Long before music and design (and almost everything else), there was ... baseball.

In the eighties it was our hometown pride and joy - The Bend Bucks - who would later become the Portland Rockies. The Bucks were a single A farm club for the (now) Anaheim Angels. We'd love to hit the games with Dad and grab autographs from the retired major leaguers who were acting coaches for the team. $5 tickets and cheap popcorn didn't hurt either.

Between Bucks games, the best movie ever created, our own little league games (where I told all my teammates that I was related to this guy), watching the Braves (lose) every waking moment on TBS and our unhealthy addiction to baseball cards (wish we still had this), there was time for little else. In 1989, our family moved to Sacramento and our love of the game got even stronger - thanks to the Giants and these guys across the bay. RIP Candlestick Park.

Fast forward 25 years later. After visiting the beautiful new Ebbets Field Flannels storefront in Seattle a few months back, we came up with a crazy idea to fuse a few of our old passions into one: Baseball, art and ... people. People who are making really cool things in the world of baseball - and beyond. We even commissioned our Humble Beast bros in Portland to create some knickerbocker-era music to bring it all together. After coming up with a dream team list (and it was hard to stop at 6), we had our roster.

Enter: Invisible Creature Farm League.

We've partnered with Ebbets Field Flannels from Seattle, Mitchell Bat Co. from Nashville, Leather Head Sports from New Jersey, Oxford Pennant from New York, Curtis Clark Woodworks (or, Dad) from California and the uber-talented and undisputed aesthetic king of baseball himself, Jon Contino from New York to bring you IC inspired game gear for your closet, wall, shelf, desk ... and even the field.

Have a look around our rookie season and click some stuff. A HUGE thanks to all of our collaborators for an amazing experience. We hope you enjoy ...

It's been busy here at IC, to say the least, and we haven't been updating the blog as often as we'd like. To make up for lost time, here are a handful of new albums we've been working on over the past 6 months. Enjoy.

WovenWar I've been friends with these guys ever since we toured together in 2010, but never had the chance to work with them on a design level. I couldn't be more pleased with how smoothly everything went. We knew we wanted a cover image that centered around an icon, and the WW mark is something that came to mind instantly after our first conversation. As always, I loved working in simple black and white. Each image is comprised of abstract painted shapes to convey a ink-blot/rorschach vibe. Pre-order the physical package here.

Tedashii Below Paradise Taking a page from the late, great Storm Thorgerson book of "doing it for real," we ventured out into the high desert of Southern California in early 2014 to create this album cover. Caleb Kuhl did a killer job on the photos, Neil Visel was particularly handy with the forklift, and I put too much lighter fluid on the car and we had to call the fire department. Apparently they saw the smoke from a neighboring county. Oops. Grab the physical album here.

Propaganda Crimson Cord Our pal Prop gave us free reign on his (amazing) new album - we wanted the packaging concept to feel as organic and layered as his music. What may look like paint drips and splatters are (mostly) images of his iconic dreadlocks. Our goal was to blend his soul into the art as much as possible - which was inspired by the album title and album concept. Grab the physical album here.

Memphis May Fire Unconditional The guys in MMF came to me with this concept, which I thought was great - that of the bond between father and child. Since my dad happened to be coming to town around this time, I thought it would be a great opportunity to photograph his arm for this cover... and I was able to talk one of my brother's children into giving us a "hand" as well. Grab the physical album here.

The Atlas Moth The Old Believer I’ve always enjoyed creating imagery that is “more than meets the eye.” I also love concepts that allow for some real hands-on interaction. Ideas like this have kept music packaging exciting for me through the years. When The Atlas Moth came to me with a concept that would change the cover image when wet, I thought there was no way we'd get the necessary approval to make it happen. Thanks to the folks at Profound Lore, who, in rare fashion, believe in going the extra mile in the name of artistic endeavor, this amazing idea is something you can now hold (and drench) for yourself. Above are both "before" and "after" versions of the cover. Grab the physical album here.

Lecrae Anomaly One of our favorite clients, Lecrae (and his label - Reach Records), asked us to work on the follow-up to his last album Gravity, which we had the pleasure of working on in 2012. We enlisted the help of our friends at Shinbone Creative to create Crae's likeness in 3D wireframe (spot gloss varnish!) form for the cover. The physical packaging will def. be worth checking out. Pre-order that here.

Killer Be Killed Working with an entire band of metal visionaries isn't something I get to do every day. Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. The aesthetic that we really bonded over, and seemed fitting for this project, was that of crusty, gritty, photocopied punk. The real fringe - Discharge, Man Is The Bastard, Doom, Crass, etc. It was a blast getting to work in a style that I love, for awesome guys that totally get it. Grab the physical album here.

Grieves Winter & The Wolves Another album cover that's more than meets the eye. We worked with Grieves to create something really special for 2011's Together/Apart, and we knew we wanted to do something amazing for this record as well. The actual cover (top image here) features a die cut hole right in the center, where a standing Grieves shows through. When the cover is opened, we see that he's surrounded by wolves. Careful out there, buddy. Grab the physical album here.

Insense De:Evolution I had the pleasure of touring with these guys in Europe during the spring of 2012. We spoke a bit on the road about working together for the artwork on their new record, and I'm stoked that we were able to make it happen. Not to worry - no babies were harmed in the making of this cover. Grab the physical album here.

Over the years, Number One Gun has been a source of creative exploration for us. They've always been great at essentially giving us free-reign, which has allowed us the room to create some work that we're really proud of (thanks, Jeff). For this, their newest digital-only release, This Is All We Know, we created a scene made to look like a page cut from a special Twilight Zone Edition of a 1960s Life Magazine. We started with a pre-printed image and added a mysterious mirrored box, nestled into the setting.

Here's a look at the album cover we created with long-time friend Aaron Sprinkle, for his newest release, Water & Guns. The Album itself is phenomenal, and Aaron, as usual, gave us his unyielding trust to create something with no boundaries but our own imagination. Water & Guns speaks of (among many other things) Aaron's recent move across the country, and his long journey to complete this record. Our idea was to represent two polarizing landscapes using abstract shapes. In this case, all pre-printed materials from vintage magazines. Buy this record.

Here's our album cover for the one, the only Andy Mineo. Heroes For Sale arrives on April 16th. To be continued...

Here's our cover for Lecrae's much-anticipated new album Gravity. We've been fans of what Reach Records has been doing for years  - so we're pretty excited to be part of this record. And Church Clothes has been on repeat in the studio since it dropped.

Check out the cover we just wrapped up for Sold State newcomers The Overseer.

Check out your local newsstands now for the new issue of Revolver Magazine, featuring Zakk Wylde. We did the photo-illustration work for the cover and the feature, which meant many hours of cutting out little demon people to create the elaborate scenes. The cover image itself pays homage to recently deceased Frank Frazetta's classic artwork.

Check out our new post over at Headbangers Blog, in which we explain the process of creating imagery for the April, 2009 issue of Revolver magazine, featuring metal heavyweights Lamb Of God. Feel the wrath!

Here is a cover that we did for a documentary about The Doors, titled "When You're Strange." Unfortunately this cover was rejected when it turned out that the band just "wanted a band photo" instead. We thought we'd show it to you anyway, as we're rather fond of it.

Here's the cover for Demon Hunter's new "Live In Nashville" record. For this album cover we wanted to execute our "demon skull" logo (which graces every DH cover) in a new and unique way. If you focus on the black negative space, you'll see it. Album available January 27th!

Just finishing up the artwork for new Solid State band, The Ascendicate. This is actually a band that I sought out and recently helped sign to the label. I'm very excited for the release of this record. The above image is the final cover (sans sticker, which displays the band name, album title).

Here's a glimpse at some imagery that we're working on for the new record by Becoming The Archetype, titled "Dichotomy." The theme of the album is loosely based on C.S. Lewis' "The Hideous Strength," wherein Lewis writes of the dichotomy between man and machine. Brutal! Oh, and the album slays. Buy it November 25th!

Here is our cover for Unconsecrated, the new album from Australia's The Red Shore.

Sleevage has posted a feature on our work for Joy Electric's album, "My Grandfather, The Cubist." You can read an in-depth explanation of the process and view initial concepts for this project here.

A friend just sent me this picture of a Norma Jean fan that decided to get a portion of the artwork we created for the band's "O' God, The Aftermath" record tattooed on their side. I'm not sure who did the tattoo, but it looks like pretty nice work. And the ribs are no joke (just recently had mine done), so kudos to this dude for withstanding such a large piece.

Stunning Adobe Photography Shop work by Jaap Vliegenthart.