The Taking Me Apart series continues to surprise me as time goes on. Initially, I thought I would explore this series for a few months and then put out a book showcasing the best ones. After a few months, I selected the best 25 and realized that I was only at the tip of the iceberg.

I’ve actually thought about taking these pieces to the street. I would love to see what they look like at 25′ x 25′ or even bigger. Unfortunately, going that big cost some serious money.

It’s hard to really figure out how to provide a short description of Peter Case with all that he has done. He’s a singer/songwriter, a musicologist, and a Grammy nominee, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. I recently became aware of Peter, even though he has been making great music before I was even born. My good friend, David Ensminger, befriended Peter and has been playing drums with Peter every now and then.

In 2009, Peter underwent heart surgery and was stuck with a very large medical bill that lead to fund raising events by other musicians to try and help reduce the burden. Fast-forward to 2010, and the burden has not let its grip up on Peter.

David asked me to redesign a CD package for a live set that he did with Peter back in 2005 at Rudyards in Houston so that Peter could sell it at his shows for some extra cash to help with medical expenses. After looking at the original design, I opted not to touch the design since it was designed by Randy “Biscuit” Turner.

Instead, we decided that a poster promoting his new album that he could sign and sell at the show would be an additional way for Peter to raise some funds.

The inspiration and concept of the poster came from a quote that I saw on Peter’s blog that said: “Wig! It’s not just a way of life, it’s an explosive reaction against the tension of living in an insane century.”

The poster will be available at Peter’s upcoming shows. If you are unable to make it to one of his shows and would like a copy to help out a good cause email me and I will mail one to you. They are $10 + shipping. 100% of the proceeds are used for Peter’s medical expenses.

I can be reached at operator@systemoferror.com

For more information on Peter.

Awhile back, I was messing around on the press and seeing how sloppy I could get the prints before they became unbearable. I chopped up a bunch of prints that I did for a poster and printed randomly on the sheets not worried about registration on the letterpress. This is one of the more successful ones.

A few days ago I was thinking about some photographs that I had taken last September at the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. It was in the Primate House that I encountered this big fellow. I remembered wondering if a photographer had set up the lights in his cage, because it was set up so dramatic that it was perfect for shooting photographs. In the beginning, I was standing in the back of the room shooting over a large crowd of people. One by one, the crowd began to leave and that is when he began to take notice of me.

Before I knew it I was the only one left in the room and by now he was full on staring at me. That is when he proceeded to get up and move to a more dramatically lit area. It was almost as if he knew that I was taking his photograph and he was moving to a better lit area to have his portrait taken. Without hesitation, I began to snap off as many pictures as I could get in as he began making different faces and moving his head at different angles. When he felt that I had the shot, he simply got up and walked away into the shadows and sat with his back to the glass. Moments later another group of people walked in and I walked away knowing that I had captured a special moment.

This is another outtake from the book Genesis: The First Book of the Machine. There was always something eery, yet beautiful about this photograph. I think it was a combination of the oxidation of the metal mixed the shot being taken in the shade.

See the June 16, 2008 post for more information on the book.

Last November, I did a poster for my good friend David for his Left of the Dial magazine 10 Year Anniversary party. The image above was one of the directions that I was thinking about heading in, but after finding the ghetto blaster font, I quickly abandoned this idea. Even though this image does not have all the typography applied to it, I feel that it is interesting enough to stand on its own. I think it would be a good addition to my postcard collection.

A few days ago, my girlfriend and I were on our way back from dinner when the conversation turned into a discussion of what was going on with the BP Oil Spill. I mentioned to her that I would like to do a poster showing my displeasure with BP and the entire situation. When we got home from dinner, my girlfriend went online and found some horrific photographs of all the birds covered in oil. We watched a video of Anderson Cooper down in Louisiana and he was talking about how the CEO of BP, Tony Hayward, said “I Want My Life Back” and that is when a light bulb went off.

My concept would be to take the CEO’s statement and flip it around so that his statement, “I Want My Life Back”, would be coming from the animals that are being effected by the oil spill.

My girlfriend also found Greenpeace’s Behind the Logo competition, where they are asking people to rebrand BP. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to create some posters and enter the piece in the competition in hopes of helping Greenpeace and their fight against BP.

The posters are 35″ x 35″ with Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup applied to them to look like oil. At this moment, their are 9 different designs, but I have only included 4 photos that show each piece shortly after the syrup was applied.

I will be posting more throughout the week.

This is the Worst Human-Made Environmental Disaster, please take the time to educate yourself on the disaster and use your voice to speak out.

It is hard to believe that it has been exactly two years to the day since I started this site. I started the V01D as a vehicle to post all the work that I do in my free time. Some of the work is paid, some of it is pro bono, and a lot of it is just little experiments, but at the end of the day all the work has helped me grow as a designer.

As of this moment, their has been 34,583 visitors to the site. I’m sure a few of those people are repeats, but I want to thank everyone that has stopped by, subscribed to, or commented on the site.

I have no idea what direction my work is going to head in, but I will continue to post it here until I feel like it is time to move on.

I have always wanted my own screen printing setup at home for the studio, so this last Christmas I bit the bullet and made a purchase. The first few months of the new year has been set aside for testing what can be done with the equipment that I have. Here is one of those tests.

The imagery comes from a mug shot and scans from a medical book that I scanned a long time ago. As far as the name goes, he just looked like a man of first names.

Sorry everybody, I know it has been awhile. Jennifer and I just moved and I am trying to get back into the swing of things.

This is a piece that I painted towards the end of the year last year. It is painted on a piece of found metal. It reminds me of a photograph from a satellite looking down on an alien planet.