Bearded Productions: A Theo Mays Showcase

[Theo Mays]

Usually I just make a thread per new piece that I feel like showing off. I figured I'd finally just make my own showcase thread and keep everything in here. So ladies and gents welcome to:

In this showcase you'll see whatever graphics I come up with on my free time. This could consist of sigs, wallpapers, posters, anything. I hope you all enjoy this as much as I do. First piece will be up in a bit and it is for my buddy Jam.​

With Love,

The Beard and I

 

[Theo Mays]

Here we go, lets make history. This piece here will hopefully be the first of many Bearded Productions. This one here is for Jam, so he can come and retrieve it at any time. Lets reveal the piece, shall we?

Spoiler

This piece here was pretty simple. AJ doesn't scream flashy and I didn't want to go that route, but I did want to add a little pizzazz to it. So what I started with was a star image from a Converse wallpaper. Makes sense due to AJ wearing those Converse like Chucks. I placed the star right in the middle as I wanted it be the backdrop to AJ, who could be a star in her own right. Next I did some black brushing to add some texture to the star. Then I added in a vector showcasing some blue colors and set it on Linear Dodge with 72 opacity. Then I did some brushing with white to add some light and brighten up the sig a bit. Added in some diagonal lines with the fill set to 23. Next I put in my text using Quer (Seth has me hooked on that shit). Put a white outer glow around it with the fill set to 19. I finally added in my image of AJ which perfectly shows her cutesy spunk (future Mrs. Beard if ya didn't know). Next I filled the sig with some pale red, set it on color with 9 opacity. Rounding it out I applied the image and sharpened it up and dropped the fill to 54. Finally added a border with a 37 fill and there ya have it. The cute, spunky, lovely, and beautiful AJ Lee. Have at it my loves.

 

[JamJam]

WHOAAA. I love it man! Looks like Captain America in the back. Haha. Well anyway, I'm taking this sig so yeah. Ehh, maybe a different would've worked but this is fine. Always an awesome piece you do Theo!

And finally, your own showcase. Looking forward to what else you make!

 

[FSWWE]

Spoiler

Why does Jam get all the love? I'm jealous!!
Just kiddin'! I love the signature, it looks very cool. I love the Background it really gives it a formidable touch and it makes the sig have some kind of flow.
The color scheme is pretty good, it's a good combination.
I hate the font in this signature :b Quer doesn't really fit, you could have used some font more groovy and cool to combine with the BG.
One other thing that I find that gives a cool effect is brushing the line pattern, specially around the main render, but it's only my taste Theo

FSWWE Rate:
9,5/10

Give me some love with a McIntyre signature, I would probably have an e-orgasm!!

Note: I love the bearded productions logo, I think it is time for you to create a signature for your sigs.

 

[Theo Mays]

Alrighty then. FSWWE wants a Drew McIntyre sig, FSWWE gets a Drew McIntyre sig. Again I went with a pretty simplistic approach with this as I'm still trying to get out of the minor funk I've been in since that Punk wallpaper.

Spoiler

What I did here was started with the flag of Scotland in the background and then I placed the three closeups of McIntyre's face from the Rumble poster. I then placed the main image of Drew in the center. Next I added in some white brushing for some lighting and brightness. I then put a splash vector and put the color overlay on blue to remain consistent with the color most associated with Drew. I set that layer on overlay. I then added a stained paper like texture, set it on saturation and the fill to 51. Of course through this process I moved by main image back to the forefront. Next I added in my two layers of font, applied the image, sharpened it, lowered the fill to 48, added a border, and called it a night. Hope it suits your fancies FS.

 

[FSWWE]

Spoiler

FSWWE is happy!!
The only thing I don't like is the main render, it needs a black and white gradient blended to give some contrast.
The text looks very good and it is one of the highest points as well as the BG, specially the splashed effect, it really gives it flow.
It is a beautiful design, it really is. I will add the gradient myself later and I will wear it with pride!!

FSWWE Rate <- Very Important
9/10

Theo tomorrow check my showcase with probably 2 new sigs, do you?

 

[ARLO]

Yes! Finally, a place to see some of the best sigs on WZ all in one thread.

You've been one of, if not the best sigger on WZ in the time I've been here.

The two sigs you've posted are already awesome. I especially love the BG on the AJ Lee one.

I've always loved your work Theo and hopefully this means you'll be posting new stuff on a regular basis. Keep it up

 

[Theo Mays]

So I sit here struggling to finish Extreme Rules for my Book This, so I decided to take a much needed breather and make a new sig to share with the world.

Spoiler

That's right another CM Punk piece from yours truly. Again this is another simple piece. I started off with a white background and placed CM Punk's newest logo over top of it. Next I added in some white brushing behind the main render of Punk. I then added in two more layers of black brushing over top the white and set them both on multiply. Then I added in my sub text (What's My Fucking Name?) and then placed a red bar behind it to make it stand out. Then I added the CM Punk text with a red bar in front saying "best in the world". Then I added in some gradients along with an exposure layer and voila, finished. If anyone would like to use it, be my guess. Any comments or criticism?

 

[Theo Mays]

I'm bored working night shift so I figured I'd whip up a siggy. Another simple one, but I really like the turnout.

Spoiler

I haven't done a DB piece in ages and I was really digging some of the renders that PSDdreams had. I was going to do the hooded one, but I see that one everywhere now so I used one that I can't recall ever seeing. I started with a white background and that put a dragon over top of that. Next I added a layer of white brushing over the dragon. Then I added in my render of DB and put a white texture set on soft light over top of him. Then I added a bunch of effects. Hue/Saturation, Photo Filters, Gradient Maps, and Brightness/Contrast. Then I added in a picture of clouds but dropped the fill to 18 and set it on Multiply. Then I added in layers of black, white, and red for lighting purposes. Played around with the settings with them to get them where I wanted them. Added my text and dropped the fill on them to blend with the background. Added a grey, concrete like texture and set it on multiply. Added an exposure layer, followed up with another DB render on soft light. Finally added in my borders on a fade to the sides and that was that. I'll admit it isn't my best piece, but I like the outcome.

 

[Theo Mays]

Yeah it's been awhile hasn't it my loves? So I'm here with a pretty simple piece that I made while sitting on my ass at work. Here is currently my background, replacing my CM Punk one that I made following Money in the Bank. I swear you'll be shocked when you see who it is.

Spoiler

Yeah I lied. The world knows of my AJ Lee crush, so I figured I'd display it in an artistic way. This was actually a pretty simple piece. I first started with the background. I took the brush pattern and put it on light blue and put it over a white background. Then I took a c4d effect and set it on screen over top the background giving the blue lines that added effect. Then I added in my main image of AJ. I then placed in some background images of AJ and took a white brush around them to blend them behind the main render. I added in my text (happy squid) and put a shadow and outer glow around it. Next I applied my image and played around with smart sharpen to give the renders of AJ a special effect. Finally applied the image and placed a light blue and white gradient on it and set it to soft light and I called it a night. Any comments, criticisms, likes, dislikes, etc. are always welcome. Enjoy!

 

[JamJam]

Yeah it's been awhile hasn't it my loves? So I'm here with a pretty simple piece that I made while sitting on my ass at work. Here is currently my background, replacing my CM Punk one that I made following Money in the Bank. I swear you'll be shocked when you see who it is.

Spoiler

Yeah I lied. The world knows of my AJ Lee crush, so I figured I'd display it in an artistic way. This was actually a pretty simple piece. I first started with the background. I took the brush pattern and put it on light blue and put it over a white background. Then I took a c4d effect and set it on screen over top the background giving the blue lines that added effect. Then I added in my main image of AJ. I then placed in some background images of AJ and took a white brush around them to blend them behind the main render. I added in my text (happy squid) and put a shadow and outer glow around it. Next I applied my image and played around with smart sharpen to give the renders of AJ a special effect. Finally applied the image and placed a light blue and white gradient on it and set it to soft light and I called it a night. Any comments, criticisms, likes, dislikes, etc. are always welcome. Enjoy!

DUDEEE THEO! That AJ picture is quite awesome. Best thing in the world, honestly. Lol. If you could turn that into a sig, I would proudly wear it. It's really good. I like the starburs theme. With AJ having the same outfit for all the renders, mmm mmm mmm! Really awesome work Theo

 

[BigDesigns]

Hey Theo!!
Thanks for the feedback, I must have looked like a clown, asking for yours and don't giving mine.

I will start for saying that you made me an AJ Lee fan, the first signature is outstanding!
The McIntyre and CM Punk sigs a re like your worst in this showcase, and your worst are like 8/10 sigs ahah

The AJ Lee wallpaper, I didn't like the text, you could have used a different font, I don't really like rotating text without some kind of effect!!
Oh and one tip and this tip is only about my personal taste, what about decreasing the saturation in the secondary renders?

Still a good work, I'm not really good in wallpapers, but this one is something I would use

 

[Theo Mays]

Has it really been this long beardos? Well guess what, I'm back with my first piece of work in ages. So ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages. I give to you: Cody Rhodes!

This was a really simple piece and more so a photo manipulation than anything else. I love me anything regarding the old Intercontinental Championship. Whether it is the belt itself or the matches that came with. Both make me happy in my lower regions. With that said you can probably imagine how I reacted when Cody brought back the old IC title. My love for Cody Rhodes is already at a huge level as he is number one in my fave five (thanks Booker) and now he is rocking my all time favorite championship title. Enough talk. Lets get down to business shall we?

First I copied the picture from WWE.com and then duplicated it in my layers. I sharpened the top layer and lowered the fill so it wasn't overly fudgey. Next I added in my Cody Rhodes font and made it the light blue of the globe in the IC title. I then duplicated that, set the fill to zero and put a 1px white stroke around it. I then moved it as if it was a shadow to the original text. I then added a simple black bar slightly under the Rhodes font and placed IC Champion into it. The rest is pretty much layers upon layers of brushes and backgrounds that I nitpicked with to get to the right levels. Then I added in an exposure, brightness/contrast, black and white, another brightness/contrast, photo filter, and hue/saturation. The final three layers consists of an applied image with a bas relief, an ink outline, and a cooling filter. All of which are adjusted to make the image pretty. Finally I added in my side borders and called it a night. So let me have it boys and girls. Obviously not my best work as I'm rusty as all hell, but I love the overall product and I'm rather pleased with it. Take it away!​

 

[Daniel]

I said I'd drop you some feedback, so here it is.

First of all, the image is a great one to use. Not enough people make sigs with single images, and the fact that it's a close-up means that the sig makes a big impact. The methods you've used are very interesting. Stuff like the applied image with the bas relief is something I've never even thought of doing, so I'll have to check that out. The text is great and perfectly placed over the rather acute image, and I love the fact you've played off the blue in the IC title. And the distorted border is very cool. It really works with Rhodes' current twisted persona and imagery.

Overall, I really don't think I can fault this at all. Very impressive stuff, especially if you're rusty. You've given me some great ideas. And Cody Rhodes is awesome.

 

[Theo Mays]

Here we go. I can't sleep and I figured I'd make a new piece as I'm getting that itch to make sigs again. This one is using a mixture of Kayoh's finishing tutorial and my new obsession with desaturating. Lets get started shall we?

Cowboy James Storm! This is my guy, easily in my fave five of TNA and very well could be in my fave five overall. First I started off with a city background and then duplicated and desaturate it. Then I darkened the desaturated layer. Next I brushed in a concrete layer colored black. Next I added in my render of Storm and duplicated it. I (go figure) desaturated the upper layer and put it on darken. And here is where Kayoh's tut jumps in. I then added three layers of gradient maps and set them to their corresponding set according to his tut. Check it out here: http://forums.wrestlezone.com/showthread.php?t=188384. Then it was pretty much adding in finishing touches. Photo filter here, high pass, and exposure. Next I added in the text and then did one more photo filter to blend the text into the overall image. Added a border and called it a morning. Any comments or criticism is nice. Give out some rep to Kayoh, he deserves it. He is as much a part of this sig as myself as his tut helped add some of the finishing touches. Have at it my loves.​

 

[Theo Mays]

I'm back with another piece. I'm sticking with a pretty simple approach to everything, but I'm really liking everything that I churn out. Lets take a dabble at my latest piece, shall we?

There it is, the current US Champion. Dolph Ziggler is one of my favorite stars in the business, easily in my fave five dawg. I had to make a sig with him. So how did I get here? I'll tell you. First I used the same city background as the James Storm sig above. I copied and desaturated it and set the top on darken. Next I added in a steel like texture set on hard light. I then put in my render of Ziggler. I didn't want to use the generic posing type ones, so I used a action shot from Raw. Next I added in a black, scratching like texture and set it on lighten. Then I added in a plain light blue background on lighten. Next I threw in a photo filter, an exposure layer, and a color balance. I then applied the image, desature on darken. Then a match color and fiddle with the numbers to get what I liked. Finally I sharpened it and lowered the opacity and called it a night. Have at it y'all.​

 

[JamJam]

I'm back with another piece. I'm sticking with a pretty simple approach to everything, but I'm really liking everything that I churn out. Lets take a dabble at my latest piece, shall we?

There it is, the current US Champion. Dolph Ziggler is one of my favorite stars in the business, easily in my fave five dawg. I had to make a sig with him. So how did I get here? I'll tell you. First I used the same city background as the James Storm sig above. I copied and desaturated it and set the top on darken. Next I added in a steel like texture set on hard light. I then put in my render of Ziggler. I didn't want to use the generic posing type ones, so I used a action shot from Raw. Next I added in a black, scratching like texture and set it on lighten. Then I added in a plain light blue background on lighten. Next I threw in a photo filter, an exposure layer, and a color balance. I then applied the image, desature on darken. Then a match color and fiddle with the numbers to get what I liked. Finally I sharpened it and lowered the opacity and called it a night. Have at it y'all.​

Amazing sig Theo. You gotta open up a request thread again soon man. Your sigs are just awesome. Love the choice of Ziggler for a sig as he's on fire right now. Currently my second favorite after Sheamus. I think that should be your next sig, Sheamus But anyway, keep doing what you do Theo!

 

[Theo Mays]

A Sheamus piece is what you want to see Jam? Well I'm a person of the people and a Sheamus piece is what you will get!

With this piece I've stuck with my main theme of late. I started with the scratchy black texture I used as a minor piece in the Ziggler sig above and made that my main background image. Next I found an effect on psd dreams and colored it yellow to go with the overall theme I was looking for (this is the sqwuiggly thing in the background). Next I used Sheamus' logo and put slightly behind the main render of Sheamus. I desaturated a duplicate and set it on darken, same with the Sheamus render. I then added my text which is black with a yellow border around it. Then added in the same photo filter, exposure, and color balance as the Ziggler sig. Then I finished it off with the gradient effects shown in Kayoh's finishing tutorial. The final layer was a high pass (again in Kayoh's tutorial) and that was that. Again it was relatively simple, but unique at the same time.​

 

[Theo Mays]

So I saw this picture of CM Punk "punking" in his announce chair from Raw and I really felt that would be a nice piece for a signature. Problem is that it really isn't that great of a sigmaking picture, so to do a complex sig would be complicated. So I went with an approach I don't recall ever using in a signature. An experiment to say the least. I'm not going to claim this as a masterpiece, but I think it is decent enough to hold its own.

What I did here was paste a bigger image of the picture in the background. I duplicated the image and then played around with some exposure on it to make it a bit more of a background instead of an image. I already made a smaller image of Punk and I duplicated it and desaturated it and put it on overlay. I set this behind the bigger image. I then did a faded erase of the bigger image so that the small image was now the center of the sig. Next I added in the star from his shirt and then placed the text on top of it. Next I did a layer of desaturation on darken, a sharpened image with the opacity down, and a high pass on overlay with the opacity down. Then I added in the really faded caniborrowyourblazer text. Reason being I thought that was hilarious and didn't think to put it in towards the beginning. I ended it with a dual red and black border and that's that. Praise, shred, critique, do as you please my loves.​

 

[Kayoh]

The Ziggler and Sheamus sigs look really similar, aside from the fractal highlights in the background of the Sheamus sig which look cool (they flow great with the render) but take away from the background itself.

Your two best works are Rhodes & James Storm imo. The Rhodes sig I like because it's so unique and the text is absolutely PERFECT. The Storm sig I like because of how much depth there is and again, great text. The depth in the Storm sig blows me away, though. Even the text looks like it's popping off the screen, it looks great. High Pass is a miracle worker, right?!

The Punk sig looks like it has potential. Maybe try using some filters on the background (spatter, sprayed strokes, ripple, ocean ripple, glass, etc) so that it doesn't look EXACTLY like a duped render layer. Unless that's what you were going for, but the big white chunks in the bottom left and directly to the main render's right look pretty bad. That, and it looks like the main render has a bad black outer glow or drop shadow that just does not work at all. Again, though, phenomenal text work - that's clearly your strong point and it's usually one of the most difficult elements for digital artists of any kind to master. Sometimes I'm working on text that, in my head, looks awesome, and then I finish, thinking "FUCK YEAH THIS IS EPIC," and then I sit back, look at the image and think "fuck, this looks like a buffalo took a wet shit on my sig. *deletes text completely* Let's try this again." - that exact process happened on my newest Punk splash. I tried adding, in big, cutesy Web 2.0 stylized font, "THE VOICE OF THE INTERNET MARKS" at the bottom (to make it look like he was almost sitting on the text) and it just turned out horrible. Needless to say, I left that text out and opted for the "Shove your borders up your ass" above his head.

Your font work is great and your background work is inconsistent, but when it's good, it's great. I'd say try doing a few more manips so you don't have to worry about making a background from scratch - the Rhodes sig is your best work imo and that's a manip. Stick to your strong suit, right? =)

 

[Theo Mays]

Guess what? Time for another CM Punk piece. It seems he brings out my best work. I didn't have plans on posting anything for awhile but I really loved this Punk piece and figured I'd share it with you.

This was a request for SC, but I figured sharing it here. First I placed the image of Punk to the left. It was a sig made and I just used it as a background picture. Then I placed the image of Punk punking to the right. I erased it so the rest of the first image is visible. I then copied it and desaturated the upper layer, set on multiply and lowered the opacity to 67. Then I added the center image of Punk with the mic. I duplicated it and set it on color. Added in my text and that was pretty much it. Obviously there are added effects, but I'll bore you to death with things like gradients, hue/saturation, color fills, lighting tricks, c4d, textures, etc. Simple stuff like that. I really like the dark approach it has and would love to hear what y'all think.

​

 

[Monkey_Mania]

Theo, I will clean your beard, give you rep, and love you forever if you would make me a schwiggty schag awesome sig of James Storm, with his famous saying...

"Sorry, About Your DAMN Luck!

Please and thank you.

Also didn't realize that this wasn't a request thread. So im just going to say that Theo is the best damn sig maker ever. His sigs are always flawless, and I love him very much.

 

[Pay Per Ghost]

This is a tricky one Theo.

I want a sig with that evolutionary pic of how apes evolved into man. However instead of apes I wanna timeline of Jericho pics from 99, 03, 06, 10, then the little kid from the videos, and finally the Jericho that debuted last night.

Possible?

 

[Liberty Prime]

Hi Theo, just went through this thread and just wanted to say I'm really impressed with some of your stuff. Would you ever consider doing some tutorials?

 

[Tequila Dave]

Your stuff looks great! I was wondering if you could make me a sig using these pictures:
http://0.tqn.com/d/prowrestling/1/0/...-ric-flair.jpg

http://cdn.sescoops.com/wp-content/u.../hogan-wtf.jpg

http://www.linkwhip.com/wp-content/u...c-Flair-09.jpg

http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images...jpg?1314787138

http://www3.pictures.zimbio.com/gi/R...Vf2h_ohoyl.jpg

And along the bottom have the words "Oh, How The Mighty Have Fallen"

I've asked a few people but no one has replied...Thank you!