Our friend’s head shop opens in a couple weeks. ACL is this weekend and they’ll be passing out 5000 of these postcards to get the word out. I didn’t really go into the project with much of a thought of what it was going to look like. Evan needed it quickly, so I just sat down and started drawing it out. I took some pictures of some clouds a couple of days ago and decided to throw one of those into the mix. From there everything came together pretty quickly. The sky background looked really natural against the sign. A somewhat obvious solution, but that’s been the theme for this project so far. I decided to change up the backside and make it opposite of the front. Landscape orientation and warm colors. I really like the way it looks. As if the sun is shining down and Jesus himself was on his way in to pick up some 420 Jars and a Gravitron. Don’t forget your 420 Scope Jesus!

Anyway, if you’re in Austin and you see one of these cards pick it up and tell me about it. I’ll make it worth your time.

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A few months ago I saw the story of Rachel Hoffman. She’s the 20 something girl who was murdered in a drug sting gone terribly wrong. I saw the story in High Times a few months ago. Recently ABC News featured this story about the incident. It’s a tragic story and ABC does an excellent job of pointing out the critical missteps of local law enforcement and how they brought about the death of this poor girl. All for the sake of a drug bust. This video is something I think everyone should see. It’s somewhat reasuring to see this story make it into the mainstream media. Maybe there’s some hope for us.

Video: Rachel Hoffman: Someone you know.

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Every year High Times puts on an event called the Stony’s. It’s like the Oscars for weed related films and TV shows. Here’s a clip from Conan O’Brien talking about the awards show.

So, Matt calls me today (he’s on vacation) and tells me that we’re going to be sponsoring this years Stony’s. Of course I’m like “fuck yeah, let’s do it!” And with that, we were in. I’m really excited at the prospect of meeting Seth Rogen. I love that guy. How awesome was Superbad? We also took all of our employees to see Pineapple Express a few weeks ago. Also an awesome stoner flick. Who doesn’t want to have a whacky adventure with their dealer? The show is Sept 27 in LA. We’re going to be taking a few of our employees and some select friends along with us. I think it’s going to be a great time and an adequate substitution for the Cannabis Cup this year. Only a 5 hour drive too. I don’t think I’ll miss the 12 hour flight to Amsterdam this year.

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Our friends in Austin are opening a head shop and guess who’s designing the logo. That’s right, this guy right here. The shop will be located off of South Congress in an area that’s known as SoCo. Yes, as you probably guessed, it’s a hipsters paradise. People riding around on fixed gear bikes, eating tex-mex and doing whatever else we hipsters do. (Yes, I’m admitting that I could be called a hipster, but I’m a elitist graphic designer first and foremost.) Anyway, being in SoCo, we decided to call the shop SmoCo. Matt and I were brainstorming names and came upon this one withing minutes (his idea). The minute I heard it I knew it was golden. It wasn’t hard to sell anyone else on the name either. So, with the shop now christened, it was time to make it look good. I sketched out a few different ideas before coming up with a solution that might be considered a little obvious, but quite clever never the less.

There are still some final touches that need to be worked out, but this is pretty much it. Everyone loves it too. I believe Evan called it a “home run”. I don’t if it’s an award winning logo, but I do think it’s a great solution for the shop. I have lots of ideas for all the different applications of the logo too. Shirts, fliers, ads…you name it. Now I just need to get paid for it. That’ll be $2000 Evan.

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This is the ad that will be running in the December 08 Issue of High Times. I’ve been working on this for the past few days and I feel that it came together nicely. Both Matt and I are happy with the direction that our ads have been heading lately. Lots of white space with a nice photo. Everything I have been designing for the past year has tended to be a bit busy. I’ve been showing a lot more graphic restraint lately. The primary factor has been my new camera.(sony a350) This has allowed me to take much more professional photos. The inclusion of prop weed into the photos has also added an extra punch to our ads. Yes this is my job. Taking pictures of jars with wonderful inside of them.

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The trade show also requires a new catalog. This is easily our nicest wholesale catalog to date. We’re very happy with the outcome. Matt’s favorite part is the “printed with soy ink” logo in the bottom corner of the cover. I didn’t think he’d even go for it, but he loved it. We’re so eco-savvy.

Along with the catalog came several banners and an entirely new booth setup. It was definitely the biggest presence that we’ve ever had at a show. Below you can see the catalog and a picture of the booth.

Something that I’m also curious about is the amount of people reading this blog. Who are you 147 people this week? I’m sure I know some of you personally, but I surely do not have that many friends. I’m a dick after all. I guess when you have close to 5000 friends on myspace some of them are bound to read what you write. It makes me wonder if what I’m writing is any good. This is myspace, does it even matter? Do people really care about what I design for us? I guess I really don’t care if people think it’s good or not. I just do it because I can and I like to write. It gives anyone who’s interested a look into the design process at 420 Jars. We’re really unique in the fact that one of the owners (me) is a designer. It definitely gives us an edge. I suppose that I’m doing something right. 147 readers this week can’t be wrong.

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It’s been pretty crazy around here for the past few weeks. Last week we spent a week in Vegas at our fall trade show. The cover that I designed for HQ went over really well. I still don’t know that it’s my best work, but it didn’t bomb. It’s a relief to have it all over with, but now it’s time to start getting serious about our move to Austin and everything that needs to be designed for the holiday season. We’ll be making changes to our website and most of our print ads. I also have some neat freelance projects coming up. The most notable are the Helix and a head shop that our friends in Austin are opening. More to come on all of that in the next few weeks.

What I really wanted to show you today was this…

With the holidays comes the Cannabis Cup and once again we’re producing a limited edition jar for High Times. Usually the art for the jar comes at the last minute, but not this year. I’m pretty happy with the art that they are going with. It’s bright and visually interesting. Unfortunately we will not be attending the cup this year, but the jars will be available on our website sometime in November.

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