Rencontre avec l'artiste Gregory Manchess
Créateur des patchs Crew 1, Crew 2 et futur Crew 3
Who are you ? What is you job ? And why did you choose it ?
I'm a freelance illustrator and have been working in the arts for 40+ years.
Born and raised in Kentucky and have traveled all over the United States for work and to give lectures at art schools and universities.
I've drawing and painting since I was child and am largely self-taught (you can find more about my career at manchess.com).
How long has your interest in space been ?
I was little when John F. Kennedy annouced that he wanted us to try to get to the Moon.
I've watched with enthousiasm ever since.
Space travem has always intigued me, wether it was Flash Gordon or Neil Armstrong. T watched the Apollo 11 mission and had assumed we would build a moon base and continue working in space kerp up whit it.
How did you end up doing the Crew Dragon missions logos patchs ?
I'm a science-fiction reader and also paint imagery of that genre.
I was at a science-fiction convention in Helsinski and I met the astronaut Kjell Lindgrend there. We spoke at lenght about space and art, and my book Above the Timberline. (a 'widescreen novel') Kjell is a science fiction fan, too, so we got along quite well.
I saw him again another convention and kidded him about going with him the next time he goes into space. I said << you can add a lawn chair for me, in the hack, and I won't make trouble >>. He asked how good I was with a robotic arm. I said << Man, I can handle a brush. How hard can it be ? >>. After stopped laughing I asked him who was designating his mission patch. He asked if I'd like to give it a shot, and so I eventually got to do the patch for the Dragon Crew 1. After that one was successful, Aki Hoshide of Crew 2 asked if I would design their patch . I couldn't resist.
Do you work with the crew first and then you draw ? or you propose them a design before and you retouch it afterwards ?
For these patchs, we had a couple of Skype calls ans talked about what kind of image elements they might be interersted in. Then I did loose sketches to show them, and they had the though job of deciding which one ?
We all picked several, and I refined those sketches. Then the job got thougher as they had to come down to one patch. With that decision made, I refined the final fesign into the patches that you see for yhe Crews.
How have you worked of them (design, colors, etc...) and more expecially on Crew 2 (with Thomas Pesquet) ?
I studied a lot of other designs and let them inspire me as to how a patch should look. Then I sketched freely, working with shapes and thinking about space themes, ideas, and equipment, like the capsule and the space station. The dragon was a nice feature to work with. I was happy that SpaceX name it that way as it gave me somrthing really fun and visual to work with !
I wanted Crew 2's patch to be similar, but different. So we went with many ideas for dragon colors, but because we want it to stand out on their blue flight suits, we chose orane.
I worked with Aki very closely and he shared the designs with the rest of the crew as we went along, to get their thoughts.
Would you like to go into space and why ? What would you mission patch look like ?
I would adore going into space, especially to the Moon, if only I could.
You see, I get terribly motion sick and I wouldn't be any fun for my crew !
I'd always wanted to be the first artiston the Moon, but I soppose that dream will have to stay that way. I would imagine my patch would want to have a lot of color, show some sort of ship, with the Moon in the background. I'd like it to have lots of depth, to feel 3-dimensional.
Because of working with the crews, they felted I needed a NASA call sdign like all of them have. They started out calling me, ''Patches'', but soon settle on ''Zero-G'' ! Hah !
Gregory Manchess a aussi créé le patch pour la mission Crew 3 (qui doit partir en octobre prochain). Voici le dessin final (crédit ; Gregory Manchess)
Crédit : Cpllection Stéphane Sebile / Spacemen1969
Space Quotes - Souvenirs d'espace
Gregory Manchess
Un très énorme remerciement à Gregory Manchess
