Every hero has an origin, a story of how they became the legends they are today. We teamed up with History Channel to create a universe that explores how the talent from their top shows came to be. Our story focuses on 6 of the tentpole franchises; Ice Road Truckers, Counting Cars, Swamp People, Forged in Fire, Mountain Men and American Pickers.  Legends tell of an ancient belt buckle handed down from generation to generation. We get to witness our hero’s receiving their buckles after traveling through extreme conditions to meet face to face with the original Elders. Our heroes are among the bravest and most skilled humans on earth uniting together on History.

Together with History we examined several different illustrative styles ranging from Ralph Bakshi all the way to Saul Bass and everything in between. We eventually settled on the iconic and bold Action Comics look from the late 1930s. The use of bold colored simple backgrounds was the perfect balance to letting our characters shine as the heroes they are.

We then embarked on designing and illustrating all of our heroes characters, as well as the elders they sought out. We had to strike the balance of honoring the stylistic inspiration while keeping a close likeness to their real life counterparts. We we’re able to push the boundaries a bit more on the elders. We thought long and hard about what the original Ice Road Truckers or Forged in Fire smiths would look like. We took cues from the shows they inhabit to inspire their design and the thrones they sit upon.

Each of our heroes offers a different skill set to the team. We wanted to visually represent this by giving each H belt buckle a unique aura. David Baker is a master smith and controls fire like no other. Tom from Mountain Men lives amongst the elements and is a master of lightning while Alex from Ice Road Truckers can survive in the coldest extreme temperatures.

Much like our awesome team of heroes, when we bring everything together magic happens. Here are some of our finished design frames from the spot. Our ultimate aim with this launch is to create a rich and detailed universe that can be expanded upon in the future. We give a slight glimpse into each of our heroes worlds that begs for further exploration. So stay tuned for more adventures team History!

Before we settled on the final direction we did quite an extensive design exploration in another direction. Ultimately we ended up changing the direction but wanted to share where we began on this fun journey.