Each year I Design and Illustrate a new Christmas Card to send out to a majority of my friends and family to celebrate the Holiday Season. The last couple of card designs I’ve done have featured my “Artzee Fartzee” characters based on my wife and me, so this past Christmas I ran with that idea again. The card’s final layout differed from the original concept that my wife and I discussed. She said, “Hey why don’t we make a card this year that’s shaped like an ornament and it opens to reveal the card.” So with my wife’s suggestion in mind, I did just that and began drawing our new card.
I wanted the gag to be that when the card is folded you think that Troy is holding the Mistletoe over the head of the character based off of my wife, but when you open the card…SURPRISE! So the punchline is revealed when you open the card. After I finished the pencil drawing I took it into the computer and colored it in Photoshop. I stuck to the original Ornament design and worked it up that way initially.
However, after I had printed and mocked a version up…it didn’t fold and stay closed the way that I had intended. That, and the cut and folding time was a bit more than I wanted to spend on it. Christmas was fast approaching so my deadline to get all of our cards printed, addressed, and sent out via the United Postal Service was looming. Below is a video of how the card was to look and be opened. Click on the video below and enjoy!
So with the layout of the card not working exactly as I had envisioned it, I quickly decided to go with a much simpler square design. Not only was it easier to cut, but it also had less fold line to have to deal with. I think the Final layout works much better, even though the original concept was a bit more fun. I may revisit the ornament design in a future Christmas Card but I’ll have to tweak it to make it work a bit better than it did. Below is the Final layout.
I also did an alternative “Happy Holidays” version to send to our Jewish friends. They were the only ones who got this version, so they should consider it a Collector’s Item. One day…some day…maybe…possibly…it might just be worth something on eBay.
Below is a video of how the Final card looked when it was opened. Click on the video below and enjoy!
So there you go, that was my Christmas Card this past Holiday Season. Now I’ve only got less then 365 days until I’ve got to come up with yet another one drawn, printed, cut, folded, signed, stuffed, addressed, stamped, and sent out. I could start now planning for it or…put it off ’til this November…I’ll see what I can do, but until then…Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!