We’re very pleased to announce this year’s winner of our folder design contest is Rade Stjepanovic, a talented graphic designer from Jacksonville, Florida.
Rade is a graduate of the University of North Florida as well as Florida State College at Jacksonville. His designs have won awards from the American Advertising Federation of Jacksonville as well as several scholarships and grants. Currently, he works for CFI Marketing and is a member of the prestigious American Institute of Graphic Arts.
We spoke with Rade about his award-winning “Legends of Rock’n Roll” folder design as well as his passions and inspirations.
Legends of Rock’n Roll Folder – Designed by Rade Stjepanovic
Company Folders: Tell us about this folder design. Who was it made for? What was the folder’s intended purpose?
Rade Stjepanovic: This was a school project where I had to come up with a name of the company, their logo and other pieces that would promote the company itself. Since I am a person who like rock ‘n roll and guys like Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton etc., I came up with the name “Legends of Rock’n Roll” that would go along those lines of music. I also came up with an idea of designing one folder that would hold several pieces such as a CD, business cards and brochures.
CF: What was your process for creating this folder?
RS: Creating the logo was the biggest challenge. I wanted to make it clean, sharp and eye-catchy, but at the same time a little bit old and classic. So I decided to incorporate music records in the logo somehow. Playing with the letters L and R and images of records, I came up with a nice illustration for the logo. Once I was done with the logo, I just started to apply the elements and colors to the rest of the pieces. I kept using only two colors (red and black) to keep it looking like the 60’s and 70’s style.
Alphabet Stories – Designed by Rade Stjepanovic
CF: As a graphic designer, who or what inspires you?
RS: I feel that everything around me inspires me. I think that every single thing that I know of could be translated into a nice art piece. No exceptions.
CF: What do you enjoy most about graphic design?
RS: The thing that I enjoy most is definitely typography. I never get tired of trying to use it in a different way whenever I work on any of my projects.
What I enjoy about typography is its geometry and creativity, which are the main elements of a design. There are endless ways to use typography as geometric shapes to create cool and beautiful pieces of art.
CF: What’s the best piece of advice you would suggest to those looking to enter the graphic design field?
RS: It is hard to tell anyone whether they should enter the graphic design field. It is just a decision that everybody should make on his or her own. However, there is one thing that I would like to tell anybody who is thinking about becoming a graphic designer: “Unless you really like to challenge yourself every day, stay awake for many hours, and drink coffee a lot, don’t even think about becoming a graphic designer.”
Check out Rade Stjepanovic’s personal portfolio site for more samples of his work and information about his background.
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