February is my least favorite month. I’m quite sure I’m not alone in that. It’s tough to spell, the holiday hangover is now COMPLETELY dead, and of course the weather……….the weather! And I love black history month, but I’d love it more in July, or August! But I didnt even notice those slight annoyances this year, I had two projects that took up the bulk of my time.

One of the projects was, boring and uninteresting. But the OTHER project, a limited edition J.Dilla trading card honoring his 50 birthday, that was fire! I was given 2 weeks and free creative control to do what I wanted. Which normally can spell problems for me (I have too many ideas sometimes.), This worked in my favor because I was already working on some J. Dilla sketches for fun-zies.

I love the way the MPC came out. Using some different sketching techniques from my sketchbook.

I figured the street sign was the one to go with, its pretty on brand using the multiple street signs fits into everything else I was doing stylistically, and I could include a Detroit specific reference. I came up with a few different designs out of my sketches, took my favorites and submitted my final designs to the client.

Dilla is from the eastside of Detroit, so I had to incorporate the street names of the neighborhood he grew up in. I’m sure the appreciated the attention to detail

I’ve learned in my experience working with rappers, portrait is important. This posed some problems for me, their aint alot of good reference photos of Dilla out there, Sadly he passed away before the “camera phone era” blew up the way it did. So I had to make the best out the situation.

So this was 1 of 3 different designs I did. Like I said, sometimes I have too many ideas, I share this one because this was the one the client loved and ultimately chose. I really did love all three, and I’ll find a way to put it in one of my upcoming sketchbooks maybe idk. They’re just too dope to be sitting on my hard drive! Hit up my Instagram to see the final, or to purchase, visit Rapper- Cards to support. My personal favorite was the one Nate did, incredible work!