What you need to know
- Apple has highlighted the work of Eric 'Efdot' Friedensohn.
- He's an artist reimagining baseball cards using the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil.
Apple has highlighted the work of a New York artist reimagining baseball cards using an iPad Pro and the Apple Pencil.
From the feature:
In his Brooklyn studio, artist Eric "Efdot" Friedensohn sets up his tools for his next project. It calls for a little bit of nostalgia, mixed with his signature bold and graphic art style. He sits down at his desk, picks up his iPad Pro and Apple Pencil, and gets to work. "iPad Pro is very intuitive," says Efdot. "And together with Apple Pencil, it's like an extension of my hand and my brain." His canvas today is a baseball card. While it might seem like an unexpected place to find modern art, there's a renaissance under way for these collectables, thanks in part to visual storytellers who are transforming sports memorabilia into pocket-sized masterpieces.
Efdot works for Topps, the official trading card company of MLB on Project 2020:
It was a limited edition release of 20 baseball cards illustrated by 20 different artists that attracted not just collectors and sports enthusiasts, but art and culture lovers too. It's part of the reason that topps.com saw an astounding 250 percent increase in sales from 2019 to 2020.
This year Project 70 is an expansion of that with more artists reinterpreting cards from the last 70 years that are only available to purchase for 70 hours once released. The report describes how Efdot uses the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil to bring his vision to life:
"If I do a piece of lettering that says the team name or the player's name and I really like it — maybe there's some cool drips or accidental textures that happen — I will snap a photo of that with my iPad," says Efdot. "That part of the sketch goes right on the card." Once he moves over to his iPad Pro, Efdot uses Apple Pencil to illustrate each card in the Procreate app. "I think the digital tools help me work faster and help me work in layers so I can easily combine ideas," says Efdot.
You can see more stunning designs and read the full report here.
