Matt,
Thanks a bunch! These were taken in the cave better known as the East Alton Ice Arena. I wish I could get over to Fairview Heights and shoot a little more because the light is FAR SUPERIOR. The posters I offer are mostly 16x20 and 20x24. I sell 99% of them in the 16x20 size and it allows me to sell them about $30 cheaper than a 'normal' poster size of 20x30, and I believe this is why I am able to move so many posters.
I like the larger logo. Billy, I have a question... do you notice how some letters in the varsity font family kerns at various widths? I get that too. See how the M-Y letters are so much wider than the E-R in MYER? Frankly, it drives me nuts and I'm wondering why it does that. Sometimes, when it looks really odd, I have to manually change the kerning for each letter to make it match better together.
It's an extra step in photoshop, but when using the font family in an express digital border... well, basically, I can't. I have to use a different font. It's a major pain.
Paul,
I see what you are talking about and now that you mentioned it, it drives me nuts as well. I am hoping this is something as simple as just selecting the affected letter(s) and then manually change the kerning? I'll give that a try. If there's a different way to approach this, please let me know.
I've dealt with that issue in several fonts and have taken to manually sliding the letters closer together. It only occurs when diagonals on letters are parallel (like M and W (or W and A). If you were to put those letters in a box, you'd see that the boxes containing those letters are actually spaced the same as all the rest, but because the blank spaces in those boxes are opposite (one top, one bottom) they appear to be further apart.
Back to the C & C, while I totally agree with everything so far I want to mention a subtle touch that hasn't been addressed ... the ice reflections. While all the other aspects of these are killer, without that reflection the player wouldn't be anchored and would 'float' on the background. The reflection puts his/her skates right on the ice. A small detail, but in my book separates this from great poster into the stellar category ... Awesome stuff Billy!
I remember Paul devoted a thread to this technique ... I'll have to dig it up and have a go at it. I'm in the midst of working on some hockey stuff myself and I could use this technique on my cutouts.
Thanks for giving a relative knuckle dragger some great idea fodder ... !
Gary
