Obviously when you think about a show like the Expanse you think about the
sets and the props and the costumes but one aspect that you might not consider
in your head that's super super important is the graphic design: the
labels on the walls, on the floors and on the clothes and that is the job of Kim
Sison here. Kim, you're first assistant graphic designer. Yes I am. I've been
working on the Expanse since season two. Tell me about what your job is like?
You're sitting and coming up with graphical information, labels
stickers, posters ... So I'm the graphic designer for the Expanse. I basically do
all the graphics that you see on sets, on any props so these would be more obvious
things or you would see like branding and stuff. But we also do the chevrons
on the floors and all the splashes of color that's vinyl is ours. Numbers,
space numbers -- lots of space number. Warning labels ... A lot of warning labels.
I've become pretty much the go-to person for mechanical labels because I've just
done thousands at this point and I just I love looking at them now.
It's something you don't usually notice. There's a visual iconography to it that's
very specific. Yeah, and it just adds to it, adds to the texture. Yeah, that's
what I do. Well so I want to talk about this because so here is a backpack from
season three am i right i season two season two and like when we when we
think about something like this people may see this as a prop ago oh yeah that
looks like a kid's prop from some show right but you've got a design so it's
funny cuz like I read the book the first book before I started and this there's
this whole beautiful like segment in the book where they talk about misko and
Mariska but it was never in the first season right and I was really glad that
they like added it in a prop as a nod to the book series right yeah so I
basically took what was described in the books as two comic character
yeah - it's a children's TV show that exists in the universe that Holden and
Miller were both reminiscing about while they were in eros and they were like
singing the theme song and they're like oh and and like do you remember when
they're always like being chased by this guy with a pink hat and all that so yeah
I just had I mean that's the thing is it feels like it carries with it a history
of a thing that really existed and that's not trivial to give it that was
there was their source material you took inspiration from like the Teletubbies or
I just really like looking at lowbrow art as far as I was really really big
into vinyl toys like in the early 2000s so this was all I drew which was really
funny because when it came up as a project I was just like code like this
is I have been training all my life for this right in your department if you're
super enthusiastic about a specific design they're just gonna give it to you
pretty much that I usually like the little drawing ones and there's usually
about four or five people in the department and each person has something
that they specialize in but yeah like I do the little little illustrations like
this eventually you'll use everything you ever lived right exactly also I want
to talk about this this incredible intergalactic waffles takeout container
now just in when you encounter a real takeout container from some branded
company in the real world it's the result of hundreds of hours of meetings
and decisions and efficiencies and industrial design and then you have to
do all that yourself in like a few hours like I think I only had maybe two days
to do this or something crazy this is amazing from incredible it feels like
I'm looking at a real thing we we had some
like source material there was just these like really beautiful packaging
like Asian packaging that was just like from Google like we were just googling
like all these really interesting packaging and they just kind of created
this thing out of it but it's not even real cardboard because
we wouldn't they could have print on cardboard so I had to like get a
cardboard texture and print it on vinyl yeah so this is whole like this is all
vinyl on cardstock got printed and then like it was really funny it's just like
getting a prototype done out of paper and like making sure everything worked
in the color matching was great like okay because all I really was given were
these takeout boxes okay the two takeout boxes and these like ice cream
containers and you came up with a formula and the cutlery in gyms like put
them all together I love the cutlery sitting in this is
brilliant and this is what any companies should actually do this is smart design
thank you that is fantastic okay now a tie Frank just gave me
something that I think is partially your work is the savage industries jumpsuit
this is you this is me so yeah you know how much I love Futura Extra Bold is a
great it's very Universal and I think it will
carry on hundreds of years from now I've talked to me about this gorilla talked
to me okay so the gorilla is actually originally was a stock image because we
only we only have like a day usually to do these things and it's tricks of the
trade so I got this like full-size gorilla image and then just like
manipulated it to get just this head and like it had to be the perfect shape to
go with it with the logo and then it turned into that and like when I first
got it I was really really excited because I was a huge fan of Mythbusters
it's really bizarre it's like going a full circle isn't it yep you're gonna
find that regularly with life no well tell me about these other logos these
are also all other logos that were created I think
these were created by me yeah I'm pretty I've done so many
mission patches on the show yeah it's so for every single mission pets you have
to again tell a story about that mission so it can't feel like every other
mission path yeah exactly and we just looked at a lot of mission patch
references online and like even just looking at sci-fi like other mission
patches from sci-fi shows as well just to kind of get that blend of both yeah
I'm curious about your process do you start out with a paper and pencil doing
rough drafts or do you sometimes sometimes I do usually it's just mucking
around with with illustrator just moving things around until some it feels right
our working files are just it's an absolute disaster it's all these like
shapes and like trying to like cut champers out of things because
everything is on an angle okay right um yeah and then you just kind of keep
going until you see a shape that works and then color scheme that works when I
was I was working in the model shop at the Industrial Light and Magic I did a
lot of laser cutting and as such I drew a lot of weird shapes and whenever I
drew a particularly complex one I would actually store it in a separate file
that just was like the repository of all weird shapes you must have photos like
that yeah I do I also have a big file of just like reference images like going
back to mechanical stickers yeah I have like a library of mechanical stickers
that I just go back to every time for reference just for inspiration just for
inspiration yeah yeah and as far as like for things
like where I'm actually illustrating something like the intergalactic waffles
and even the scone risco it would be like an iPod iPad sketch with a
periscope with a pen okay um because that's where it's going now yeah like
paper and pencil or another thing I smell of them I still try to draw on
those notes though I do draw on a lot of post-it notes you save them
I do sometimes yeah yeah I still have I think I I still must have something
from the original mr. Moresco somewhere is there a design in season four that
you are particularly ecstatic about well aside from the intergalactic waffles is
pretty Amanda with us my favorite I think that I've done for season 4 is the
Tainan the time so I did all the graphics for the Tyne in the China
airlock and it was just so cool like it just felt like you are in space and
you're in the future and like everything's so gritty and it all fell
into place for you oh yeah I was a huge sci-fi nerd growing
up and it's really funny like this is like a perfect job oh yeah totally
totally the perfect job for me because it's like again this coming full circle
from like now I'm making Kenan right you're the person that's I'm gonna go to
to ask about and I used to go to like I mean I still go to comic-con so I still
get excited about cosplay and everything and now there's like people that are
cosplaying stuff that I've done and like replicating graphics that we've done and
it's just really cool that's the best channel thank you so much for giving me
an eps into your world yeah