Amy's Ice Creams' 2023 Gift Card Redesign
In November and December, 2023, I created four original illustrations for Amy's Ice Creams to be used as the artwork for their gift cards for the coming year. With this project, I was given clear parameters to work within.
The first design was to represent "Bat Bridge Delight". Or rather, a depiction of a famous colony of bats that resides in the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin, TX. The main aspect of the art direction was to ensure the bats were flying from the bridge in the shape of an ice cream cone. The rest was up to me. I felt adding too much small detail might take away from the colony cone, so I opted for perimeter details on the clouds and bushes.
Design Two's theme was Neon Logo Lights. I created a line drawing of a very simplified skyline meant to represent Austin, TX, and used this to form multiple layers that are stacked on top of one another with varying degrees of gaussian blur, and in varying colors, to mimic the look and feel of vibrant neon tube lights that have made a comeback in the last couple of years. I turned the normally solid Amy's logo into a mix of a neon outline and the recognizable Amy's typeface to help it blend with the illustration style. The cow driving the ice cream truck is a reworking of the cows created for Amy's Branding by another artist.
The third design is a Birthday theme, meant to illustrate the popular Oreo ice cream cake sold by Amy's. Since the color palette for an Oreo Ice Cream cake is a simple black and white one, I opted for variations of near black and near white, to better signify the cookies, and vanilla of the ice cream. I opted to add color to help the cake slice stand out with a monochromatic purple background, complimented by the bright blue text, and matching candle with colorful sprinkle sparks. The text is hand embellished using Adobe Illustrator's blob brush tool.
The final design's theme is one of gratitude. Austin is a uniquely diverse city, and Amy's marketing wanted the expression of thanks to represent as much. I had a few iterations of this ice cream parade with different character poses and colors, but the rubber hose style illustration was always the direction I wanted to take. I feel it's simple and expressive enough to convey the message, while complimenting the different languages on the flags. For this design, I wanted it to specifically say thanks from Amy's so I used their online menus as a reference for exactly which flavor ice creams (or cake!) should be in each cone and cup.
Note:
There may end up being an AI note attached to this project and I would like to clarify, if so. I was mid-project when Adobe rolled out an update for Illustrator that included a new feature called "generative recolor". It's a tool where you can select your vector illustration, type in a prompt like "moonlit city walk", and it will recolor your entire illustration with a new AI generated color palette. Upon updating the software, I was prompted (by multiple popups) to try it out, and I did. I didn't love any of the color themes it produced and eventually ctrl+z'ed my way back to my original artwork. This all seems innocent enough, but because Behance is also owned by Adobe, and they're pushing their new AI tools pretty hard, some things are being tagged with a blanket AI disclaimer without actually telling viewers how AI was utilized. I put as much work into knowing my brand and my base as I do the actual design projects, and take pride in the many hours, weeks, or months a project takes to create and complete, as well as the multiple iterations and creative problem solving that comes with the territory. This is why I personally feel it's important to clarify the use of AI with regard to this project.
In November and December, 2023, I created four original illustrations for Amy's Ice Creams to be used as the artwork for their gift cards for the coming year. With this project, I was given clear parameters to work within.
The first design was to represent "Bat Bridge Delight". Or rather, a depiction of a famous colony of bats that resides in the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin, TX. The main aspect of the art direction was to ensure the bats were flying from the bridge in the shape of an ice cream cone. The rest was up to me. I felt adding too much small detail might take away from the colony cone, so I opted for perimeter details on the clouds and bushes.
Design Two's theme was Neon Logo Lights. I created a line drawing of a very simplified skyline meant to represent Austin, TX, and used this to form multiple layers that are stacked on top of one another with varying degrees of gaussian blur, and in varying colors, to mimic the look and feel of vibrant neon tube lights that have made a comeback in the last couple of years. I turned the normally solid Amy's logo into a mix of a neon outline and the recognizable Amy's typeface to help it blend with the illustration style. The cow driving the ice cream truck is a reworking of the cows created for Amy's Branding by another artist.
The third design is a Birthday theme, meant to illustrate the popular Oreo ice cream cake sold by Amy's. Since the color palette for an Oreo Ice Cream cake is a simple black and white one, I opted for variations of near black and near white, to better signify the cookies, and vanilla of the ice cream. I opted to add color to help the cake slice stand out with a monochromatic purple background, complimented by the bright blue text, and matching candle with colorful sprinkle sparks. The text is hand embellished using Adobe Illustrator's blob brush tool.
The final design's theme is one of gratitude. Austin is a uniquely diverse city, and Amy's marketing wanted the expression of thanks to represent as much. I had a few iterations of this ice cream parade with different character poses and colors, but the rubber hose style illustration was always the direction I wanted to take. I feel it's simple and expressive enough to convey the message, while complimenting the different languages on the flags. For this design, I wanted it to specifically say thanks from Amy's so I used their online menus as a reference for exactly which flavor ice creams (or cake!) should be in each cone and cup.
Note:
There may end up being an AI note attached to this project and I would like to clarify, if so. I was mid-project when Adobe rolled out an update for Illustrator that included a new feature called "generative recolor". It's a tool where you can select your vector illustration, type in a prompt like "moonlit city walk", and it will recolor your entire illustration with a new AI generated color palette. Upon updating the software, I was prompted (by multiple popups) to try it out, and I did. I didn't love any of the color themes it produced and eventually ctrl+z'ed my way back to my original artwork. This all seems innocent enough, but because Behance is also owned by Adobe, and they're pushing their new AI tools pretty hard, some things are being tagged with a blanket AI disclaimer without actually telling viewers how AI was utilized. I put as much work into knowing my brand and my base as I do the actual design projects, and take pride in the many hours, weeks, or months a project takes to create and complete, as well as the multiple iterations and creative problem solving that comes with the territory. This is why I personally feel it's important to clarify the use of AI with regard to this project.
