‘Tuatara - Sphenodon Punctatus’ portrait T-shirt front

Fuss, fuss, fuss: How this Tuatara drawing evolves

This terrific Tuatara illustrative design work evolves by focussing on the details, this is quite common

Surface Active made in Aotearoa, T-shirts main neck label.

Surface Active Wildlife art – making waves in a sea of sameness.

To make digital art of New Zealand’s Tuatara, that has the look and feel of a natural line drawing, the editing, fussing process can take hours and while it isn’t easy it is a great deal of fun. I take pleasure in design and I enjoy using the computer to draw with the stylus, inking over the scan just as easily as I would with traditional pen and ink. The production of design work is an incredible drill when you are doing your utmost to make it terrific. I do my utmost to make sure that every design project I work on is mega.
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Proof of concept visual of Heather’s helping hands’ screen printed in two colours on white T-shirt.

The elements of iconic design: Heather’s helping hands’ branding

The iconic logo design elements of the “right” logo for my clients

To design the right logo for a business is crucial irrespective of the firm’s size. A successful design may meet the goals set in your design brief, but a truly enviable iconic design must also be relevant, relevant, enduring, distinctive, adaptable and for successful use in responsive web design, simple and bold are key criteria too.
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Sillicon Planet’s world-wide smile promo

When it comes to promoting entertainers, creating distinction is key.

Because of the tremendous competition in the market, promotions for Circus-Arts performers, children’s entertainers, need to be well thought out, be comprehensive and also entertain the reader in the same manner as performers do in order to capture the attention of any audience world wide.

Sillicon Planet’s New Zealand audience is a mash-up of schools, festival and event organisers, corporate clientele and talent agencies.
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WorkPace Ergonomic resting software draft packaging concept 3D digital rendering.

WorkPace packaging: great brands stand out

Whenever I am working on a packaging design project I’m focussed on one thing, how can I add value. How can I by research, writing, developing messaging and design elements add value? What strategy can I develop that will make the WorkPace breaks and exercises software brand better and stronger? What can I develop that will help create engaging packaging design concepts that appeal to office workers and their managers?
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Packaging carton for MyoPace EMG Equipment for Physiotherapy

MyoPace EMG carton

This beaut MyoPace packaging design uses simple, clear visual language as well as text as the approach to expressing the core messages and to simultaneously capture and hold the consumer’s attention.

The power of packaging for your brand

As a manufacturer it is your job to package your product well, advertise it to your audience nationally and internationally, take orders, ship your product, collect revenue, handle accounting and so on.
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Southern DC3 Newsletter, Spring 2007, pages 2 & 3.

Southern DC3 Newsletter

Issue 1, Spring 2007

The multicolumn layout makes for an easy read and a flexible format that packs in plenty of information per page. Photography, illustration and other graphics make the newsletter more visually appealing and encouraging people to either dip into the articles that interest them first or read the newsletter from end to end.
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Southern DC3 Charitable Trust donations prospectus, Help us reach for the sky, Front cover.

Southern DC3 Trust prospectus & promotional materials

Patron Richie McCaw chats with Dave Horsburgh on the cover of The Southern DC3 Trust “Help us reach for the sky” fundraising prospectus I designed and published in 2006–7.

My role was as Creative Director of the Trust and Mac operator, providing all creative services, photography and the desktop publishing of all print collateral. This provision of goods, branding and brand management services was under the auspices of Pionair Adventures for whom I was in-house Creative Designer at the time.
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Da Vinci rebrand: software brochures

Software brochures makeover for Da Vinci Communications

Desktop publishing is a path of discovery. Why is making something look better worthy toil? There are benefits to clarity, ease of understanding for busy people justifies hours in production.

Pleasing design needs no apology, even in technical publications. Artistic expression can be placed on the same level as informational expressional.
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ContainerWaste website makeover

ContainerWaste is a very successful independently owned residential and commercial waste management company based in Amberley, North Canterbury. The firm is an expert in carting waste to landfills in a range of bins and containers that they deliver to clients’ sites. As part of the rebrand Identity Signs approached me to design a responsive website that communicated Container Waste’s all-in-one fast service with the least effort from the site user.
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Auto Restorations A5 brochure front cover

Auto Restorations capabilities brochure

Auto Restorations logo. Brands for New Zealand companies, Christchurch, New Zealand.Auto Restorations has a story to tell. This capabilities and profile brochure was designed with people in mind who will have heard about Auto Restorations by other means, such as work of mouth, the core of the brochure design, as with the website redesign is for people to see the sort of things that Auto Restorations do, the sort of company that they are. The idea is to give them the impression that Auto Restorations are people worth their while to deal with. So the main purpose, as with the website is to; showcase their work, give an impression of what the company is like, give the impression they are reliable and work to the highest achievable international standards.
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Atujara logo makeover in progress.

Logo makeover: Atujara MCC

Turning a “jaggy” unusable logo into clean web & print files

Velocette Racing New Zealand organisation logo. Classic racing motorcycle enthusiasts organisation brand. ‘Coca-Cola’ style sloped and looped copperplate lettering in metallic gold on a black background, consistent with the historic livery of Velocette motorcycles. Brands for New Zealand / International organisations.You’ve got a scan of a great retro logo, everything looks perfect when you look at it at small size on the screen. But when it needs to be printed at a large size, it turns out to be unusable because the file format is incorrect. A logo makeover is the BRAND-AID® that turns unusable logos into clean web & print files by converting the jaggy, pixellated logo to a clean vector drawing format that is future proof.

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