Finishing up the November issue …

It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to update my blog. I’ve been working like crazy just to get the magazine out every month, and haven’t had the time to do much else.

Here’s some stuff from the September issue of Seattle Met:

I continue to experiment with the logo (it used to appear exclusively in white, with a heavy drop shadow), and the way in which secondary cover lines are presented (they used to appear exclusively in a black bar along the bottom of the page):

Wine Lover Weekends

(This 2008 cover shows how the logo and cover lines were typically treated:)

100 Best Wines, 2008

I tried out a different way of opening the Mudroom in September:

The Mudroom

I sketched out this opener idea for the bank heist feature and sent it to illustrator Justin Wood:

"Heist" sketch

Heist

Heist

And here’s a Nigel Buchanan Back Fence illustration that I really love:

Back Fence

And now some stuff from the October issue, which is still on stands for another couple weeks. Lindsay Borden shot the cover and feature photos for Best Restaurants:

Best Restaurants

I threw in a little Norman Bates shadow at the bottom of this TOC page, whose design continues to evolve. I made Norman by tracing some guy’s Halloween costume in Illustrator, then blurring it in Photoshop.

Table of contents

For this article on Seattle’s departing mayor, I asked photographer John Keatley for candid outtakes from a portrait session he shot for Seattle Met a year ago. I thought this one seemed appropriate.

Power Lines

(We’ve been running a fake defaced campaign poster for the mayor ever since my first issue back in May. Here are a couple of my past illustrations:)

June Nickels illustration

September Nickels illustration

Some pages from the Best Restaurants feature:

Best Restaurants

Best Restaurants

Best Restaurants

I read an early draft of the feature on rival local weathermen, and took from it these facts: one guy favors snow in his forecasts, and the other guy is a troublemaker. I sketched out this idea for the opener and sent it off to John Keatley:

Atmospheric Disturbances sketch

We couldn’t ask the guys to pose together, because their rivalry is bitter and real. But my idea was to have the guys dressed for totally different weather in response to the exact same environmental conditions. So Keatley set up the same shot at two different locations, and I lettered the headline by hand:

Atmostpheric Disturbances

I’m really happy with the drastic difference in weather in these two shots. I love that about Seattle:

Atmospheric Disturbances

Atmospheric Disturbances

My designer Melissa and intern Anna collaborated with me on this one. They did the sketches in charcoal pencils, and I did the layout and compositing and chalkboard effect in Photoshop:

Adult Ed 101

Another fun Nigel Buchanan Back Fence illustration:

Back Fence

Lots more design changes in the November issue, including more attractive folios, section openers and listings pages …