Wednesday, August 1: What Might Have Been

Today I have a re-imagining of some uniforms which could have been from Canucks history. I remember reading (on Icethetics, I think) that the logo which is now use for the WHL's Vancouver Giants was originally intended to be a Canucks logo. This makes a lot of sense, as it plays on the Johnny Canuck/Lumberjack motif, which is not the first image that pops into my mind when the word "Giant" is mentioned. Ultimately this logo was rejected by the Canucks, but has found a happy home on the front of the Giant's sweaters ever since they joined the WHL in 2001.

The fact that this logo was first rejected by the Canucks, and then introduced by the Giants in 2001, leads one to think that this logo may have been considered when planning the new alternate sweater which the Canucks introduced in 2001. This would have been a major departure from the Orca Bay logos, and a huge step back in line with the original Canucks identity. Perhaps the Third jersey would have ended up looking something like this:

As you can see, I have maintained the layout of the third jersey worn from 2001-2006, but have used an updated version of the Giants crest instead of the Orca. I have simplified the Giants crest to instead be a V shape (for Vancouver), instead of a G shape (for Giants). I have also altered the colour scheme to fit the colour scheme worn by the Canucks from 1997-2007 (the fact that this recolouring does not appear forced, also adds soem legitimacy to the thought that the Giants logo was originally intended as a Canucks logo). I maintained maple leaf detail on the Lumberjack's sleeve, however, did try to make it more subtle. I do think that it is kind of tacky for a Canadian team to feel obliged to put a maple leaf somewhere in their logo, but Canuck is a slang term for Canadian, so I don't feel that the inclusion of a maple leaf is unwarranted.

Just for fun I have also included home and road sweaters which go along with this concept. I based them off of where I felt that the third jersey design, and other similarly progressive jersey designs from 2001 in the NHL, were leading.  Hope you enjoy!

So that's that. Fun to relive one of my favourite eras from Canucks history, and do a bit of historical re-imagination, and a bit of logo alteration. All around good times. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I have.

Come back on friday to see some more concepts from contributor Steven Grant.

I will be back on the weekend, but can't promise a post, however I will be able to publish any comments which you have submitted in the past week. 

Thanks for reading!

Friday, July 27: Contributor Concepts

Hey everyone, we've made it to yet another friday, which means we have some more work from people other than me.

Before we get to that, a bit of housekeeping. As I mentioned, next week I will be on vacation, and have set up some auto-posts to go up while I am away. I laid out a schedule of these posts on Wednesday, but have had to scrap one of the posts (the one on monday, simply because I did not have enough time to write it, and do everything else which I needed to do before I left). There will be posts on wednesday and friday, and I hope to finish the scrapped monday post when I return home on thursday, and post it on the weekend.

Anyways, lets get on with the concepts:

This week marks the debut of Steven Grant on the blog. Steven runs his own concept site (sg-94.blogspot.ca) but has kindly sent along some Canucks concept work to me.

Steven sent along his ideal Canucks sweater set. The home and road sweaters are very similar to the sweaters worn from 1972-1978, except the logos have been slightly altered, making the overall shape and outline pattern really similar to the current updated Stick in the Rink logo, but maintaining the simple "stick" part of the logo, and staying true to the original colouring of the jerseys. I really like these subtle changes. Good work, they really do make a difference. As you probably know, I am not a fan of the striping pattern introduced in 1972 (I have always thought that the 1970-72 striping was much more creative), but I really can't complain about my personal preference. This look is classic, and well put together.

THE THIRD JERSEY IS AWESOME!!! It's green. It's retro. It uses the VC logo. It reminds us of the millionaires jersey. If I were me making this sweater, I might make the hem stripes straight, and I might make the shoulder numbers a bit bigger. Other than that, no complaints. Really well done Steven, I look forward to seeing and posting more of your Canucks concepts.

Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for reading! I look forward to seeing your comments, and emails when I get back!

Wednesday, July 25: Green Alternate (continued)

Last week I posted this green sweater, but wasn't sold on it. I wasn't expecting a lot of positive feedback on this one. Despite my own hesitation, people seemed to like it. Nevertheless, I have tried to innovate. The treatment of the VC logo being placed in the arm stripes was inspired by the way the C with crossed tomahawks logo was placed on the Blackhawks sweater from 1956-1959. This is such a classic look.  I also added some football style numbers in the top of the shoulders (as the sleeves would have been too crowded if I place the numbers in the usual position).

The circle logo, and the treatment of the arm patches had a real Chicago feel to it (the Hawks used a circle logo often, most recently on their Winter Classic uniforms). Despite Vancouver's rivalry with Chicago, I can admit one thing about the Hawks: they do get their uniforms spot on. I have thought this for a long time, and even made a Canucks sweater based on their Winter Classic uniforms early on in my concept designing career. Here it is:

Today I revisit this concept in an attempt to explore other options on my quest to find a great green alternate for the Canucks. The first thing wrong with this concept is the logo. The logo is not a classic logo, and this jersey screams old time hockey. The numbers fall into the same category, not old-timey, on a faux-back sweater.

Here is my first attempt at fixing this sweater. It is basically a Chicago Winter Classic rip-off, but hey, with that striping pattern, you can't really go wrong.

The next concept is a slight departure from the Chicago Winter Classic form, with the switch of the circle logo to the shoulders. I like how this swap has worked out.

I would love to know what you think of these sweaters, and if you have any ideas or suggestions.

Now for whats coming up next on SOAC. I am going away on a little vacation for the next week or so, but there will be posts on SOAC. here is what is coming up:

Friday, July 27: Contributor Concepts
Saturday, July 28: Evolution of My Jersey Design
Monday, July 30: The Quest for a Green Alternate continues POST DELAYED... probably until the weekend. Sorry.
Wednesday, August 1: What Might Have Been
Friday, August 3: Contributor Concepts

For the time being, I am going to try to be posting regularly on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (with the occasional Saturday post). My post are typically set to go up at 9:00 AM here in Vancouver. (perfect for a lunch-hour read for my friends out east!) Be sure to take note of that and drop by accordingly.

Thanks for reading!

Saturday July 21: Evolution of the V

For the weekend's post I thought I would give you a glimpse into my creative process, and show you how these Flying Vs came to be.

I started making hockey jersey in early 2011 (have I only been doing it that long!?!) the first ever design I made was an Ottawa Senators jersey which I posted to my facebook. Soon afterwards I posted a few Canucks concepts, and a my friend David said "Wanna make up a demo for the flying V in blue, green, and white? I still want to see the Canucks try that. With Johnny Canuck as the Shoulder patch."

I did and just that, and here is what I came up with. This is one of my very early designs, so please, go easy on me!

I was very happy with these at the time, but as my skills improved, I knew I would have to revisit these at some point. This was one of the reasons I started SOAC, so that I could revisit some of my old Canucks designs, and apply my improved skills and ideas to them. These were pretty good for having only been designing jerseys for a week or so, but still, there is a lot to be improved upon.

The next step in this process came a few weeks ago when I posted a trifecta of Flying V concepts on this blog from Stéphane, Justin, and myself. Truth be told, I really hated the designs I came up with. They were too busy. Here they are again, anyways.

These looked more like Ms than Vs, but there were elements there which I did like. They just needed some refining and simplifying. That was the next step to come. I finally felt like I was getting somewhere. here are the results of the refining and simplifying.

I was really starting to become comfortable with what I had created, but that is where some more help came along from regular reader and contributor Stéphane, who suggested I cut off the V at the sleeve stripe, and switch some of the colours around. I likes his suggestions, they made the jersey more balanced and logical, while still reminding me of the original Canucks flying V uniforms. Just for fun, I also made up a green version of this sweater. Here are the final versions, which are now posted in the final concepts page.

So there you have it. Those are the finalized flying Vs, and that is how they came to be.

Next weekend I will also have an "evolution" post where I look back at some of my VERY early Canucks jersey designs. This will be a very unique, and interesting post. I won't say more than that. check back for next Saturday for that.

Another stab at a green alternate

A while ago I tried to develop a green alternate uniform. What I came up was probably one of the simplest routes to take, but in the end was something I was not really pleased with. Now that I have completed my Millionaires project, I want to start another project and come up with a green alternate that I am really happy with.

Here are some alternates which I have made that I am NOT happy with. Each of these have some merit, but are not quite right.

Then there is the alternate which was featured in the collaboration I did with Justin:

I love this one, but do want to complete what I started to develop with those first two green sweaters.

Here is a never before seen concept which I put together based on some suggestions I made to Justin when we were working on our collaboration. He tried to put it together, but said it wasn't working, so I tried, and I couldn't really get it to work either, but thought I would include it anyways, because I think there is some really interesting elements (which I would like to use on my green alternate) on the sweater.

I was going for a real vintage feel on this one with the oversized logos on the sleeves, and the large, football style numbers on the shoulders. It's just not quite right (the shoulder numbers kill it, I think... but they would really crowd the arms if I put them there)

So, with all of these ideas circling in my mind I am going to set out some guidelines for myself for creating this alternate:

1) Make it GREEN.

2) Feature Johnny Canuck prominently.

3) Go with an old-timey, vintage, faux-back feel. I want to make this sweater feel like it belongs to an original 6 club.

4) Make it connect or make sense with my redesigned the home and away uniforms.

5) Use the VC logo... it is too good not to.

I feel like my last attempt on this post is closest to  doing all these things, but still is not quite right. I am open to changing the main crest to a different treatment of Johnny. I am willing to alter the striping. I am not willing to drastically change my treatment and placing of the VC logo (I think it really works well on the arms. It feels really vintage, and makes a nice connection to the negative space V in the arm stripes on the home and away sweaters).

Please help me out! I have come down with the designer's version of writers block!

thanks for dropping by.

More Flying V updates

Hello Everyone, hope you enjoyed the weekend (and monday...), I had a great weekend! Thanks for dropping by SOAC even though I haven't updated the blog in a few days. I feel like I had a really good excuse though, I had a weekend pass to the Vancouver Folk Music Festival and spent the entire weekend outside in the sun (and the rain... this is Vancouver). It was a really great weekend, listening to really good music, in a really beautiful setting.

The festival took place in Jericho Beach park in Vancouver, on the shore or the Burrard Inlet. The park itself has many nice forest groves, and is steps away from the beach (and Pacific Ocean, perfect for a quick dip on a hot afternoon!) and has a wonderful view of the Coast mountains on the North Shore of the inlet.

photo from: 604pulse.com

Even though I took a break from doing any concepts or work on the blog this weekend, it doesn't mean I wasn't thinking about it. Sitting and looking at the ocean and mountains and trees (and their vivid shades of green and blue), I was reminded how perfect the Canucks' colour scheme is for this city. I also want to make a concept inspired by Vancouver's landscape, but I have other things to do and finish up before I take that on, good thing because I still need some time to formulate that idea in my mind.

For today's concepts I have a few updates on the flying V sweaters I posted last week. I had a few suggestions which I implemented, and a few additional options for this concept which I have made up. I have also added a green version.

The big change with all of these concepts is stopping the arm stripes at the piping. This is definitely more in the spirit of the original flying Vs, but steps away from the modern trend to have arm stripes all the way around the arm, over the vertical arm stripes or piping (like the Jets and Kings currently have on their sweaters). I like the way it looks, but am obviously open to suggestions.

Blue Option 1:

Blue Option 2:

White Option 1:

White Option 2:

Green Option 1:

Green Option 2:

So there you have it, plenty of options for modernized flying Vs. Let me know which ones you like best, or if you have any suggestions to make these better! I will be finalizing these concepts by the weekend (I fell like they are VERY close to being complete).

Also, if you have a Canucks concept you would like to send in, feel free to! I hope to feature other people's Canucks concepts regularly on fridays. The email you can send your concepts to is: shirtofacanuck@gmail.com

Thanks for reading!

With a Little Help from my Friend.

Hey everyone, I don't know if you recall me mentioning I was working with Justin on a concept. for those of you who have not heard, Justin (from The Art of Hockey) and I have been working on a concept together. It is now complete. Justin approached me with a proposition to use my home and away sweaters, and his third sweater (which was posted in the post I linked to previously in this post) to create a collaborated Canucks uniform set. I agreed, and have had a lot of fun doing this over the past couple weeks.

Working with someone else is great, they can catch your mistakes, make alterations to make the concept better, or you can bounce ideas off of them. But it is not without its challenges. Working on the V in the arm striping took us five back and forths before we came up with something that was as I wanted it (thanks again Justin for putting up with this!), but all the back and forth was worth it because in the end it looks great.

The only real alteration made to my home and road jerseys (other than the template) is in the collar striping. Instead of modelling that after the current Canucks' collars, they are based off the 1970 original jerseys.

A lot has changed in Justin's jersey since its original incarnation. It was giving me a vintage vibe, so that is the direction we took it. We added collar laces, and simplified the striping making white more prevalent and eliminating silver. We also used the Canucks' 40th anniversary numbers, which are big and blocky, and ooze tradition.

All in all we are both really pleased with the alterations made to our work, and I for one think they are better for having input from someone else.

Concepts From Friends Friday!

Hello everyone, we've made it to another friday!
Today I am excited to introduce a new feature on the blog which will hopefully become a regular thing. I have mentioned on previous posts that I have set up an email account for the blog (shirtofacanuck@gmail.com) and am accepting concept submissions (obviously Canucks themed) to be posted on the blog. 

I have had some awesome contribution on the blog from some other fellow bloggers (Stéphane from Le Troisiéme Chandail, and Justin from The Art of Hockey), this has not only been through comments and suggestions on my concepts, they have also sent in some of their own work to me.

Stéphane's work strays a little from the blue and green brand identity that I, as a 21 year old Vancouverite, see fitting best for the Canucks. Nonetheless, Stéphane's work is flawlessly executed, and creatively based in the era of Canucks history which he identifies with most strongly.

As Stéphane wrote:

I don't know why most Canucks fans don't want to talk about the "big Vs" years… For me, those jerseys represent the real Canucks. It reminds me of Tony Tanti, Stan Smyl, Richard Brodeur… The years when the Canucks were in town (Montreal that is) with jerseys that no other teams could match: different, original, new. I sure wish that they could bring back that black jersey with the dominant V as a third (cause I really don't believe they will step away from blue and green now).

Obviously to complete this "wish" Stéphane would like the name on the back of the sweater to be GOMEZ instead of LAPIERRE, but seeing as Mike Gillis has again proved himself a capable GM (with the recent Schneider signing), I don't see that happening anytime soon.

I really like this design. It is way more logical than the original flying V sweaters, but does not lose any of the boldness of the original sweaters.

I have really grown to enjoy the flying V sweaters (I definitely want to add one to my jersey collection!). Stéphane mentioned that he doesn't think that the Canucks will abandon the blue and green colour scheme, but to bring back the Vs, you don't necessarily need to bring back the hallowe'en colours. One of the first ever concepts I did was a Flying V jersey in blue and green. This post acts as a bit of a teaser for the updated version I am working on. Look forward to that in the next week or so.

Justin has also sent in a great concept. A few weeks ago when I was working on green alternate sweaters, Justin sent his take along.

There are a number of things I like about this concept, love the green, love the fact that Justin does not shy away from the striping (I tend to be way more minimalist when it comes to stripes, Justin is brave enough to make all these stripes work!). I also love the logos. That VC logo is a hidden gem, and I have no idea why the Canucks have not used it on a jersey yet.

His presentation of the full body skating Johnny Canuck logo is one of the two ways that I have seen work on the front of a jersey. The second is the way I presented in this post, which I admittedly did not come up with. I think I first saw it some sort of Canucks official merchandise (maybe a T-shirt or flag). By itself, the skating Johnny Canuck logo seems awkward and unbalanced to me (almost as awkward looking back on this photo retrospectively after the 2011 Stanley Cup final...). Even Tanner Glass can't make these jerseys look great, although if having awkward looking sweaters for the rest of time meant having Glass back on the Canucks, I would seriously consider taking that offer, what a gamer!

I like the old-timey vibe I get from Justin's green third jersey, and have encouraged him to push it a little further. Justin came to me with the idea of collaborating on a Canucks jersey set. His third with my home and away sweaters. This is really great because together we can make all of our jerseys better. When we finish our collaboration, I will definitely post it. Consider this another teaser!

Anyways, that is all I have for today. Check back for Canada day stuff this weekend. Next week I am going to continue working on the classic uniforms, hopefully we can make some headway on those and get them wrapped up by the end of next week.

Thanks for dropping by!

Going Green

There is a green deficiency in the NHL today.

Throughout the Canucks history, they have worn basically every colour jersey, except green, which seems ridiculous, especially considering the prominence it played in the original Canucks branding, and in the latest blue, white, green colour scheme.

Do the math. It is time for the Canucks to start sporting some green sweaters.

To start us off, I have a special treat. A green jersey which reclaims an awful jersey (which I actually like and own) from Canucks history. The Canucks 95-97 alternate jersey. I hope to feature these sort of faux-back sweaters/jersey reclaimation projects from time to time on Shirt of a Canuck.

Now into the heart of the matter. What should a green Canucks Alternate look like?

A couple weeks ago I posted a version of the green jersey (Option 1 below). I was not too thrilled with it, and have taken steps to refine it a bit. 

OPTION 1:

This is essentially the current Canucks alternate uniform in green, with the primary and secondary logos swapped. I modified the stick in the rink shoulder patches slightly from the previous version to add some definition and clarity.

But there are many more options which I considered to add some cohesion and pop to this concept.

OPTION 2:

Added a white shoulder yoke outline to add some brightness and flavour to what could be perceived as a dark and bland upper half of the sweater. I think it may also tie the sweater together a little bit.

OPTION 3:

A blue shoulder yoke. Again to add some flavour, and help to define the shoulder patches.

OPTION 4:

A white yoke outline combined with the blue shoulder yoke.

OPTION 5:

A double yoke outline in blue and white.

Vote in the poll to let me know your favourite. As always any comments and suggestions are welcome.

New Alternates

With my proposed promotion of a version of the current alternate sweater (and a matching white version) to home and away uniforms, this leaves a void in the Canucks uniform set at the alternate jersey position. for me the solution is simple. Swap the main logo and the shoulder patches on the current alternate sweater. The striping design looks really good on these uniforms, and the logos really embody the Canucks' identity. Also, the stick in the rink shoulder patches have become a mainstay of the Canucks' uniforms ever since 2003, this sweater would continue that tradition.
























Another available option, which many in the jersey design sphere have been calling for is a green alternate for the Canucks. The NHL severely lacks the colour green right now. The Canucks could be part of the solution if they opted to sport these sweaters.

I have also included a matching away alternate uniform. I think the NHL should consider a little bit more leniency when it comes to rules surrounding uniforms (for example, multiple alternate sweaters, games where both teams wear contrasting coloured uniforms). Uniforms generate profit for the league, but also generate interest for the fans. I have no problem with teams wearing more uniforms in a season, so long as the fit with the teams identity. So I have included this away version of the sweater with the hope that some day soon the NHL allows alternate road sweaters.

So, which uniform set do you like the best? Any feedback on these uniforms would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading!