For those who don’t know, Laura and I have a baby boy on the way due in early November! A while back, actually before we even knew the baby was a boy, I put together a countdown timer because everything in life is better with a countdown timer. I may have been overcome with glee at the prospect of a new Soule in the world or perhaps a bit drunk but either way I decided the best “theme” for this countdown timer would be “Soule Designs: The Next Generation”. And so began my Star Trek: The Next Generation themed countdown timer creation!
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Shine on, you crazy diamond! |
First step was to craft some artwork. Anyone who has looked over my blog will know that I have a tendency to draw cartoony stuff, so I once again went this route for the main graphic of the timer. Here is my initial concept sketch done in Manga Studio:
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Pretty rough, the "I ♥ Cthulu" sticker didn't make the final cut |
Based on that crazy first sketch, I hopped over to Photoshop and did a much cleaner sketch that started to look more like the final image. I used Photoshop for this because at the time, I think it was March, I was hot and heavy into Peck, Peck, Peck illustrations and I didn't want to spend the time getting up to speed in Manga Studio. You can find posts on inking in Manga Studio here on my blog where I did eventually delve into that topic ;-)
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Getting closer, phaser was Laura’s idea and it is awesome! |
After the sketch was complete it was onto the inking, below is the inked artwork sans color and crazy futuristic space glowing bits:
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Stay on target... |
And finally the full color version you all now know and love!
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Final color version! |
After the image was done it was just a matter of creating a TNG web font, pulling in some JQuery timer code, and it was a wrap! Full the live page head here https://www.souledesigns.com/the-final-countdown/tng though the timer will only be running until November 4th, baby or not!