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FlowForm Wheels by HRE packaging

FlowForm by HRE Wheels – Case study / packaging

[caption id="attachment_47062" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] FlowForm Wheels by HRE packaging - by Valhalla Design & Conquer[/caption]Whole case study is up for FlowForm Wheels by HRE. Marketed towards the entry-level market, with the "Things are about to get awesome" & "Other side, amigo" messaging on the box,...

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How many San Diego references can you find?

How many san diego references can you find? Detail of the poster wall I did for the refresh of the Flippin’ Pizza in San Marcos, CA. If you’re interested in seeing the logic behind the posters & what not, check the case study here Flippin' Pizza Case...

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Violent death of Art Direction

This is a great piece, written by Chris Worth on Linked In. "Take a look at the image above. It's from the opening credits to Deadpool, a film set in the Marvel Comics universe. A single frame doesn't do it justice - the camera follows an...

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Twiz the Season

We tell ourselves that our hard work is what keeps our clients happy but know holiday gifts like this don't hurt. HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO EVERYONE FROM YOUR FRIENDS AT VALHALLA...

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Happy High Five Day

Since we're general fans of tomfoolery, today we'll take advantage of High Five Day, as should you....

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Happy Birthday Mies

Wonder why the Google logo is a weird looking building today? Click and you'll see it's in celebration of Mies van der Rohe's birthday on March 27, 1886. Mies' work as a designer & architect of awesome included the Barcelona Pavilion (pictured top) & Chair,...

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Valhalla “Bearded Viking” Shirts

Got these a little while back but haven't had a chance to get them up in the shop because of the crazy hustle recently. Enough of the excuses though, everyone that's seen these shirts loves it. Super comfortable / great fitting Royal Blue Heather blank...

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If only Rube was around to see all this

If only Rube Goldberg was around to see this & so many other contraptions that his drawings inspired. Melvin The Magical Mixed Media Machine from HEYHEYHEY Thanks, Todd...

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Not another random post.

Oh hell no. Love snakes, super cool creatures. But see how these have diamond shaped heads? That means they’re not nice snakes. Pretty amazing collection of snake photos over this way.

Great font called Crescendo by Canadatype, featured in this post over on Quipsologies
More snake photos & fun after the jump!

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The Business

Now that our cards have been on featured on For Print Only, I figure it’s time to get around to putting them here. A few months back, after realizing I had 14 business cards left with a tradeshow in a couple weeks. I worked with Tim at Quality Letterpress to create some pretty cool cards.

Check after the jump for more photos & a bit of a writeup on the cards

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Patience, young grasshopper

That's what I thought when I saw this great piece which would make Rube Goldberg a happy man. (via Quipsologies) ...

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75 Abandoned Theaters

Great gallery of 75 abandoned theaters across the good ol' USA. Like the Abandoned Houses photo essay we posted a while back, it's sad to see such glory rotting away. Makes you appreciate the work that went into restoring the old greats like LA's Pantages...

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1986 called

A quickie for you all today, just got back in the shop after the SIA shredfest last week, complete with literal bone-chilling -20° temps in the mtns. In celebration of the mtns though, we found this jewel above after clicking a couple links which started over on Quipsologies. Pretty amazing collection of VHS tape box Horror Movie art – Monster Brains Awesome!
More after the jump!

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RIP Hubba Hideout

Hubba Hideout, a piece of SF's legendary skateboarding puzzle is done. Sure am glad the nefarious characters who congregate around in the area will be left alone now that there's not skaters to scare them off. Read about it Here. Sad to know that another...

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Another (random) Post

Cool graphic design oriented Venn Diagram by How Would You Like Your Graphic Design?. A 160pg PDF of Stefan Kanchev's work on logo design from behind the Iron Curton on LogoBlink. In line with the random title page link from the other day is all...

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I’m gonna make color theory better

Cool Video we found over on Under Consideration's Quipsologies blog originally by Clim. We unofficially rolled a similar saying for a while there, We Make It Better, until our friends @ Shilo heisted it & rolled out We Make it Good a few years back....

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Another Super (random) Post

Another random post for you all today. What you're looking at up above is the seriously ridiculously awesome work of ...

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Super (random) Post

On our semi-regular list of checks is the DDC site. Draplin & I have been running in the same circle for a number of years & only a matter of time until our paths cross in person. It's always interesting to see what he has...

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How to make a skateboard: video

How to make a skateboard: video. Pretty interesting insight on how they do it. Don't know if this is how the 5yr olds make them in China but it's interesting none the less. We found it over on AWSM...

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Whole lotta awesome

Dang, check this jem out! Veer's Fred & Fred Jr Moose Trophy Puzzles. Amazing. Thanks to James for alerting of of this Jewel!...

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From back then up ’til about now

Spent the weekend putting together a collection of branding projects I've done over the years. Most of them are in here, there's a few that aren't which were lost to the great hard drive crash of '03 & a couple which haven't launched yet, so...

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Life Flashing Before My Eyes

Saw this on So Much Pile Up. One on the left is By Vince Collins from 1984, I think the right one is Goosebumps - Don't go into the Basement. Warning, these get a big Far Out & Trippy if you keep following them, just a...

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Gettin’ AWSM

WHOAA, I recognize that logo. Oh, wait...

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The land of fist bumps & high fives


The bi-annual brofest known as ASR is going down in SD right now and, as hard as we tried, we were sucked into it once again. This year wasn’t especially any different than any other years, still lots of dudes rolling around trying their hardest to be seen by anyone willing to look. More after the jump with a slew of pictures to keep you abreast of the art that seemed to be the theme this year.

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Is the red blood?


We came across Jeff’s work somewhere in the last few days and thought we’d post it up on here. These are cut paper people, not multiple layered photoshop documents. Nice to see someone getting their hands dirty (or bloody when fingertip & xacto meet, you think the red on this one is blood?) and doing some amazing stuff for people to see. More of his artwork after the jump!

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Shepard Fairey gets busy in Hillcrest

This may be old news to the super-Shepard or Hillcrest Regular crowd but I was down there the other day & noticed a gigantic wall of his on the side of the new(ish) Urban Outfitters on 5th. The thing is huge, like 120′ x 30′ huge. More inside

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E3 Twenty Ten


E3’s going on right now. We rolled up there last week to meet up with some people and check out what’s going on in the world of video games. Microsoft’s Natal Kinect was everywhere & it was pretty a impressive deal. By the looks of the sheer amount of games released at the show, there’s going to be a lot of synchronized dancing going on in the world next year.. Lots more inside.

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Roll over your own grave

Skeleton Bike by Eric Tryon
Ever want to roll over your own grave? Well, now you have the chance. I’ve never been to the Shadow Conspiracy’s headquarters but I imagine things like this around every corner there. More after the jump.

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Paper Cut exhibition

Papercut Exhibition
Handmade design work is the new rage. Everywhere you look there seems to be another amazing thing done by another new artist / designer. Papercutting is one of these new trends in design and the publisher Gestalten is promoting their new book, Papercraft, with an exhibition in the Netherlands this week. More after the jump

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Where the Awesome Things Are…

Whoa
Medicom has teamed up with one of the most visually stunning movies released in recent years and one of the greatest kids books ever written, Where the Wild Things Are. More after the jump

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Ode to the Carlsbad Skatepark

Carlsbad Skatepark
How do you explain the significance of Carlsbad Skatepark? How about Carlsbad Raceway? To have them both at essentially the same location is amazing, something like having the Tate Modern next to Fenway Park only better. Looking back, it was as close to Valhalla as I could get in my teenage years. Throw in some snowboarding (in reality, all I’m doing while riding snowboards is acting like I can skate good) and BMX (which if you think about it is an offshoot of motocross anyways) and you’d have every sport I ever cared about all in one spot. There’s a lot more fun (photos, videos) and a lot less dribble (me rambling) after the jump

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on the road to Ummmm

Found this on Andy's Bend Press site, a 10 minute movie on Thomas Campbell preparing for his show in Denmark. I love Thomas' work. I talked to him about being included on the Ascape project as well but, alas, he was under contract with Paul...

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an interview with Andy Jenkins


Came across this gem a couple days ago over on BMXSociety. I worked with Andy a couple years back on the Ascape project, he did a couple rugs for us and was super cool to work with. We have some similar interests in bmx, mx and of course skateboarding / art / design. It was cool having him in on that project and interesting to read about how he got where he is today in the interview. Check it out here (the interview link is after the intro paragraph). After the jump I’ve put up some highlights

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Welcome to Costco, I love you.


Idiocracy couldn’t have said it any better. In case you haven’t noticed, this blog is generally about design, skateboarding and snowboarding with a few random tidbits of nonsense thrown in. Well, this covers at least two of those subjects. I came across this in a recent email blast from Megalo Mart, Price Club, Costco – heli time in Alaska.

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A few posters for you and yours.


Popping up a few amazing posters I’ve run across the past few months. A little of this, a little of that. Think of it as a St Patricks Day present from us to you only without the nonsense that’s become synonymous with St Patty’s day. Check out more after the jump.

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Speaking of Eames…


Just a couple days after House Industries had their Eames Century Modern font Wright announced their Charles & Ray Eames auction taking place on April 8th. Click here to go straight to the auction site or just look after the jump for an overview.

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The way things looked back in the day


It’s always fun to look through the great work of the past. While many people I know dislike them for some reason, I’ve always been a fan of old posters. It’s nice to look at packaging from yesteryear as well, it’s like looking through the window to a time before focus groups and execs dabbling in everything they get the chance to.

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Berlin, it’s not just for walls anymore


Found a couple pretty nice flickr sets the other day from the Berlin Buchstaben-Museum ( or letter museum for us English speakers). Being a lover of signs, old & random stuff, the next time (first time?) I’m in Berlin, I know where I’m going. (check after the jump for some highlights & links)

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Don’t forget about the Germans


Sure yesterday, we put up some good examples of American design on cars from the 70’s but don’t think for a second that the German’s were sleeping at that time. The early 70’s meant business at the Porsche factory, their cars were works of art and to top them off, they painted them amazingly well for the races. Here’s a great set from the Porsche museum of the branding on their racecars. (check after the jump to see out highlights)

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Cars used to be cool.


Seems like now the only thing that car companies make are remakes of older cool cars, cars with some Green story or just complete garbage. Enough of that though, here’s a cool set with some amazing examples of how cool the typography on old cars used to be (you can also see a condensed version after the jump)

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Elephants are like ice cream

I just can't say no. Check this out. Amazing German currency note from 1919. Or check out this a doozie of a 1921 Czech note. Or how about this random German note with a devil dude on it from 1921? I could go on...

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Neon Asphalt


Road trips mean new adventures whether it be seeing new & cool things, eating new & cool foods or acquiring new & cool stories. One of my favorite parts about road trips, especially road trips through random area are the incredible roadside signage. This year’s SIA show was in Denver, so naturally that called for a road trip and all it’s glorious signs of yesterday.

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Conan got jacked


In case you’ve been living in a cave the past couple weeks and didn’t hear, a big hullabaloo went down in late night TV with Conan O’Brien coming out on the short end of the stick. Last night I caught his last show and it did not disappoint

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Mini-movie Review!


You know, since we have a mile long to do list and 407 things planned for the upcoming year, we figured we’d start another section of the site (note the sarcasm dripping out your monitor). We watch movies like everyone else; some good, some bad so we figured, why not give our $.02 about them?

For our first in the installment, we have three films. Strange Brew, Hurt Locker and a blockbuster currently out in the theaters which we dubbed Crapatar

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Bringing heat that makes Al Gore cry


That’s what Portillo’s does. It’s hard to say what’s better, the absurdly delicious food or the amazing hand painted signs. Of course 99.9% of the people who frequent their establishments probably never even notice but being the design dorks that we are – you know we do.

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Red Five standing by…


Rolling through a little store the other day that you may have heard of named Macy’s, came across a slew of the most awesome unwearable hoodies ever seen… although, I must say it’s pretty tempting to pick one up.

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Roaring out of the holiday

We finally had a minute to mess around with the blog over our Gobblicious Thanksgiving holiday. In addition to doing heavy codework to customize our template, we now have a new section aptly titled "Book of the Month", we hope you like it. We have...

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A month with Snow Leopard in the house

snowleopard
A month ago now Apple dropped Snow Leopard on everyone. A month in and we have to say it’s been the best $30 investment we’ve made in some time. If you’re on the fence with this one and have an Intel Mac, by all means do it. Starts, restarts, app launches, pretty much everything is much faster with Snow Leopard. The only thing we’ve found to be frustrating is the dropping of “Creator Codes”,

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