For creative types: Design a Raw Charge jersey / uniform
by John Fontana on Jul 15, 2011 4:31 PM EDT
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Hockey logos, jerseys, and uniform designs bring out a passionately creative breed of hockey fan with fantastic graphic and Photoshop skills. You can witness this on a regular basis with designs cooked up and posted on Icethetics, or Puck Drawn. The creations can be innovative, clever, controversial, or just a subtle upgrade.
Of course, the Tampa Bay Lightning brand transformation that launched last winter set off a flurry of design ideas before and after the unveiling of the new Bolts logo and uniform system. Everyone had something to add or change with the design; everyone had something or other they wanted to see included or eliminated...
With the summer doldrums in full effect throughout the hockey world and on Raw Charge; with the Lightning changing their own looks around... I got an idea.
What about a Raw Charge jersey design contest? Just what would people expect or creative for a team named Raw Charge, playing in the SB Nation Hockey League?
When I say contest, I don't mean "with fabulous gifts and prizes", this would just be for bragging rights and chest thumping, and just a display of personal creativity.
The ground rules are pretty simple: Take the site name and theme (knowing we're covering the Tampa Bay Lightning) and create a jersey system around it. You don't need to adhere to the current site logo or color scheme (it needs to be tweaked anyway), you can create your own. You also don't have to cling rigidly to Tampa Bay Lightning logo or jersey system (new or old).
We recommend using any one of the jersey templates you can find on this Puck Drawn page.
Entries should be emailed to me at jpfontana at gmail.com with the subject title "Raw Charge Jersey contest submission". You're allowed multiple submissions if you want to.
We'll allow entries for two weeks, starting today, and then announce the winners the week of August 1st.
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Unfortunately, I am absolutely awful from an artistic standpoint, and have little clue how to truly place my ideas onto an actual design template.
I’ll say this however – using the basic three jersey rotation (home, road, alt, though I would like to point out that teams are allowed to actually have two alts, it just hasn’t been seen since the Anaheim Mighty Ducks in the late 90’s), I would love to see, color-wise, something like this:
Colors – What the Lightning had prior to this upcoming season – would be ludicrous to twist the color scheme into something that wouldn’t be at all resemblent of the Bolts.
(helmet/sweater/pants/sock)
Home – black/blue/black/black – white numbers/lettering
Road – black/white/black/white – blue numbers/black lettering
Alt – black/black/black/black – white numbers/lettering
As I’ve said before, despite my fondness for the color black, it doesn’t work the best as a sweater color in the NHL when it’s the featured color, unless a team has a long, long history of using it in that capacity(see: Boston, Pittsburgh, hell even the likes of LA or Dallas). I like to see contrast within the primary combination. As I’ve pointed out before, the Blackhawks are one example of a team that looks magnificent from a color contrast standpoint.
Furthermore, the black pants would suit the blue sweaters better when thought of in terms of what I call “bottom-heavy” design – that is, a lighter color on top of a darker color. The NFL can get away with what would be “top-heavy”, because almost every team wears white or gray pants in a primary capacity, and those are two colors that will never be pants colors again in the NHL. However, in the NHL, where actual colors are used for pants, I think the darkest color being utilized makes sense as being the pants color. How foolish would TB look with black sweaters and blue pants? It wouldn’t work.
As for actual design on the sweater itself – hmm…
I liked the contrasting shoulder yoke on the old blacks and whites, but I don’t think that would work as well on blue sweaters, and what I would think of as being most important is a general matching of the three designs – no mismatches, in other words. That is, unless the alt would be a throwback black sweater, in which case we would simply be trying to match the home and road primaries.
Yeah, this is very difficult to figure. I know what I think would look good, but I can’t put it on paper. My apologies.
Now on Twitter @Carcillo_
http://twitter.com/#!/Carcillo_
Way too much black, IMHO
Black is very dated, as well. I don’t mind black as an accent—but not as the main (or only, in the case of your 3rd jersey) color.
I do not have an artistic eye, either, so folks probably are asking me to propose a counter offer. If we’re making Raw Charge sweaters—like the original post suggested—then I would use the upcoming season’s uniforms as a departure point. The site is affiliated—if only by fanbase—with the team, so it makes sense.
If we’re talking “hypothetical” unis for the team, then I’ll have to think about it more.
"[The Lightning] are uncanny. When they want to get a goal, it's like they just snap their fingers or hit a button. They just dial it up. You can see it. It's like they flip a switch. When they are down, it's just like they think, 'we know we are going to score.' I don't know what it is, it leaves [the opposition] flabbergasted." - Mike Knuble, 3 May 2011
That’s why I don’t think black is the best color to use as a base, sweater color. As I said, the NHL is very heavy on bottom-heavy design, and when a team wears black sweaters, there’s no choice but to wear black helmet’s and pants with them. And I think all-black loses its appeal very quickly if used on a regular basis – there’s a reason why I loved the Bolts blue alts the past few years in spite of the hideous “Bolts” signage adorning the front.
The other idea is to do what the Coyotes do with their alternate set, which is red/black/red. And even though it’s probably their best sweater in the whole set, the red helmet and pants just look terrible. In general, since most teams in the league wear either black or navy, those should be the helmet and pants colors, along with the color of any alternates set sweaters. The sweater on the primary colored set should be lighter.
I think the Panthers switching their colored sweater back to red will look much better, even though they could’ve made the actual design on the red look much better in and of itself.
Now on Twitter @Carcillo_
http://twitter.com/#!/Carcillo_
by FloridaownsFSU on Jul 17, 2011 11:13 AM EDT up reply actions
Oh shit I have to take a crack at this.
@DigDeepNYR
"I like a man who grins when he fights." -Sir Winston Churchill
"It's just pain." -Brandon Prust | "In Prust we Trust."
Please do.
Typing is an adventure, and reading should be, too!
Raw Charge.
by John Fontana on Jul 21, 2011 12:16 PM EDT up reply actions
Happy to announce that I just emailed John my first submission! I hope I have some competition (no offense to Clark).
@DigDeepNYR
"I like a man who grins when he fights." -Sir Winston Churchill
"It's just pain." -Brandon Prust | "In Prust we Trust."
Actually, yeah. I got a submission the day before.
Typing is an adventure, and reading should be, too!
Raw Charge.
by John Fontana on Jul 22, 2011 3:13 PM EDT up reply actions
This is right up my alley
Love doing stuff like this and designs of any type. Been really busy at work lately though, hopefully I can find the time. Hell, I’ll even submit something after the contest ends, if I miss dead line. Ironically enough, I happen to work for a graphic design textbook publishing company.
So... if that was just the beginning? Can't friggin' wait to see what's next!! A HUGE Thank You to Mr. Vinik, Steve Yzerman, Guy Boucher & the whole damn Lightning team/organization!! 100% Continued support and respect.
by Let's JOE WINGS-BOLTS on Jul 25, 2011 11:29 AM EDT reply actions
Here is Mine
This is what I thought the team should have done…
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