If you’re looking to inject more ‘feels’ into your illustration. Maybe this will help you.

I’ve been sending my work out to illustrator agents to get representation. One agent in particular offered curt feedback to the effect of; “I don’t feel it”. And I though to myself, that is really good feedback. Of all the jobs an illustration must do, one of them is to give you the feels. That’s why I chose ‘Middle-Earth’ as the theme for my A-Z Series. In addition to working out my style this gives me a chance to work out my ‘feels’. Yes ‘feels’ is a technical illustration term.

1. Study the creative expressions of the theme by have gone before you and tweak for taste.

Some of my favourite visual interpretations of Middle Earth were by Tove Jansson of Moommin fame, Micheal Hague, Mikhail Belomlinsky and Tolkien himself. These classic interpretations were full of the wit and humour that was found in the writing and served as a great jumping off point. I then tweaked it by incorporating more modern color palettes and composition trick that I’ve learned from reading comics which are designed to lead the eye around the page.

2. Have a clear image of the audience that the work is aimed at.

“The Hobbit” illustrated by Micheal Hague, was my introduction to the rich world of middle earth. As a young dyslexic kid the illustrations were all the motivation I needed to spend hours reading the book. I wanted to make work aimed at that version of me. And when my baby girl is about able to read at this level, I wanted illustrations which could make her want to read the text. If ya’ll like it too; that’s a bonus.

3. Get slightly outside your comfort zone.

At this point I’m pretty confident I can cleanly nail a brief. But nailing a brief doe not produce the feels. Instead I need to aim slightly outside my range of competency. When done correctly, this brings in a sense of adventure and uncertainty, and ultimately joy when things go well. I get out my comfort zone by trying new tools and techniques and leaning in even more on the techniques that I am currently using.  E.g the cutout look that I’m using to design some of my edges.

4. Curate your choices

We can’t choose what we’re interested in. But we can transform anything we are working on by injecting into it  choice elements of things that we’re interested in. Put as much of ‘you’ into the work. Favourite color, favourite brush at the very least listen to your favourite music while you work. The better you are at articulating your interests, the wider the toolkit you’ll have to be able to inject interest into the thing you’re working on. I transformed this A-Z project by choosing a subject matter that I loved and many others love to.

I continue to work on this project and share it on Instagram.

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See you next time!