What a Story 2012

What a Story | Politics in Children's Literature event's poster.
The technique used is Spray on paper along with Rotring drawing.
Check the event here : http://www.facebook.com/events/235576786556507/

Illustration Workshop - Sharjah

Happening in Sharjah, from 28th of April till the 2nd of May. Apply if you can attend or share with your friends :) cheeeeers

Tania Saleh - Wehde Music CD

For many reasons, this is one of my favorite projects i did so far. It s the Music CD of Tania Saleh's new album "Wehde". I m a big fan of Tania's music; when i discovered her first album, i kept looping the songs specially "habibi khelsoo l dafater" that i adore. Now, here i am designing her new album.

Thanks Tania for the opportunity and for believing in me :)

The Design process of the CD was not that easy. When we started brainstorming, Tania, William Choukeir and me, we wanted to create an experience throughout the CD, a journey where you discover a hidden world. William designed this brilliant package that brings a music CD out of its borders.

This unfolding act leads to a panoramic format. It s perfect for the Wehde scene on the corniche of Beirut where all the lebanese citizens from different backgrounds are gathered.

Tania and Maria Ghazzaoui went to the corniche and took many pictures as a reference for the coming steps.

I used some of the photos, distorted them and later added some illustrations to create the characters like the yanaseeb guy.

Aalia is my favorite character in the CD and it started from this sketch and later i added some newspaper texture and some colors.

All the other illustrations in the CD started with pencil drawings and edited later digitally. i photographed as well a lot of papers as a base for the illustrations.

some parts are done separately and combined into one composition digitally.

The cover and back cover, was based on a photo for Tania Saleh by the amaziiiing photographer Tanya Traboulsi. The styling goes to Petra Abou Sleiman, a pretty lady with a great sense of "zo2". I did some color correction for the photos so they fit the CD atmosphere and added some pencil drawings and paper cuts on top.

Here is a preview of most of the album. But this is not to be compared with the feeling of the printed CD. so GO BUY IT ! :D

Tania Saleh's CD is available in all Virgin Megastores and in case you don't find it, just wait few days and you ll get it coz the CD is being sold like crazy and it s now # 2 best selling after Feiruz :)

Tania Saleh - Wehde Website

Hello jami3an,

I proudly present for you Tania Saleh's new website, designed for her new album "Wehde" :)

George Rouhana is the interactive designer behind this amazing website. Tania, George and me had long discussions about how to design the website and the mixture of George' logic, practicality and great sense of design and animation along with Tania's conceptual, artistic background and the love for details was a great platform for my illustrations to grow. I m lucky again and again to work with these people, work is not really work anymore ...

Tania Saleh live in concert at Pierre Abou Khater Thater, USJ, Damascus road, May 5 & 6 at 9 pm. you can't miss it :)

PICON

This is another illustrated and animated campaign with agency Leo Burnett Beirut.

The client is Picon, and it is the back to school promo entitled "a2wa rass bi Lebnein" :)

it s a competition on Picon's website that challenges the kids knowledge about Lebanon.

Here are the key visuals i did for the campaign.

i had to do all the elements in the illustrations with a simple contour line so the production team can add die-cuts easily, specially that part of the campaign is to do pop-up stands in supermarkets.

Just after the visuals, we moved to the animated TVC Ad. I did the animation together with the great Ashley Choukeir :) tx Ash.

Enjoy the animation and i hope you like the project :)

Beyroutes - A Guide To Beirut

"Beyroutes", the intimate guide book for Beirut, is the result of a one week workshop that involved illustrators, photographers, journalists and architects from Lebanon and Holland. the project was initiated by Studio Beirut and supported by Partizian Publik, Archis and Pearl Foundation. We worked in groups to cover 4 geographical areas in Beirut; Hamra, Ashrafieh, Bourj Hammoud and Dahye.

Dahye in 2006.

“Ahlan wa Sahlan” to Dahyeh: Welcome to Dahyeh… to you and was for me too, my very own first time, a Lebanese animator and illustrator, never acquainted with the actual reality of Dahyeh, a tourist in my own land. Once down there, I would say Dahyeh resembles the playfield inside a Flipper game… This being said, of course I related myself to that little shiny ball, that is in constant movement, propelled back and forth by any encounter with the switches and buttons! You as a tourist, are the same in Dahyeh, you are as shiny and glowing as an intruder could be!! You are of course lost, with no notion of direction, bumping back and forth from one checkpoint and landmark to another, which of course fill this field up… Being in Dahyeh is being in a state of constant agitation and activity, for you can never settle in one place. But no matter how lost you will be, by the end of the day you are out, merely because there are no hotels to house you here!

other artworks about my experience in Dahye.

an illustration for a story we heard about a nude photographer in Dahye. strange job in a conservative region.

my presentation in Pecha Kucha 4 long time ago :) but amazing experience

Kassatly Chtaura apple juice TVC

we freshly finished this television Ad for Kassatly Chtaura new apple juice.

Nathalie Masri & Tony Khoueiry, a fresh young energetic team ;) that worked a lot in advertising, created an independent agency and this is one of their first projects. they did the concept of this campaign and asked me to do the animation. let me say it was really fun working with them !

this year, i decided to focus more on the group work, specially in the illustration part. Ghadi Ghosn, or "king of ogres" helped me in the visuals; he drew the elements and inked them. i did the color rendering, the composition and character design and prepared them for animation. Ashley Choukeir , akid, took all the thousand layers and animated them with a smile on her face :) she s amazing ! we finished the animation and we moved to the music part. Karim Khneisser, a talented young composer, did the music in his studio somewhere in the streets of Achrafieh :) Christelle Franca, assisted in the process and we thank her for her positive energy always !

wbass ! I hope u like it.

za second Book

the second book for "Haltabees" is now OUT :) it s entitled "حلتبيس حلتبيس : أشعار من سمسم وخيار" and it s a poetry book for children about Love written by Rania Zaghir and published by al Khayyat al saghir. it s available in Arche de Noe library in Hamra and soon will be available in other libraries. I attached some photos of the book and illustrations. enjoy :)

Making of Haltabees Poetry Book

as usual, the best part for me, is to share the making of the book with you :)

this book is the second book in the series "Haltabees" so i used the same mixed media technique that i used in the first book. however, the color palette is brighter and less contrasty.

a basic version of spread 1 inside the book. later, i changed the hierarchy of the elements to give more importance to the "Kebbe", a traditional lebanese food item. i added more depth to the illustration by adding the blurred background and the light with uniform shadows on all other elements.

spread 1 done.

in spread 2, "Abd l Halim Hafez" was mentioned in the text and i was lucky to have bought before this disc from an old library in Hamra so i took a photo with the sesame background. however, i was not happy with the foam effect.

chasing balloons in the studio was hectic. but at the end, i managed to avoid blurry photos. tx Kevin :)

spread 2 done & dedicated to mOmO and Egypt :)

i wanted to illustrate a telephone so i used this vintage phonebook that i bought for free from Jounieh, where i live :) i changed the original latin numbers into arabic numbers with a twist of love.

taking photos of Haltabees was a main step in the process, but it was harder this time coz Haltabees, the clay character is getting older so the clay is becoming dryer :s

i used different patterns from gift wrapping for the background of the illustrations.

tx to Hanane & Ashley for posing :)

spread 3 before applying textures to Lamees and without Haltabees.

spread 3 done.

some Luxury objects found in a shop called "Tansa" in Jounieh. the owner of this shop was not sure about my interest in Dentelles :)

to the right, the making of the castle done from cardboard and clay.

finishing the castle but from one view only. you can see the mess from other views.

spread 4 done.

the title page

the sherpa proof from the printing press to make sure of the colors.

za parents checking the printed book but it seems they are more happy with the camera than the book.

the biggest assistant ever Mr. Pierre Boutros.

a BIG thank you for Hanane Kai who assisted me in the research and illustrations for this book. i love u Hannouch !