My close friend from high school and I starting to learn how to ski and snowboard together. After he decided he was going to snowboard every winter season, he commissioned me to make a custom snowboard design.
He is a huge fan of both Star Wars and The Legend of Zelda, so his only request was to make some sort of mashup of both with some Japanese motifs. Given that I'm a huge Zelda fan, a budding Star Wars fan, and a Japanophile, I was teeming with ideas.
First Draft
My friend loves The Great Wave Off Kanagawa and has that print in many forms around his house. My first ideas revolved around incorporating that into the design.
There's a Zelda game that takes place on islands in a great ocean, so this was the first idea:
My friend liked the idea but he really wanted the style to be more based on one of the more recent Zelda games at the time, Skyward Sword. The art style in that game is inspired by impressionistic paintings, and he wanted a similar aesthetic to be used on his board for both the Zelda and Star Wars motifs.
Design iterations
Skyward Sword has no oceans, and Stars Wars has few, so I threw out the waves in favor for Mt. Fuji. I decided a more action-packed scene of Link fighting Tie Fighters was more appropriate.
Below is the progression of designs before reaching the final design.
"In a galaxy, far far away..." The border reads the intro paragraph to Star Wars in Japanese, and the extra Japanese by Link in the center says "My name is Link" because my friend's name is Link.
My friend wanted more pink to contrast the blue, and suggested incorporating some cherry blossoms.
Final Design
After replacing the border with cherry blossoms, we found our winner.
