Students in the graphic design classes recently competed in the Papa John’s San Antonio region Slice of Art Contest for National Pizza Month where they drew and created designs to advertise Papa John’s pizza.

Juniors Averie Lerma and Aubree Pipkin won first and second place, respectively.

“I was in my third period, and my teacher ran up to me saying ‘Aubree you need to look at instagram right now’, and there was a post saying I got second place,” Pipkin said. “I was really surprised; I didn’t think it was going to turnout that way.”

Graphic design teacher Nikki Rudloff found out about the contest from senior graphic design student Austin Ison whose sister was in charge of the competition for the San Antonio area. 

“In the competition, people could submit hand drawn art, graphic art, or any other type of artistic expression to try and win a prize,” Ison said. “First place got free pizza for a whole year, second place got six free pizzas, and third place got a gift basket.”

Ison joined the graphic design class as a junior thinking it would be easy – it wasn’t – but he fell in love with it regardless.

“I’m not that good at drawing, but I feel like graphic design was really easy to pick up and improve at,” Ison said. “It’s a really good skill for life, and it’s cool because anything around you like my shirt and your shirt had to be designed graphically.”

While Ison is interested in a career in graphic design, Lerma is not. For her, drawing is just a hobby, but that didn’t stop Lerma from winning first place.

“I was really inspired by graffiti work,” Lerma said. “I took an idea of street work on walls and mimicked tags from it. I drew a girl holding a pizza with one slice of pizza going up, and it said ‘Pizza like no other’.”

Lerma created her drawing on adobe illustrator, but Pipkin’s process was a little different. 

“I first drew it in my sketchbook with paper and pencil, and then I took a picture of it,” Pipkin said. “I went over the drawing on my tablet, using ibisPaint.”

Pipkin’s drawing features a girl floating on a piece of pizza in space.

“I knew I wanted to have a character with it, and I knew I wanted it to look like the graffiti style,” Pipkin said. “I wanted it to look like it would belong on the side of the street, and I wanted it to be a little bit weird, so I put her on a piece of pizza.”

Pipkin says that placing so high in the contest has made her feel more confident in her design abilities.

“I’m really glad they liked my work,” she said. “I can put it in my portfolio, so I have something to show off and be like ‘I did this’.”