Monday, July 14, 2014

Dead Designs

The year was 2008 and we had spent much of the year coming up with new designs for our first online launch.  For those who don't remember, t-shirt designs at the time were dominated by Affliction and Ed Hardy.  Much of the imagery used by Affliction, such as royalty, swords and such, lends itself well to chess.  I thought that we might as well take advantage of this trend and design an Endgame shirt that was in the same vein.

Ultimately, I just couldn't go through with it.

Not sure this guy's a chess player.
I was very happy with the artwork and the overall execution of the design.   However, when it came time to actually print the shirts, I was having second thoughts.  I felt that I was only printing this design because I wanted to capture some of that sweet Affliction market share.  In the end, my conscience won out and the design was never printed.


It hurts a bit when I realize the time and money that was spent on designs that were never printed.  

I guess it's all part of the game.  


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I really like the two knights and the sword. You should bring that one back.

X said...

Maybe someday ;-)

Anonymous said...

I agree, that's a great design, you should have done it. Glad to see you posting, I thought your company was dead since you haven't been posting or putting out anything new.

X said...

Not dead...we were just quiet for a while!

ChessAdmin said...

Great-looking design, very cool and accessible in concept for the chessplaying and more general public. More so than some other recent themes, to provide honest feedback. Hope to buy more shirts in the future, I have three.

X said...

It's always tough trying to create something that is accessible enough to sell, but unique enough to stand out from the crowd. Thanks for the feedback!