Illustration Heat

This summer is super-hot. Not just because of temperature, but additionally because I'm taking break for another course: "Illustration for motion" from SOM. Was waiting the beginning of the course for already a month. Decided to organize my workspace a little for illustration setup. Helped ergo josh YouTube channel. And probably he was the main indirect facilitator of taking this course for me. I just found that Illustration for Motion was really great option for me.

When I started to take the first course from School of Motion, was choosing between Design and new Illustration course. At the last moment I've chose the Design, just because it was more familiar for me, and I didn't plan to draw traditional animation frame by frame, it was frightening and simply speaking - not mine type of work.

But after checking the material of the first week - I can say that this course should be the first or second along with the design, for a motion graphics artist.

In this post I'll try to describe why illustration is important almost in every creative activity.

I've been following various AI channels and checking trends to understand how it will be developing in the nearest future. Impressive tools are doing their job well. Creating art, branding, code, videos. It works already as intended and I feel happiness for that I live in this wonderful time.

What will remain stable for longer time is that technologies will be controlled by human beings with their senses, abilities, mistakes and tastes.

Making fun things is much simpler now but it doesn't mean that's simple for everyone. Those who can find great idea and recreate it in art or some kind of product for consumers - will be creating more. AI boosts economy does not destroy it. Soon everything will readjust according to these new realities and then will start a new huge growth.

In this ocean of content and products will be hard to be unique and noticeable. But nothing new in the marketing can be added. Customers will be still loyal to brands, which they're recognizing and feel familiar, friendly. AI can help here but will not play major role, because only people are able to understand what other people are feeling when seeing characters, things from their childhood, some traditional cultural activities, celebrations, meals, and feelings like love, passion and many more sides of life. AI is just not capable to cover it all.

That's why it's important to grow creatively, emotionally and culturally to understand each other better.

Illustration creates a cloud of creativity around you. Where you can breathe freely and take something interesting from ti just by asking imagination to help find something for your work, education or planning.

When you wake up and want to save a good idea or story and recover later your dream in reality - you can use a recorder, so you can speak up everything you've seen. You can use a notepad to write some notes. But later you will find that's the description is lacking some details and clarity. Soon you will forget the great looking mosaic or building facade, or some futuristic device form, or movement sequence for animation.

AT those moments, the sparks of inspiration are hard to catch and memorize. Being able to illustrate main points and forms is very important in our world of distractions. Good ideas costs millions, why not to catch them from time to time?

Illustration supports creative thinking. Frequent sketching sets your mind on a productive stream, when your previous actions are directing your further steps. Comfortable work with a stylus or a pencil transform thinking from abstract wandering to a focused detailed explanation. Each next exercise enforces the confidence into successful and useful experimentation. What the creativity actually is. Creating varieties and selecting the best options.

Making simple illustrations is helping to discuss with others some concepts, designs, animation and project structure.

But comfortable work is achieved only when you do this every day, when you have favorite tools for this, learned process of sharing such illustrations. Usually, it's ready when you do illustrations more professionally, not by unexpected necessity. That's why I decided to take a course and learn it more deeply, without spending years for learning it all by my own.

During the first week of the course, I've started to understand how it's hard and important to see all the details of objects you are trying to illustrate, to understand the composition and stick to some particular style. I'm checking Naive illustration book to support the process.

I've ordered it previously by suggestion from the book Design for Motion by Austin Shaw.

Such examples are setting the ladder that makes you ready to get much more from the course materials and other projects. To decode correctly what you've seen in the projects of other motion designers and artists. To understand how to make something similar, even if it will be just some small element or a scene.

Making illustrations takes time, especially if it's needed to finesse every inch, to make it all look wholesome. But speed increases after you start doing more relaxed, thoughtful and simplified. For example, instead of making one cherry with all lights and shadows, you firstly create basic shapes across the composition to make them fit comfortably, cherries are simply the circles firstly and later there are appearing some details, evenly distributed among all objects.

The course teaches to work faster, and to be more precise. But all depends on your interest and readiness to practice this skill every day. Sometimes I think it's better to do 95% of work intuitively by myself, with mistakes rather than learn courses and do just as little of 30-50% of experimentations, with less mistakes, but still less than what you could do by learning it solely.

This time I just wanted to start quickly and see good results earlier. I don't have patience to learn it as a lifetime profession. Just need an experience to do quick sketches and later maybe it will be something that gives me fun and joy, so I can do it constantly.

Speaking about fun and joy I can admit that the process can be especially exciting when you touch topics of illustration that you really like. For example, if I love honey and know about it a lot, it's characteristics, how it influences the mood and health, and certainly I remember how it looks like in liquid or more thick form. How light transmits through its texture, how it smells, and glows in the morning rays of the sun and pours through the mist of a hot tea. Such illustrations obviously will be drawn better than some commercial product, you never tried before, but have to do an illustration for their dull website.

Illustration should be more for creative inspiration, for creating an environment that inspires. Printing good examples and sticking them onto the wall, or even putting them in frames, to remind how beautiful ideas and emotions can be. Illustration can raise the level of creative and art direction. Seeing more incredible stuff initiates more artful solutions. It sets some standards, that are translating to everything you do, from design to animation. It creates a skeleton, that can fix muscles and lift some weights. All depends on muscles, but they can appear very quickly, if you will do many repetitions.

High quality Illustration catches attention immediately as you see it. The combination of colors and patterns, some interesting details, fun characters or things, messages. People were drawing illustrations on the walls of caves, and they are installing projectors now to watch moving illustrations on the ceiling of big spheres and movie theaters.

Illustration helps build friendship, provokes thoughts and improves the story. There would be no Lion King powerful story without greatest animation and illustrated characters.

Great illustration skills enhance the workflow for solo freelancer, to do a full cycle of video production that requires highest attention to the branding and design requirements. Or simply to do illustration work, that's always needed for clients and various ongoing projects.

Vector illustration can be the only option for low-weight apps and websites. And it's frequently needed to create a series of illustrations, emojis, UI elements to look in one style. It attaches the client to the freelancers, in comparison to the animation-only freelancers. That are competing among each other for the client, and he can choose the lowest price.

Illustration certainly requires a lot of time and dedication, but almost each time you can raise the level after accomplishing any single project, receive benefits and satisfaction. It boosts the motivation and open the route for developing the story through the animation. And here's also you, who can animate Own illustration much quicker and better than a majority of good animators. Saving some money and enlightens and educates of how to name layers better in illustrator, or which blending modes, masks or gradients to use. These feeling of total control is also another addition to your confidence.

Time spent by drawing and illustrating makes your more disciplined. Practice and challenging projects it's all an experience you have to earn by stepping over your ego and jumping into the cold stream of creative improvement. It's hard to learn something without risking losing a lot of time and efforts for nothing. But sacrificing some time to learn something - may be the way to finally find a freedom. Of making what you love and to show exactly what you wanted to show and tell.

Universal language of illustration is a necessary part of media and communication. As like proper message and right typography, Illustration can tell a lot even without any words.

Hoping you had a great time reading this post. Till next time, Subscribe and Share to support my blog. Even one free subscriber is a hero for which I want to live and create.

Have a nice MotionDay!