Another week in the books here at 420 Science. Notable achievements this week include finishing the Gravitron Catalog, finishing the HQ cover and coming up with a new jar design. First the HQ ad…

I had posted this design a few weeks ago and now it’s finally finished. I really don’t even want to look at it anymore. I had too long to work on it. I think I produce better work when I’m under pressure and a tight deadline. This piece was outside of my usual design style to say the least. It’s hard for me to be objective about it, but it didn’t turn out so bad. It’s better than most (if not all) covers they usually have. It definitely posed some unique design challenges. The main requirements for it were as follows: must contain hot chick (the magazines requirement), must show a jar and a scope (our requirement). Other than that I had total creative freedom, which isn’t always a good thing, but in the end I survived. Thanks to Sativa Verte for the rocking pictures she sent in.

The next couple of weeks will be busy preparing for our trade show in late August. I’m going home to Montana for my 10 year reunion next month, so there’s a lot to wrap up before I can leave. I can’t wait for my fellow classmates to ask me what I’ve been doing since high school. They shouldn’t be surprised though. I’m sure some will laugh and not realize how big 420 Jars has become. Big. Really big. It should be interesting to say the least.

No Comments »

So this week I’ve been working on a catalog for our friends at Gravitron. I took over all of their design work a couple of months ago and it’s kept me busy to say the least. Managing 2 brands can be a little overwhelming at times. It takes some extra effort to make sure our ads don’t look to similar. What can I say? I have a style. So that’s what’s been going on this week, but that’s not what I’m going to write about.

I’m going to write about someone near and dear to my heart. Bobby Black. Some people love him, some…not so much. Me? Well it’s personal. You see, Bobby Black is dating one of my best friends in the whole world, April. She just moved to NYC to live with him and become the Future First Lady. I honestly couldn’t be happier for her and Bobby. We’ve been working with High Times for a few years now and he’s always been one of my favorite personalities at the magazine. Now it’s almost like we’re family. Which is pretty cool considering who we are (420 Jars). I don’t know of many other companies that have a “in” like that. Though High Times has always treated us well, it seem as if having April in NYC as our representative will bolster our relationship over the next few years. She is truly one of our biggest fans. She’s collected 23 jars over the years. Our close friends having multiple jars isn’t rare by any means, but 23 could border on the excessive. She also wears her 420 Jars T-shirt to the HT office whenever she goes in.

It’s not too far fetched to say that if it wasn’t for 420 Jars, Bobby and April, may have not ever met. April traveled with Matt and me to the 2006 Cannabis Cup. It was there that she and Bobby met for the first time. I believe it was love at first sight. By the 2007 Cannabis Cup April and Bobby were the pot power couple. Now she’s in NYC and adjusting to the East Coast life style. She’s about as West Coast as they come, but I know she can handle it. She just got hired for an awesome job today too! So congratulations April. You deserve it. And thank you Bobby for everything you do for our company and for making one of my closest friends so happy. I wish you both the best.

No Comments »

Brian, our warehouse manager, informed me that we were running low on scope posters yesterday. That meant it was time to design a new one. I wasn’t really excited about it at first because I’m swamped with work at the moment and it was just one more thing to add to the list. Not to mention it needed to be done soon. Well this morning I woke up and had a burst of creativity. I took my camera and set up a bunch of scopes in the lightbox and started shooting away. After narrowing down all the photos to the best one I dropped it onto an empty white page and thought it was beautiful all by itself. Borderline art. Now I was faced with the challenge of not messing up that art with a bunch of words and graphics. Easier said than done, but in the end, we’re pretty happy with what came out. Simple, clean and to the point. These will look great hanging up in stores. Enjoy!

No Comments »

I didn’t really do a good job on writing another entry in a timely manner. But I’ve been busy. I even have something to show for it. Behold, our newest High Times ad! I guess it’s a spoiler, since this ad won’t be out for a couple months. SURPRISE! We won the Stash Award for Best Container. This ad was a departure from our past ads. Lots of white space and gold. I’m pretty happy with how the gold came out. This was one of the first ads to use photos from my new camera too. We’ve also started using props in our photos. I think it really ads to the richness of the photos. It allows the ad to be all white, but still contain color. I’d give myself a A-. Anyway…

It’s pretty cool to win a award for something that you do everyday. The thing that puts food on the table, or something in the Volcano, if you know what I mean. Besides this ad I’ve also been working on the cover for HQ magazine. This is a trade magazine that goes out to shops. We’ve been advertising in this mag for almost 4 years. We decided to sponsor the cover for the issue that will be circulating at our next trade show. I’ve put a lot of time into different concepts and we’ve finally narrowed it down to the one we’re going with. There’s still a lot of work into refining the image, but you’ll get the idea.

Other than these projects we’ve been busy coming up with new designs, working on the website and preparing for a possible move to Austin. Expect a lot from 420 Science in the months to come!

No Comments »