Site (Internet Movie Database).

Michael Jackson's Thriller Video Clip

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Retro Futuristic Illustrations by Hypnosky

paul0v2 — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 15:24:46 +0000

Fill Ryabchikov aka Hypnosky is a young self-taught graphic design from Russia with an amazing retro futuristic style. His work has a lot of light effects and a strong retro feel to it along with some features from the future. Enjoy!

For more from Hypnosky visit hypnosky.com

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Create a Zee Vintage Label on Illustrator

marcos333 — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 05:48:43 +0000

It seems that the past 3 years had a boom of retro design, starting with the "cosmic neon lightning" 80's aesthetic that I think most of you are already bored about. Not just because it became a trend, but also because everyone with a photoshop could emulate one. So here's the thing, this new retro wave more focused on 50's and 60's design and illustration seems to be really different, why? Because most of it is hand drawn, and when it to comes to drawing, you wouldn't believe how many designers can't do it.

Let's assume, the last 20 years were pretty revolutionary to design since the computer took a big role on productivity and creation. But he also created patterns and made things more similar, some designers can't even work "old school", since they rely too much on the computer and that's not good. Drawing is a really personal rechnique, you will ever found two persons who will drawn a flower the same way, even with they pratice it. I think that's a thing this trend is rescuing. But, before someone asks, today's tutorial it's not about drawing, it's more about emulating, but sure you should thing about this subject.

Step 1

First of all, let's open Adobe Illustrator and create a new canvas with 21 x 21 cm (8,27 x 8,27 inches).

You probably already know I'm addicted to guides, they're quite useful to get layout orientation, but not exactly a need to. But If you want to use some, just unhide them (command + R/ ctrl +R) and pull from each axys to the position desired.

You should divide your layer like these, use command + L / ctrl + L to create new layers.

Using the rectangle tool (M) make this big square that fits over the canvas.

Make a rectangle inside, using the previous tool.

And another black one inside the white one. You can use the pathfinder option called Minusfront here, but it's not really necessary.

Step 2

Make this thin rectangles around the borders, use the align tool to help you out.

Then go to the pathfinder panel and choose the option called Minus Front.

Uisng the ellipse tool (L) make a circle with the center exactly on the edge of the black square. If you're using guides this will be way easier to posicionate.

Again, using the Minus Front option, get ride of this part on the square.

Repeat the same procedure on the other corners.

Using the ellips tool (L)let's make this circles filling the space the orther one took. Select the cirlce and the frame, then go to the pathfinder panel and choose the option called DIvide.

You're going to get this:

Just repeat the same proceure on the other corners.

Step 3

You probably already kno the hard gradient trick (aka. hachures), he can be really handy when trying to create a stylish frame. Using the polygon tool create a triangle. Then resize it using the selection tool (V) to make it thiner.

Tunr it black and make a group of at least three triangles that fit the white rectangles space on the frame.

Copy and paste on the other spaces.

This is a new trick a learn recently: create a square using the rectangle tool (M), then use the pucker tool on it, just set all the options to be lesse heavier.

You should get these flower shape:

Place it on the corner, then create another one inside of it with a white fill. Also add a circle inside of the last one.

Let's make a circle using the ellipse tool (L), then another one but in the corner.

Also make some leaf shapes using the pen tool (P). Copy and paste all this shapes on the other corners.

Step 4

Let's make the type, you can get this font here. First make a circle using the ellipse tool (L), then use the type on path tool, you can find it on the text type menu, it' pretty easy to use. I just wrote "Design and Web Development", then press command + O / ctrl + O to turn the type into curves.

I just copied the previous flower ornament and changed the colors to give contrast. Paste one on each extremity of the type.

Let make a circle using a white fill and a black stroke on it.

Access the stroke panel and choose to use a stroke inside the path, also add 7,53pt dashed line on it.

Using a black fill, I wrote "by" using the same type.

I dig a lot those old icons used on books and ad's with a more simplified shapes. So, as a way to symbolize the Design and Web development, I decided to use a brush and a eye. Let's start by the eye, make two circles, one with a fill other with just a stroke.

More two circles inside of the white one.

Make this dashes around the iris using the pen tool (P).

Let's make a brush, first draw this pieces using the pen tool (P).

Using the previous tool, let's add this reflexes.

Now duplicate all the shapes and just right-click on it, go to Transform > Reflect, turn the Vertical Axis.

Step 5

You can grab Snake Oil Font at Legacy of Defeat, I must say I'm addicted to this font. First you should write "ZEE", then curve it before anything command + O / ctrl + O.

Make a lot of thin rectangles using the rectangle tool (M), then use the align tools to keep an order on them. Doube-click on the letter of the type (not the shadow areas) and duplicate it.

Make a clipping mask all over the rectangles using the letter shape (command + 7 / ctrl + 7), repeat this procedure on other letters.

Also added a simple detail using the pen tool (P).

Step 6

Let's a make a trapezium using the rectangle tool (M), then adjust it using the direct selection tool (A). Duplicate it and sue the option called Unite.

I made tis folds on the ribbon by simply using the pen tool (P) and space between the shapes.

Add some of the hacures used previously. Just don't forget to add a clipping mask on them and using the direct selection tool (A) leave a space between it and the original shape.

You probably already familiar with the blend tool. In order to get a hard gradient using it, you just need to make two rectangles, one large and one thin. Then click on the tool icon and a panel will pop up, set spacing as Specified Steps and use just 5.

Grab the result and place it on the ribbon letting, duplicate it and reflect it. Then finally add a clipping mask over it.

OLd trick: Write Est. 2004 using this font. Then write agian over using a black fill, just to make a hard shadow.

Step 7

We need to add some grain in order to give that used look. We will need a little help from Photoshop so. Open it and make a squared canvas, place the whole art as a Smart Object.

Get this book texture here, using the magic wand (W), select the texture of it randomly. Back to the Smart Object layer, use this selection and create a mask, if necessary use invert the selection (command + I/ ctrl + I).

Conclusion

Trying to simulate vintage design is more about rethinking how people would create such graphics in a era without computers and, of course, lots of references. Most of the things done on the 50's and 60's were hand made, even If they look really sharp and clean, the methods and techniques were pretty basic. So part of trying to reach this aesthetic is to going back to what i call fundamental: drawing technique. If you don't know how to draw what you do on the computer, you should definitely worry about, because a good designer can't rely only on a tool. That's it. thanks for you time, hope you enjoyed it.

Download the Illustrator File

Click here to download the Illustrator file used for this tutorial.

Download the Photoshop File

Click here to download the Illustrator file used for this tutorial.

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Retro Mag Covers by OMNI Magazine

AoiroStudio — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 17:51:10 +0000

The world of Science of Fiction is a universe that will never cease to inspire and feed my creativity. Let me share with you guys this retro collection of magazine covers, from the 1980s to the mid 1990s, of the science and science fiction magazine named OMNI.

OMNI was launched by Kathy Keeton, long-time companion and later wife of Penthouse magazine publisher Bob Guccione, who described the magazine in its first issue as "an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal". OMNI (Magazine) on Wikipedia

For more information about the OMNI magazine, you can visit their website at OmniMagOnline.com.

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Hand-lettering typography by Jon Contino

marcos333 — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 14:11:18 +0000

In a era where most of the typography is digital made, hand-lettering can give a hell of a charming to a design. So it is the work of Jon Contino, some may call it retro, I just think it's quite stylish and remarkable.

If you want to know more about Jon and his artworks, please access his Personal Website.

As a New York native, Jon Contino has been under the influence of corporate mass marketing and inspirational street art since his first breath. Not surprisingly, he has garnered considerable attention for his unique approach to design utilizing hand-drawn lettering and typographic illustration in conjunction with a modern, yet minimalistic sensibility (Jon's Website).

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Funny and Interesting Illustrations by Nigel Buchanan

marcos333 — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 17:52:30 +0000

Nigel Buchanan is a illustrator working mainly with graphic and editorial areas. His artwork feature some really cool retro style, reminds me a bit those old tale books, with a lot of gradients and grain texture on the characters.

You can find other artworks and some really cool proccess shots on his Blog or you can also see some of these on his Website.

About the author

Sponsored Links:

The Intriguing Universe of Hafaell

marcos333 — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 19:06:17 +0000

You really know that a illustrator got into a really unique aesthetic when you cannot label him and words are just not enough to describe his creations. Rafael Pereira (aka. Hafaell) is a well known illustrator thru the t-shirts communities, his illustrations can transit from darkness, beauty, disgust and some really unknown and weird feelings I can't describe yet.

You can get in touch with more of his artwork by accessing his Cargo Profileand his Flickr.

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Awesome Amp Controls in Photoshop

abduzeedo — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 03:23:25 +0000

I love some apps that recreate amplifiers with leather and those controllers. I have been thinking about doing a tutorial on that for quite long time, so today I decided to learn how to do that and then try to explain how I did it to you guys.

So in this tutorial I will show you how to create an awesome amp controls using only Photoshop.

Step 1

Open Photoshop and create a new document. I am using 2560x1440 pixels. After that fill the background layer with grey using the Paint Bucket Tool (G)

Step 2

Go to Filter>Texture>Craquelure. Use 9 for the Crack Spacing, 2 for Crack Depth and 10 for Crack Brightness.

Step 3

Go to Layer>Layer Styles>Color Overlay. Use black for the color and Multiply at 70% Opacity.

Step 4

Go to Image>Adjustments>Levels. Use 120 for the black input, 1.00 for the grey and 181 for the white input.

Step 5

With the Ellipse Tool (U) create a circle in the center of your design.

Step 6

Select the Gradient Tool (G) then click on the color preset. Change the colors so you have something like the image below.

Step 7

Add a new layer and the with the Gradient Tool (G) select the Angle Gradient type and fill the layer with the gradient preset we created in the previous step. After that create a marquee selection of the circle we created in the step 5, to do that is super simple, just click holding Command (mac)/Control (PC) on the thumb of the circle layer.

Step 8

Go to Layer>Layer Mask>Reveal Selection.

Step 9

Duplicate the circle layer and fill it with white. Change the order so it is on top of the other layers. After that change the Fill Opacity to 0%.

Step 11

Go to Layer>Layer Styles>Inner Shadow. Use Color Dodge for the Blend Mode, white for the Color, 90 for the Angle and 70% for Opacity. After that use 8 pixels for the Distance, 11% for the Choke and 7 pixels for the Size. For the Quality change the Contour for the one we used in the image below.

Step 12

Select Inner Glow. For the Blend Mode use Overlay, for the Opacity 36% and for the Color use White. Also change the Source to Center, Choke to 12% and 65 pixels for the Size. Also change the Contour to the one I used below.

Step 13

Select Bevel and Emboss. Use Emboss for the Style, Smooth for the Technique, 1000% for the Depth, Up for the Direction, 50 pixels for the Size, 0 pixels for the Soften. For the Shading, change the Angle to 90º at 30 º Altitude. Also change the Gloss Contour to the one I am using below. For the Highlight Mode change the Opacity to 0 while for the Shadow Mode use black with Multiply at 100%.

Step 14

Duplicate the circle layer and move to the top, make sure it is white. After that go to Filter>Pixelate>Mezzotint. Use Fine Dots.

Step 15

Create a marquee selection of the circle and then go to Filter>Blur>Radial Blur. Use 20 for the Amount, Spin for the Blur Method and Best for the Quality.

Step 16

Change the Blend Mode to Multiply.

Step 17

Select all layers used to create the button/tuner, then go to Layer>Group Layers. After that duplicate the group and resize it like the image below.

Step 18

Select the layer with the layer styles inside the group and then change the Color Overlay to Black with black for the Blend Mode at 45%.

Step 19

Add drop shadow to both circles the bigger and the smaller. Like the first circle in the stack of layers that were used to create the effect.

Step 20

With the Rectangle Tool (U) create a square holding Shift. After that rotate the square 45&ordm; and position it like the image below.

Step 21

Go to Layer>Layer Style>Drop Shadow. Use Normal for the Blend Mode and Black for the Color at 100%. For the Angle use 120º, 5 pixels for the Distance and 5 pixels for the Size.

Step 22

Select Inner Glow. For the Blend Mode use Color Dodge, for the Opacity use 70%. Change the Choke to 10% and the SIze to 9 pixels. For the Quality use the preset I used in the image below.

Step 23

Select Gradient Overlay. Use dark red and light red for the gradient colors like the image below. Also change the Style to Linear and the Angle to 180º.

Step 24

This is the effect you will get after all the layer styles. It's pretty good but it is still to uniform and with the computer look.

Step 25

To change that lets use a metal texture. The one I am using is courtesy of Shutterstock and you can find it at: http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-20761540/stock-photo-metal-plate-backgro...

Step 26

Change the Blend Mode of the metal texture to Overlay at 30% and mask it using the big circle as reference, this way the texture will be on top of the other layers.

Step 27

Lets add some leather texture to make the effect more real. The image I am using is courtesy of shutterstock and you can find it at http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-77457889/stock-photo-texture-black-leath.... Place it at the bottom like the image below. Note: You wil have to duplicate it in order to fill the screen.

Step 28

With the Rectangle Tool (U) create some rectangles and rotate them until you get something like the image below. Tip: Start with the one at the top, then duplicate and move to the bottom, after that duplicate both and rotate 90º, the select all 40 and duplicate them. After that rotate them 45º and so on.

Step 29

Merge all layers from the previous step, then go to Layer>Layer Styles>Inner Glow. Use Multiply for the Blend Mode, Black for the Color, Edge for the Source, 10% for the Choke, 5 pixels for the Size.

Step 30

Select Bevel and Emboss. Use Pillow Emboss for the Style, Chisel Soft for the Depth and 500% for the Depth. Also change the Size to 3 pixels and for the Highlight Mode use Color Dodge with white at 50%. For the Shadow Mode use Color Burn with Black at 50%.

Step 31

Select Gradient Overlay and use the same gradient we used before for the circle. Also use Color Dodge at 40% for the Blend Mode and Opacity.

Step 32

Select Patter Overlay and use the metal image for the Pattern. To do this is pretty simple. Before opening the Layer Style box, select the texture and go to Edit>Define Pattern.

Step 33

Also add a new layer on top of the previous one and go to Layer>Create Clipping Mask. Then with the Brush Tool (B) and red paint some rectangles with red like the image below.

Step 34

Add a text using for the font DymaxionScript, you can download it at http://www.dafont.com/dymaxion-script.font. I added Abduzeedo and then with rasterized the layer and stretched the end of the A and the O to fill the screen.

Step 35

Go to Layer>Layer Styles>Drop Shadow. Use Multiply for the Blend Mode with Black for the Color at 100% Opacity. For the Distance use 9 pixels, for the Spread use 12% and for the Size use 13 pixels.

Step 36

Select Inner Shadow and use Screen for the Blend Mode with white for the color at 85%. For the Angle use -90º, 5 pixels for the Distance, 0 for the Choke and 1 pixel for the Size. Over the Quality Options use the image below for reference.

Step 37

Select Inner Glow. Use Color Burn for the Blend Mode at 50% with black for the Color. Change the Source to Edge, Choke to 5% and SIze to 4 pixels.

Step 38

Select Gradient Overlay and use Multiply for the Blend Mode and the Gradient preset like the image below. It's basically white grey, dark grey, black, white and dark grey for the colors.

Step 39

You can use the metal texture on top of the text layer as well. The image below is the effect you will get after all these 40 steps.

Conclusion

In this tutorial we created a nice retro amplifier style interface using basic layer styles and a metal texture, as you could see, it's all about finding some references and trying to replicate in Photoshop. In this image below I added a few more light effects, but that is for another tutorial ;)

Download the Photoshop File

Download the Photoshop file used for this tutorial

About the author

Abduzeedo is a blog about design. There are all sorts of articles for those who want to look for inspiration. Also you will find very useful tutorials for the most used applications out there, with a special selection of Photoshop Tutorials and Illustrator Tutorials. You can get in follow us via Twitter at @abduzeedo

Sponsored Links:

The Amazing Style of Mark Weaver

paul0v2 — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 14:41:46 +0000

Mark Weaver is a Designer & Illustrator out of Atlanta, Georgia. His style is simply amazing, with a retro feel with some old collage elements and also a good use of typography makes every piece very intriguing and special. Check it out!

For more from Mark Weaver visit his website mrkwvr.com or follow him twitter

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Collage Illustrations by Heymeca

paul0v2 — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 14:32:51 +0000

Heymeca is also known as André Meca, a very talented portuguese graphic designer and illustrator. Who's currently a student of Graphic Design and a Freelancer, and on the free time works on his "Make Something Cool Everyday" project which is what we looking at here.

Andre has a very intriguing style, a mix of the old collage with the new school of illustrations, very colorful works with a hint of typography and a retro feel.

To find out more about heymeca visit www.heymeca.com

About the author

Sponsored Links:

Stylish Work of Filipp Ryabchikov

abduzeedo — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 09:18:53 +0000

Filipp Ryabchikov is a young self-taught graphic designer from Russia, Saint-Petersburg. I came across his portfolio while looking for some 80's/retro inspiration from new artists and designers. I really like his style especially the color scheme of the Futureworld one.

For more information about Filipp visit his Web site at http://www.hypnosky.com/