Adobe Creative Suite Contest Entry: Rain On Me

Here's my entry for the Adobe Creative Cloud "Rain On Me" Poster Design Contest—and it looks like I arrived just in time, too! I used Adobe Illustrator to create the line art of the portraits of Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande and Adobe Photoshop to do... pretty much everything else.

Ever since her debut, Lady Gaga has been an artist that's consistently managed to resonate with me (not to mention with her millions of other fans as well). Back in 2008, "The Fame" was a way for my awkward teenage self to take pride in his identity and "The Fame Monster" helped me tackle the adolescent demons that existed both in and outside of me. "Born This Way" was an expansion and reaffirmation of the pride Gaga's first album had inspired in so many, "Artpop" proved we could be—or mean—anything, and "Joanne" was a compelling reminder to the country music scene of what good country music can (and should) sound like. Now, in the year 2020 where it seems nothing's going right and so many are barraged by the seemingly never-ending cycle of bad news, Lady Gaga offered us "Chromatica"—I am certainly not the first to say that it's been exactly the kind of GOOD news we've all so desperately craved since this year began. Calling it an album doesn't even begin to do it justice: it's an entire experience, with the music, the lyrics, and the visuals all culminating into a final product that's truly captivating and, honestly, moving. So, when I saw this challenge to create a poster inspired by the imagery of the "Rain On Me" music video, I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to pay tribute to the sunshine the sixth album Chromatica has shone on me so far this year. Thank you, Lady Gaga, for showing us all that even the darkest storms and heaviest rains can produce beauty of their own.