‘Teeth’ is the name given to the merch line for the Dark Blood tour. As a project, it encompasses not only the website, but also every single article available: from jewellery, to clothes, printed media such as posters and zines, and more.
The main concept of both Teeth and Dark Blood as a whole is vampirism. Deeply tied to the artists’ identity, it must be reflected in every step of any roll-out and remain as the core inspiration.
The logotype for Teeth everywhere on the site except for the landing page, which is locked in to looking to focus on the products and set the atmosphere. I created it with the motive of fangs in mind, while also letting the re-appearing cybersigils dictate some shapes and lines. These sigils, which are related to the occult, give form to multiple products in this project, re-imagined for the modern age: a way to combine the ancient idea of vampires with the artists portraying it in their twenties.
The custom logo also includes parts of ‘gothic’ typographies (which, at the same time, were modified to resemble canines), also closely related to vampirism. In the center, acting as the back of the throat, is the shape of the stone used in the featured pendant.
‘Teeth’ cross necklace was fully designed by me, with the image of a full mouth in mind. I sketched it, modelled on Blender, textured it according to the materials (chrome steel, peals, a precious stone), and rendered out in different scenes to showcase its components.
As it is one of the flashiest pieces, I also created a short looping animation as a digital ad using more cybersigils to create a frame into a ‘portal’ or ‘mirror’.
The website continues the vampirism theme by using an antiquated-looking serif, the red, white, black color scheme, and a daring set of layouts.
‘Sweet Venom’ posters are a couple of matching A3 print-outs in glossy 180gsm paper. The first one, which also contains another one of my custom letterings, alludes to the process of biting and taking blood. The contrast between the thinnest and thickest parts give it almost a liquid-y consistency. I created the graphics on the poster with 3D, then rendered it out, converted into bitmap/halftone, and distressed and distorted the body text and other elements.
As for the second poster, I challenged myself to learn how to draw the cybersigils I had been seeing around me for a long time. This was one of the first pieces I started, and understanding how to construct these sigils gave me the abilities to build a stronger and more cohesive identity for the other parts of the project. In this case, they have a rougher, less-polished look to match the ‘messy’ language of the poster. I wanted to create a visual that created an atmosphere without the need of words, so there is no copy whatsoever. It also traces back to some re-emerging early 2000s online trends that by themselves are related to ‘gothic’ subcultures.
‘Orange Blood’ zine explores the most humane side of vampirism. As a way to represent the concept in a three-dimensional way, and not only through an obscure image, the artists also dive into softer sounds. To follow this, I wanted to use an extremely simple visual language that is easy to understand, but difficult to translate into words. With gradients that I crafted myself, I expressed the emotions in the selected tracks to let the audience infer those feelings slowly. The few words included serve just to guide the spectator through the duration of the song. It’s printed as an A5 stapled booklet and in matte 150 gsm recycled paper, to give way to the imperfections of the material to mirror those of the artist.
‘Bite off’ keyring follows the organic shapes of both a jaw with fangs, and the holes they might make. Included are some of the sketches of the conceptualization process.
‘Cybersigil’ set is a collection of original illustrations and a couple of text-based glossy stickers.
‘Tremble’ t-shirt plays into the blood dependency vampires have, displaying it as a vial (modelled and rendered by me) and comparing it to one’s love.