Hey everyone! I'm still ecstatic and in disbelief of yesterdays All Star competition. I wanted to do a break down of how I got to my final illustration.
I want to include everything I can so you're able to see what steps I took and get an idea of what I was thinking as I went along. I do have a secret weapon, my Wife. She will sometimes help with brainstorming and I'm constantly bugging her to look at the illustration as it progresses. She is very understanding.
This was a concept that I struggled with. There was already a lot of great ideas that had been done before in various short films and illustrations by other artists. I wanted something that wouldn't automatically remind you of those works.
One idea I had played with for a while was stars, starfish, or kids in star costumes wanting to be shooting stars. It was a lot of info to get in one illustration, so it wasn't a route I felt I could go down effectively.
I also liked the idea of people hitching a ride on a shooting star, or harvesting them. Constellations were another idea I had played with, but again it seemed like a lot for me to get right in one image. I want to keep it simple.
At some point I ended up drawing this giant that was harvesting stars to help illuminate the town. This is one I was starting to like. I liked the idea of this stoic giant that was dedicated to his work. I wanted his scale to be abnormal, hoping this could add to his mystic. How long has he been doing this?
Above you will see the last stages of my thumbnailing process. I like starting on paper and I will then take some snapshots with my phone to quickly get them in my computer. You'll see after the phone scans I do a selects round of the ideas I like most. From there I go digital and elaborate further on the ones I think are best and add some value. Through almost all of the processes I'm zoomed out on the canvas and rarely ever zoom in to draw anything.
Color color color. I love to focus on the color stage in illustration. I'll spend a lot of time in this phase to make sure I'm happy. I have struggled with nighttime illustrations in the past. I find it hard to find the balance of having it be dark, but not go too dark, and to keep the glow in check.
Bring in the noise! This is a little trick I was taught in school by Lee. On the left, noise, on the right, no noise. Often times digital illustration will look too clean. To get this effect. My color profile in photoshop is set to Adobe RGB 1998, I add a new layer and fill it with 50% grey and set the layer to overlay. The 50% grey point will differ depending on what color profile you're in. In the photoshop menus I will then go to Filter > Noise > Add Noise. You can adjust the amount, less is more. I have monochromatic click on. After, you can change your layer opacity to your liking.
At this stage I'm almost done. I will try to give my eyes a break from the piece, get feedback, and think of little things that can be added to help the piece.
As far as file management goes. I try to work as nondestructively as possible. I'll keep individual objects in the illustration in their own folders and layers and label them.
Here we're back to the finished illustration.
I want to thank everyone! I hope you find this helpful and I'm more than happy to help answer any questions.
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