Scrub My Car Character Brand Mascot
Last year I was approached by my friend Samuel Smith - he was in the process of establishing his own business specialising in ultra-professional car valeting services and as he was in the process of building his website he wondered if I could provide him with a mascot character to front his website and help establish his brand. I was eager to help and agreed without the need for much consideration.
Samuel had conducted some very thorough research into what other companies out there are doing in terms of character branding and consequently he had evolved some very specific ideas about what he wanted. To an extent that removed much of the burden from me because the responsibility for providing ground-up ideas was not mine - all I needed to do was sketch out the initial character ideas and then walk through the process of evolution and refinement with Samuel, taking note of his thoughts as the character came alive.
We knew pretty early on what kind of attributes the character would have (including a passing resemblance to Samuel himself) so I set about the task of taking the initial concept design and in turn I provided Samuel with options at each stage and proceeded only when a consensus had been achieved.
Finally the finished design was complete and I began the undertaking of drawing it on my computer - the final image needed to crisp and vector-based for easy integration into his flash-based website. It was during this stage that the final product took shape.
The finished article can be found on the homepage of his website - you can find it by clicking here. Incidentally I have absolutely no reservations about recommending Scrub My Car - they provide a thoroughly A1 service and new customers receive a whopping 50% concession! I'll be taking advatage of that myself.
Finally, for my own enjoyment, when the project was complete I played with this character further and experimented with embellishing the shade and tone to bring some depth to it. While it was a step beyond what Samuel needed or wanted, it has made me wonder whether 100% vector images are viable for some of my mainstream work. I've always shied away from producing wholly-artificial art as I've always feared it does not communicate the natural appeal of my hand-drawn work. However, with some shade applied this image looks deliciously playful and may be suitable for use in future childrens book projects. What's your verdict?
1 comment:
He looks so enthusiastic!
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