Well, it's been a while. I started fiddling around with Golden Sections the other day, and but together a label (front and back/side) for the Double IPA we brewed 3 months ago and will be bottling in the next week or so. (Stronger the beer the longer it takes.) Hope you like:

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...unnerIIPA2.jpg

And, as long as I am in here, here are a couple of others:

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...riochAmber.jpg http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...70sAlecopy.jpg

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...fectPorter.jpg http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...5/Beer/665.jpg

A word about the last two: I would have used the Divine Wind label on the last one, but we finished the 12 hour brewing day it took to make it on June 6, 2005, and this was too perfect. I did the drawing in sharpie and scanned it. As for Pyaray's Perfect Porter, that was made of leftovers. We had (no joke) 17 different grains in it and two different hops from 5 or 6 different packages.

I have been thinking about giving home brewing a shot, as it really seems like a good hobby to get the creative juices flowing. Labeling, however, I had not thought about until I stumbled across this thread in a search about homebrew. I had no idea that you could brew the variety of beers that you've done, it's quite a collection!

So I got a great deal on a pound of Crystal Hop Pellets ($5. Cannot beat that with a stick. That's like 80% off.) guaranteed fresh (guy setting up new store, ordered ounces, got pounds.) So, I figured, let's get ludicrous. Let's get Snakes on a Motherfarkin' Plane ludicrous...

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...dofHopsIPA.jpg

Oh my, Tophat...I'd never seen this thread before but I'm glad I found it! My SO and I are looking at getting into homebrewing as a hobby. I hadn't thought much about putting labels on our product as we've got to HAVE a product first, but this looks like something I can really get into, especially if we're brewing something I'm not really interested in (ie a porter--I'll drink it, but it's not my favorite...however, I would be very interested in brewing an IPA or a cream ale or a wit).

And that last label...Hilarious. A whole pound of hops sounds insane but delicious. Sounds like a recipe I would enjoy.

Brewed an 8 1/2 gallon batch of Bock last weekend, but don't have anywhere to hold the temp below 50 for lager yeast, so we used a nice, clean ale yeast. So this technically isn't a bock, but something else.

http://photos-a.ak.facebook.com/phot...72460_5803.jpg

Can't believe that I never saw this thread before. These rock! Very nice work for sure.

TopHat, I hadn't checked this out before but now I'm laughing so hard that I'm sorry I hadn't dropped in earlier. Honestly, I like most of your earlier labels better (except for the Sam Jackson, which killed me). They were less overwhelmed with text and things, and quite simple but playful. I frequently pick beers to try based solely on label and name, just to expand my horizons and have found multiple that I would never have tried just based on the description. I've always wanted to come across the Two-Headed Turtle Stout... the mascot of the Order of Procrastinators (or some such similarly named fictitional organization). Nice, slow pour that's worth waiting for and takes time to enjoy.

Cool! Thanks much.

I see what you mean. The labels are starting to get cluttered. I need to try to keep that in mind. Maybe save the wit for the neck label.

Now, Will and I brew an excellent doppelbock, along the lines of Salvator, that we talked about for 4 or 5 years before we got around to brewing it. Since Doppelbocks traditionally end in "-ator", that became Procrastinator, with part of the batch split out and repitched with different yeast and named Prevaricator. (And let's keep the politics out of it. It was going to be Clinton, but by the time we got around to brewing it there was a different president.)

I'm thinking that idea of the two-headed turtle in a pushmi-pullyew sort of mode would be an excellent label theme for Procrastinator 2 (with the tag line , "We'll come up with a more original name later.")

In any case, the labels:
http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...castinator.jpg

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...Doppelbock.jpg

***Bump***

Now that I'm in my new house and will have enough room to homebrew, I thought I'd revive this topic to see what Tophat & Gamma Hooch have been up to in the past months.

Tophat???

Well, my brewing buddy is awaiting his second child, I am distracted by Martial Arts and Aquaria, and we've let brewing slide for a while. Recently had our combined B-Day/Homebrew appreciation party. Whole Pound of Hops was one of the offerings. The other three were another incarnation of the Purple Peril and these two...

right on!!!!



Top is playin' again..........can't wait to see more man.

Good to be back, Fly. My cockles are definitely warmed.

I'm so happy this thread was revived and I found it again. I've got a buddy who has recently gotten into homebrewing within the last 3-4 months and I was telling him about a forum thread of homebrew labels that I thought were just awesome. The problem was that I couldn't remember where I had seen the thread and I had really wanted to show him the labels. Now I can! Sweet!

Keep posting the labels, they are great inspiration. I'm going to try to talk him into us doing some and actually bottling the beer with labels. Right now, they just put it in plain brown bottles and I think it goes away too fast for the label portion to be appreciated by many people, but hey.. maybe this will inspire them! :)

Thanks again for the updates to your amazing collection of labels.

***BumP***

Okay... THIS time I'm serious. I'll be hooking up with a local homebrewing club on Friday and picking their brains about what to buy and how to start. I have been wanting to get this started for a long time, and I'm finally pulling the trigger. I should have some good homebrew on tap in my garage by Christmas.

Oh, and label art too...

You better get hopping then. Pardon the pun. But by the time you get everything, brew, ferment and age it a bit you are going to be pushing that Christmas goal.

One thing about it though, there should be someone in the homebrew club you are hooking up with that can recommend something that may be done by that time.

Is anyone else not seeing the images?

I see very few of them. This is an old thread. The Internet ate most of them by now.

So I headed over to a local place called The Brew Hut and their 'tasting room' called The Dry Dock. Great bunch of guys there, and they are all homebrewers who were ready to help out a noob. So far I have picked up The Joy of Homebrewing, and will be reading that to get up to speed on all the lingo and processes.

The goal of a Christmas brew is rather lofty, I'd have to be boiling today for that, and I'm just not ready yet. I'll be starting with a boxed beer extract kit and work my way up from there, but that probably won't be for 2 weeks or so.

I'll keep y'all posted, and I may post a new topic with my own labels here shortly.

I don't know if you've seen the other home brew thread here. http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=18460 It is another older one. But there are some recipes and links to recipe sites in it.

OK, I purchased all the equipment, and a boxed beer kit for Irish Stout. I'll be doing the boil today and putting it in the fermenter. I have a label ready, but its on my work computer, I'll post it later.

Frementation is just about done, probably will wait a few more days, I have Wednesday off, I'll be bottling then. I might be able to have some good carbonation by new years eve.

Make sure you are using a hydrometer to gauge if fermentation is done and not airlock activity. And even if you bottled today, while it may be carbed by New Years, the beer IMHO won't be as good as if you let it bottle condition a bit.

I know it's hard to not rush things and stay out of that first batch, but it is worth it.

Yeah, I have a hydrometer, came with the kit. Is there some sort of adjustment for altitude when taking readings? As of 2 days ago, there was about a minute between air bubbles coming off the top, so I know I'm close.

It will be hard to wait, but I know it will be better the longer it sits in the bottle.

There is a correction factor for your hydrometer reading based on temperature. When you first put your wort in the fermenter, you should have taken a gravity reading to find your starting gravity and then you use that against your final gravity to find your alcohol content. http://www.homebrewzone.com/hydrometer.htm

Another reason to use a hydrometer is make sure fermentation is done is to avoid "bottle bombs".

And I'm back.... I've linked in some of the images that went away, and I'll see what I can do about linking in some more later. For now, though, it's past pumpkin time, so here are a couple lables for brews I want to do at some point:
http://photos-c.ak.facebook.com/phot...172478_989.jpg

This next one is an example of the utility of doodling in meetings. I got the main image marking time in a staff meeting, and brought the idea home to flesh out (I also have some lovely drawings of ties with albatrosses on them from other meetings.)
http://photos-a.ak.facebook.com/phot...39240_6968.jpg

This is a great thread!

Pffftttt! You should taste the brew.

I finally bottled 2 days ago, here is my first stab at a label. My initials are J.P. so that's where that comes from. I haven't decided on what exactly to call my "brewery" yet, so I'll add that later.

http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/8...utlabelqt0.jpg

Nice. I like the use of gradient and the stroke around Ireland. Really makes it pop out.

BTW Tophat, I didn't mean to hijack the topic. It just seems to be the only active Homebrew topic on the TFP.

I see you want to do a Milk Stout? Sounds good. I drank a milk stout for the first time the day I bought all my homebrew equipment. (They have a microbrewery and tasting room called the Dry Dock Brewery) That stuff is really good, and I had never heard of it until that day.

Milk stout, cream stout, lactose stout, and sweet stout are all the same. Will and I did a sweet cherry stout once, with sweet black cherries in a cream stout base. They can be really good. I am a big fan of Mackesons, but that is sweetened with Sucrose and pastuerized, so you can only force carbonate it.

For shits and giggles, Here's the 2007 incarnations of the Purple Peril and the Up All Night Stout. (I used Shannon Wheeler's art straight out - hope he's OK with that).

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...ePeril2007.jpghttp://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y24...Stout2007a.jpg

I suppose this was already asked and answered earlier in the topic, but I'm lazy. Do you have an all-grain setup, or do you only go from extracts? If you have some good extract recipes (which is all I'm able to do right now) please point me in the right direction.

I currently have another boxed kit for a German Altbier, which is going to be next for me. But I'd live to follow a good extract recipe for a Strong Ale.

OK... after reading this thread, I am very interested in making some home brew. I wonder if I can get what I need to do this here.

If you can get UPS, FedEX or the like and the things you are having shipped are legal, then sure. I'd assume you are living in an apartment there so you would likely want to stick with extract brewing, but that still makes good beer.

Google is your friend: http://www.homebrew.com.sg/home.htm

I've been doing all grain for a couple of years now, but some of the best are still extract. The Up All Night and Purple Peril are. I'll see if I can revive the recipe thread tomorrow. Getting too late in the evening for me to be digging up recipes and formatting them for public consumption just now.

I'll be dipped. A homebrew store in Singapore.

Don't forget the license. I wonder what that runs?

I'm happy to report that my first batch of homebrew is a success! I tried a few last night and it was pretty good. It's not as black as a stout should be, more like a really dark brown, also has a very similar charicter and taste as a brown ale. It's nice, rich and malty, just what I was hoping for. I don't know the alcohol percent because I never got an accurate starting gravity reading. I assume it's around 4-5% because thats where these boxed kits usually end up.

Brewing again tomorrow... a German Altbier

Good for you. As for the color, what grains did you use? If you used an extract kit, steeping the specialty grains should have got you to the color you wanted. Nevertheless, even when a batch doesn't turn out 100% as you hoped, it is still better than anything you can buy IMHO.

I need to get to the lhbs and get some supplies. I haven't brewed for weeks, my fermenters are empty and one keg is dry.

I steeped the grains according to the directions, maybe longer? Agitate water more? I dunno. Either way, I'm happy with the result.

Steeping by the directions is the way to go. Steeping too long or too hot will release tanins that will ruin the flavor. One thing you can do when steeping is keep the grain bag active by gently swirling or dipping like a teabag. I'll also sparge the grain bag after steeping to release as much color or wort that I can.

http://photos-700.ll.facebook.com/ph...64040_9723.jpg
The Duck of Death. This was an all grain brew for an English Ale competition. I thought about calling it English ob, and I remembered the English Bob Charachter in Unforgiven who was dragging his biographer around with a bunch of copies of "The Duke of Death" in his rucksack. Gene Hackman picks one of them up and says "The Duck of Death?" and proceeds to beat him like a Mexican Rocker thumping an Emo Niño.

http://photos-700.ll.facebook.com/ph...64041_5157.jpg
And the other one we brewed this weekend, sixth incarnation of Weisse Squad hefeweizen.

We racked the Cleopatra Schwartz Mocha Stout too, but I don't have the label done up for that one yet.

Good stuff, Tophat!

I too have been brewing away, and have 4 batches under my belt...
You know about the Stout
Next was a German Alt (another boxed beer)
Then an English Old Ale / Strong ale (followed a recipe from my homebrew store)
And 4th was a Belgian Double (another homebrew store recipe)

I have label art for the Alt and English Ale, the Belgian art is done, but resides on another machine, I'll post later.

Here is the German Alt:
http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/2...tartweble3.jpg

Here's the English Strong Ale:
http://img386.imageshack.us/img386/7...kalewebbz2.jpg

Both batches turned out very well, I really enjoy the hobby.

Kickass Labels. I really like the Jack, but they both have really good balance.

Thanks!

Here's the label for the Belgian Double. So far, I think its the best one.
http://img380.imageshack.us/img380/7...atorwebcr4.jpg

Mister Coaster, that is hilarious.

You have both made me thirsty for homebrew.

Nice! Not often I actually get a laugh out of a Homebrew label.
Now, did you put that together from Clip Art and Photoshop it, or did you draw that one yourself? It's a great piece of work either way.

Those are great labels guys. I'd post mine, but they suck greatly in comparison. I also lost interest in the labels after I started kegging. Although I still bottle two from every batch to drink a year or thereabouts after brewing.

Love the "Duck of Death" - saw that movie last week for the first time and I cracked up when I first read the label.
Pantocrator is a wonderful label. "He'll be the judge of that." If only that simple statement on a homebrew label was taken to heart by intolerant folk of any ilk.
You guys gave me my morning smile.

Thanks everyone for the comments, I had fun making that one. (both the beer and the label)

Ever since I was in school, there was that particular image of Christ as Pantocrator that always struck me as haunting. That particular original is a mosaic in a church circa ~1100 by Greek artist Meister von Daphni. I found a really nice large photo of it online and used Adobe Illustrator to trace out the image in vector format. I used the preset color palate "Byzantine" for most of the colors, the font choice and text was my doing.

The "what would Jesus brew?" quote comes from a shirt I saw at my local homebrew store. The shirt was just the quote, but I figured some imagery was needed.