OKC Thunder Alternate Uni

[Digs]

There's been some talk around that the Thunder will add an alternate uniform for the upcoming season, so I thought I would have a crack at the concept myself.

Like most people, I'm not a huge fan of the Thunder's branding, colours and uniforms - although with the team's rapid rise to prominence, it's safe to say these won't be changing (at least until Kevin Durant retires). Hence, I've tried to maintain some sort of consistency with the home/road designs, but the main departures are as follows:

- Limited the colours to 3 (down from 5 on the home uni), with the dark blue as primary. I've used the orange from the OKC logo (officially Thunder uses "red-orange" on the jersey, but then uses this more burnt-orange hue in logos/branding etc. Nevertheless, I think the straight-out orange goes better with the two blues.

- The side panels follow a similar form to those on the primary jersey, but I've converted them into a "lightning-bolt" stripe down the side (and yes, I'm aware of the difference between thunder & lightning, but it still works as a representation I think).

- Being an alternate, I've gone for "OKC" as the main wordmark - think this is a no-brainer. I know the vertical type may be controversial to some, but I think it works pretty well - a touch of old school for a team without much history.

- Have used a embroidered effect on the lines/piping (you may not be able to see this without being able to zoom in more), although not sure if this would be feasible for mass-produced jerseys.

- Used a round neck instead of the regular v-neck - I felt it just suited the whole look a lot better.

Anyway, here's the concept:

I'm still very much in the process of learning the Illustrator ropes, so any comments or suggestions would be most welcome. Enjoy!

[McCall]

Vertical words/letters are one thing (and not good), but you can't verticalize numbers like that. Numbers need to remain horizontal.

[jncox9]

Change the numbers to horizontal and this is good.

[masterchaoss]

Horizontal is probably going to make these look better

[Hurricane1183]

needs some white i think

[Conrad.]

needs some white i think

this. and make the number horizontal as well.

[Chawls]

The shades of blue are too similar. From a distance, the numbers wouldn't be legible. Make them white. And while I understand what you were going for with the side panels, it doesn't work for me. It reminds me of these fail whales:

[seancarter]

uniform needs work and change colors on it

[kw11333]

I like it, but yeah the numbers have to stay horizontal. Thinking outside the box is never a bad thing.

[roldy54]

Make the numbers white and horizontal, but keep the wording orange. Will make for a MUCH better design

[hellslayer2000]

I like them but get rid of the horizontal numbers, and I think maybe it use a bit of the yellow with a clipped v-neck and i think it will be good.

[Digs]

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. Fair call on the vertical numbers, probably not a go. Just out of curiosity, has an NBA team ever used vertical numbers on the front of a jersey?

Here's a version with horizontal & white numbers as suggested. Not quite sure the white works, but let me know what you think:

Here's another one - the same but with orange numbers (I think I prefer this one):

And one more - this time with the horizontal wordmark on the front as well:

[cohenj21]

I could see something similar to the all-horizontal version actually being used by the Thunder. Really solid job.