Revive Skateboards, Design a Lifeline Competition - My Pizza Monkeys Entry Submission

Pizza Monkey, Revive Lifeline Deck by TET.

About a month ago Revive Skateboards launched their #DesignALifeline competition where entrants had to purchase a specific Lifeline template skateboard deck, draw their design on it, and then post a photo of their finished board to Instagram with the hashtag #designalifeline.

With only 200 template boards being made available, I liked those odds, and bought a deck within an hour of seeing the competition announcement video on the day it was posted. The deck cost me US$40.00 and about that again to have it mailed to Australia. It's the most expensive competition entry I've paid for to date.

The winner gets to have their design released as an official deck as part of Revive's Spring 2020 product release. As well they get three copies of their deck along with a sponsor pack (which typically consists of a number of decks, clothes, wheels etc. from Revive's range). Four runners up will get a sponsor package only.

If you're thinking you might like to enter, unfortunately all 200 decks have sold out. Surprisingly I've seen a few comments on Revive's Instagram (@reviveskateboards) saying people have bought the template board just because they like the board and have no intention of entering... my chance of winning has gone up.

At the time of writing this only 65 posts have been made to the hashtag #designalifeline on Instagram, and not all of them are final designs. There's a few 'just got my decks' and 'work in progress' posts. Entrants have until the 31st December 2019 to post their finished designs.

I planned to enter with almost no hesitation because it was a great opportunity to get Reddy the Color monkey (who began life as a skateboard monkey) released as a graphic on an official deck by a legitimate skateboard company. In essence his chance to turn 'pro'. My finished entry below, the Pizza Monkey, Revive Lifeline deck.

The finished Pizza Monkey Revive Lifeline Skateboard.

About My Lifeline Design

The way I see it, Revive Skateboards is all about family friendly fun. A lot of their decks are quirky, humorous, or an odd juxtaposition of ideas. They particularly favor vibrant color and pop culture themes, memes, and anything else that sells fun. They tend to do their more edgy, street graphics with their other company, 3 Block (although even that is leaning closer to being the same as Revive these days).

Since licensed themes was not really an option in this comp, and I always knew Reddy was going to be the focus of this deck, I needed to find things that would make Reddy relatable to Revive. Though he already had the fun side of things covered.

It occurred to me pizza was a recurring theme on Revive decks so I started exploring interesting ways to show Reddy with pizza. I drew quite a number of different ideas, then chose four to feature on the deck.

Joint owner of Revive Skateboards, Andy Shrock, has a thing for red shirts, shoes, and skateboards. It's the reason why I thought if Reddy had any chance of being on a legit company deck, this competition was it. He's red, Andy likes red, need I say more?

I thought a red background might be too much, but I figured Reddy would still stand out if I went with a darker red. So Reddy is bright red, while the background is more of a Stop sign red.

I left the lifeline logo white because it's generally white on a standard Lifeline deck, and it stands out here without overpowering the four Reddy's.

See my process from start to finish

If you would like a blow by blow of my thoughts through the design process from template to finished deck look through the Flickr Slideshow below. You'll see all my rough sketches and work in progress.

While some of the entries have been really good so far, I didn't spend US$80.00 if I didn't think I had a shot. I think I've captured what Revive is all about but art is subjective. They may want to go with something that's a complete departure to what they normally produce (risky but can be a great payoff if you discover something new that your existing market likes).

Good luck to everyone who entered this competition. I'll certainly let you know how I go after December 31 when the winners are announced.

In the meantime, if you have an Instagram account, head over to my entry post and give it a like, and especially leave a comment. It's not a popularity contest but it can't hurt if the judges see specific entries are getting a lot of social media love.

Update, 9th Dec 2019: Watch the video below where I talk about and show the completed deck, and you get to see a bit of my skateboarding too.

Comments

How to Transfer Any Line Art to Your Griptape - Easy Skateboard Griptape Art Tutorial

Dog Star Griptape Art by TET Griptape art is once again gaining popularity amongst modern skateboarders. For those of us who have tried to create our own griptape art, using paint pens, you'll know reproducing your design onto the grip, without making any mistakes is incredibly challenging. Mostly because you just have to go for it and draw the design freehand, with paint pens, directly onto the griptape. You can make the odd mistake here or there but if you get the proportions of the design completely wrong, it can be very difficult to fix. Often you just have to live with the mistake. To address the problem I've come up with an easy way anyone can transfer a line art design to their griptape, removing almost all the anxiety of getting the proportions wrong. In fact, you could do this with any line art design, even if you have no drawing skill at all. Watch the video below to see my technique in action and/or skip past the video where I highlight the basic steps to get your de...

James Gunn's Social Media Monkeys Joke Was a Highlight of His Superman Movie For Me

B efore James Gunn's Superman Movie was released there was a whole rumor going around that the movie would feature monkeys on computers trolling Superman's social media, sparking much outrage. #supersh*t. I didn't know this was even a thing until just prior to writing this article. I did a search to see if anyone had posted a clip of the monkeys scene from the movie and got pages of discourse featuring videos and articles prior to the film. Most of it from Gunn detractors (let's say) seeing it as some kind of childish swipe at them... well not them specifically but, you know, those other people who have every right to hate on anything sight unseen. Anyway, I'm not going to give even one such example a link or air because it's kind of sad watching someone devote so much commentary to a throw away gag that is absolutely a nod to James Gunn's Superman trolls. The whole reason this post exists, is to say I loved the joke, because fourteen years ago, and I...

Is AI Art 'Art'? The Say NO to AI Art Movement, and Why Human Artists Will Adapt

AI Art No T-Shirt by TET Also available on other items . Right now there is a big debate over not just whether AI art is 'art' but whether AI's are actually ripping off the work of actual human artists, without their consent, to create their images - particularly images 'in the style of' specific artists. From my own observations this debate started to get more traction when artist's signatures began appearing in the output of AI Art image generators. Is It Art? Cool Froyd the Cat Sketch by TET. My style is very much influenced by classic Disney and WB character styles. To get some clarity on how real human artists work (of which I am one)... we, that is all of us... take influences from the art that has come before. i.e. whatever artists we like, have studied, seen etc. we are influenced by. It shows up in our work, intentionally or not. If you really study my own cartoony art style you'll see I'm heavily influenced by early Disney and Warner Bros cart...

I'm Joining the Illuminati Brotherhood By Personal Invitation of Hiltom Rothschild... Wait, What?

How special am I to have finally come of age (53 years young) and am now eligible to participate in building the world alongside other members of the Illuminati Brotherhood... Yes I've received the call by way of an email, which I'm sure is real because I had to translate it from the Dutch language and it was personally written by Hiltom Rothschild, one of the non-existent members of the Rothschild family (or perhaps deep undercover because Google has never heard of them?). A Transcript of the email below: To: etourist From: Illuminati Brotherhood Subject: Illuminati Broederschap (Illuminati Brotherhood) I am Hiltom Rothschild, a member of the Rothschild family, one of the 13 families of the Illuminati brotherhood. I'm here to let you know that you've come of age and are eligible to participate in building the 🌎 world. It is a calling and a privilege to honor him with pride and gratitude as not everyone will ever be chosen by the LIGHT, many are called but few are ch...

The Worst Book I Have Ever Read - Gulp: Travels Around the Gut by Mary Roach

TET and Mary Roach's Book, Gulp . I 'm the kind of person who only reads one physical book at a time. For context I consider a 'book' to be anything over 100 pages of mostly text. Basically your typical work of fiction novel or factual biography. It's not that I can't read more than one book at a time, I just choose not to because I don't set a lot of time aside for reading. Maybe 30 minutes a day when I'm on a good run with a really engaging text. Little did I know that Mary Roach's Gulp: Travels Around the Gut *, a book of 317 pages (minus the Acknowledgments and Bibliography) would become a bottle neck for my reading for the next three and a half years. As such, I'm calling it the worst book I have ever read. Despite how long it took me to read, it is not a bad book in the slightest, and is in fact, quite light, somewhat entertaining, reading for a book that explores the science, and the resilience of the human digestive system. I'm no st...

Skateboarders Who Ever Dreamed of Dropping In on a City Building - Sandro Dias Just Lived Your Dream

Dias's drop-in from one of the lower platforms for practice. Image: © Marcelo Maragni/Red Bull I f you're a skateboarder living in a city you've probably looked at a building that has skate ramp vibes and imagined dropping in on it... well Professional Skateboarder, Sandro Dias didn't just imagine. The Perth Telstra Building as depicted in this fantasy poster print, Forbidden Skate Ramp by Harry Young. If you lived in Perth, Western Australia, any skateboarder who saw the top of the Telstra Building likely had the same thought about the ramp like quarter pipe at the top. Also, back in the day there was a classic skateboarding poster going the rounds that depicted Sydney as a literal skatepark with ramps built up, down, and over numerous buildings. Sandro Dias, who broke the record for the world's tallest drop-in on the 26th September 2025 by dropping in on a mega ramp built on the side of the curved façade of the 22-storey Centro Administrativo Fernando Ferrari (C...

Roary the Racing Car is Evil

Well okay maybe the lovable little red racing car, that has his own TV show, Roary the Racing Car , isn't evil but I do suspect he's into brain washing. Subliminally teaching everyone his life lessons. How else do you explain a fully grown adult, namely me, waking up in the morning from a dream about Roary? Before your mind begins to wander, it's nothing even remotely perverse (or maybe it is, depending on how you look at things), my dream was simply playing out like a typical episode of Roary the Racing Car. Perhaps we should back up a bit. In your best 'Big Chris' voice say "Come on Roary!" This all starts because I do my daily work out routine watching Judge Judy . Exercise is as boring as hell (oh dear, coarse language) so I watch TV whilst I go through my routine. At 3pm the most intelligent show on the box is, you guessed it, Judge Judy. Her show is only 30 minutes long and my routine is an hour so at 3:30pm I need something else to watch. Channel fl...

TET.Life (The Extraordinary Tourist Life)

Search This Blog