Dean Zhu

[dczhu]

Illustration for Texas A&M's Aggie Society of Anime and Manga Art, or "Aggie SAMA" for short.

Customer provided the original character illustration, which I rendered and vectorized for print.

[dczhu]

Design concept for MWR Bahrain's Annual Zombie Run event.

This was a fairly open design prompt, so I used Hero Forge to draft a zombie character and pose reference for this design.

[dczhu]

Geometric Calligraffiti frame for Cheer Station

Customer asked for this draft to be done in the style of an "Personalized Artist Doodle", as noted in the annual style guide.

Since nobody asks for this style of calligraffiti on shirt orders, (mostly because most customers know what it is) I took the opportunity to practice.

[dczhu]

Selection of designs created for the TAMU 2023 Fish Camp.

Designs for this event are often parodies / tributes to existing properties, such as How to Train Your Dragon, Blink-182, and Grillo's Pickles

[dczhu]

Girl Scouts Campfire

Originally created for the Girl Scouts of Northeast Texas. Many other groups have also ordered their own version.

Placement of council service mark and slogan have both been subject to changes based on changes to Girl Scouts™ licensing requirements. For example, service mark moved to sleeve, or "Camp like a girl" changed to "Camp like Girl Scouts™"

[dczhu]

Logos for Texas A&M's 2023 Countdown to Kickoff merchandise

The customer asked me for vector copies of this logo so it could be used on the rest of the accompanying promotional suite.

[dczhu]

Drafts for Johnson City Young Life

Using neon and sunset themes integrated into the YL logo.

[dczhu]

Internal T-Shirt art contest entry.

Theme was "Space Western", with requirements for T-shirt color (Bella+Canvas' Heather Orchid), at least one ink color (Pantone 286 purple), and font style (Serif).

I've included both the entry with the required purples and one with a red-centric palette, which I think works better on this background.

[dczhu]

Concepts for the Salt Lick BBQ.

Cow skull design based on the band Motörhead's graphics.

Grill Turtle as a mostly-original concept. The original draft had the grill as the turtle's shell, with a top lid component.

[dczhu]

Mousepad design for University of Texas, Austin's Career Development Center, based on an existing sculpture.

Reference photo provided by customer.

[dczhu]

Fully Sublimated Jersey designs for Adequate E-Sports, in Fire and Ice themes

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale 1, He, Rogue — Walkaround video

Graffiti and other tags are layered over extant work as a way to show age. By weathering lower layers, with newer, “fresher” layers on top, I could add to the history of the scene. For example, I took a stiff stippling brush and wore away sections of the green background from the Robin Hood mural.

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale 2, 3Cs, 3Ds

In which a clandestine conversation between criminal collaborators and cops is overheard by a local tagger.

In this case, I wanted to use a “Massive minion, smaller superior” kind of relationship to  highlight the imbalance in power in this situation.

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale 3, Declaration of War (Night side)

Soloist takes her paint to a mural of a snake, a symbol of the gang’s influence in her area. Overwriting it with her own mark, she declares, “You have no power here.”

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale 3.5, Declaration of War (Day side)

The aftermath of a night of furious tagging. Soloist’s 单 mark uses some simple forced perspective, overlapping the windows and fire escape.

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale 4, Boundary Arch

Alongside nods to the FHK protests of 2019, graffiti on this piece references the Berlin Wall–particularly the segment kept at the GHW Bush presidential library.

[dczhu]

Heroic Scale, Miniatures

3 miniatures for Hemei “Soloist” Chen, 2 for the Police Officer, 2 for the Gangster.

Each mini is 25-30mm tall. Minis are sculpted using steel wire, ”Green stuff” epoxy, Sculpey Firm and/or FIMO Professional polyclay. Painted with acrylics.