Sean Sims - Editorial Illustrator

Sean Sims is an professional illustrator who creates designs that go on to be featured in editorial, and other commercial sectors.

Sean originates from Teeside, and operates from Brighton.
His retro designs are akin to "1970's primary school library-esque".

https://fishinkblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/fishinkblog-7409-sean-sims-1.jpg?w=600 < image reference at this link.

He came into the lecture theatre today, and gave a talk to a full room of students.

http://www.creativereview.co.uk/images/2013/11/sean_sims_05.10.13_0.jpg < image reference at this link.

He works with a large range of national, and international clients, including the Guardian, Paperchase, the Discovery Channel, and The BBC.

It was very interesting to hear his take on the world of the editorial sector, and he gave a lot of information on how he entered the field, as well as what a lot of editorial companies look at, when it comes to their illustrations.

He told the audience that very often, advertising and editorial agencies that are looking for illustrations to go alongside their articles, choose simplistic, but colourful designs.
Sean's works is a good example of this style, which can be seen in many different editorials today.

http://modculture.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451cbb069e2015390ed8e81970b-800wi < image reference at this link.

As well as producing work for the editorial sectors, he creates a lot of designs that go onto be featured on cards, such as the one above.

Over the course of the lecture talk, he showed a vast amount of work, and it was very interesting to see a successful illustrator, and how he works in the industry.





http://www.artrepublic.com/biographies/265-sean-sims.html






Thomas.

Elly Walton - Editorial Illustrator

http://www.ellywalton-illustrations.com/146691/about-me < image reference at this link.

Elly Walton is an English editorial illustrator based in Derby, which is in the UK.

She is an established illustrator, who has had over 10 years of experience, and prior to her illustration role, she was an art director for several advertising agencies.

Her work contains a lot of traditional medium use, and she also uses digital software in her work.

She has had a number of magazine editorial clients, ranging from the likes of Which?, MacFormat, Moneywise, Waitress Weekend, PC Pro, The Guardian, Timeout London, and Thomas Cook.

http://www.ellywalton-illustrations.com/146689/1370176/portfolio/selected-highlights-editorial < image reference at this link.

http://www.ellywalton-illustrations.com/146689/1370176/portfolio/selected-highlights-editorial < image reference at this link.

The illustrations above featured on both pages, were featured in an article discussing the catering of the London 2012 Olympic Games, and was included in an editorial format called 'Delicious Magazine'.

https://www.cookie.com.au/cache/accc3cb269f82a5ab3f473b444c017e4_w1275.jpg < image reference at this link.

Other clients spanning different sectors, which include books, include Ransom Publishing, and Crown House Publishing.

Her awards include:

• AOI "Images" Jury-selected annual 29, 31
• Cream "Best illustration in a print ad" Silver
• Creativematch "Flair" winner 2010, 2012

http://www.ellywalton-illustrations.com/146689/portfolio < image reference at this link.

Her contact information can be seen on the illustration above, which is featured at the link provided via the caption.

I really like her work, it has a heavily cartoon appearance to it, which is a style that I like.
Some of her work features the usage of 'flat' design styles as well, it is worth noting.
This design style is common in today's fashion, so she has adapted her self to move with fashion.

http://www.ellywalton-illustrations.com/146691/about-me < blog research, referenced at this link.

Thomas.

Editorial Concept #6, (Final Design)

In my last editorial development blog, I finally decided which concepts I was going to base the final design on.

My editorial illustration needed to work with a hypothetical interview with Kate Bush, discussing the album, 'Hounds Of Love'.

I tried working away from using a portrait style the for the editorial, since I wanted to explore with using an illustration that complimented the album, since Kate Bush was already established, and well known enough, to not have the article illustration focused on her.

You find the use of artist portraits a lot in editorial illustration, and I feel like this is uncessarrily overused for established artists.

I decided to go with concept #2, which was originally sketched as part of the album cover development.

Concept #2

The illustration that went on to become concept #2, was actually used in the final album design, but only as a very small part of the design, being featured on the back cover.

As you can see, the illustration wasn't a very prominent part of the design.

I felt from the start of the editorial development, that this illustration had a good chance of working on its own, due to its bold, and intricate level of detail. It also could have easily have been re-sized, in order to fit the required 15cm x 15cm size, as stated by the brief.

I used photoshop to re-size the image, and matching it to the require DPI, as stated by the brief.

Photoshop is a great tool for re-sizing images.

I knew the importance of adding a bleed to my design, and decided to opt for an industry standard size of 5mm. I also used photoshop to adjust the level of black in the image, after deciding to use a simple black and white style, resembling my album cover design.

My final editorial with a 5mm bleed.

Thomas.

Editorial Development #4 (Digital Manipulation)

The next stage to help me come up with a final editorial illustration, is the experimentation with digital manipulation.

I have used Photoshop a lot in this module.
It is software that is industry standard, so I feel I should get more familiar with the software because it is a staple in industry.

Photoshop allows the user to do almost anything to an image, and with a wide range of features and ways to edit visuals, It makes sense to use Photoshop as part of my development.

For this section, I have scanned all of my chosen concepts into individual Photoshop files, where I have then gone onto tweak such aspects as depth, contrast, and colour.

I will now highlight my first chosen concept, followed by the other concepts chosen in editorial development #3, (refining concepts).


Concept #2:

Before

After

This manipulation trial has allowed me to come up an incredibly striking illustration.
By again manipulating the colour settings of the image, I was able to reduce the amount of cyan, yellow, and black, which allowed the magenta hues to stand out, and become more prominent.

This manipulation in my opinion make the illustration quite, 'crazy'. The pink I felt could reflect her femininity, and also the two tone grey and pink tone seems to work incredibly well together.


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Concept: #3:

Before

After

For this digital manipulation, I used the solarise filter found in the settings of photoshop. I knew that by applying this transformation, it would cause the colour tones to invert.

This in my opinion, allows for a much more bolder image, and has an element of fear in it, as the negative version seems much more 'darker', than the original. This matches the album, as there is a lot of 'dark' songs on it.


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Concept #6:

Before

After

Using the photoshop filter called, wind, I was able to create the illusion of wind distorting the image, from right to left. I really like this manipulation, as it creates the illusion of motion. This motion theme could refer to her movements in dance, as I have observed her through her numerous music videos, and I am very surprised by the fact that she can do all sorts of exquisite movements, and poses, incredibly quickly. I love her dancing, I think Kate Bush is great at this, and I feel that through certain styles of dancing, it helps to set the tone more for the music.



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This blog was meant to see what photoshop could allow me to achieve, through digital manipulation.
I will now be moving onto choosing my editorial concept, to progress with toward my final illustration design.







Thomas.

Editorial Development #5 (Choosing a Concept)

With all of the research that I have come up with in the development of my editorial illustration, I finally feel like I'm ready to move onto the final stage in my development, which is choosing a final concept to work with.

All of my concepts, really tie into the theme of the album, however some more than others.
A lot of my concepts in the editorial development are more varied compared to the concepts produced for the other criteria in the module.

I have focused a lot more on typography based designs for example, as I have realised the importance of typography greatly, especially over the last few weeks as I have been placing this into my concept practises.

An unused editorial concept, with a heavy typographic theme.

My editorial has to be digitally submitted with a bleed, in the size of 15cm x 15cm (150mm x 150mm), and at a size of 300dpi, all of my editorial concepts featured in my second development book are automatically at this size.
The final editorial illustration however, will be illustrated at a larger size, to allow for a high resolution image to be produced, once the image has been increased in size.

The concept that I have decided to choose to put forward as my final editorial illustration, is that of concept #2.
I really feel that this choice is the illustration that stands out the most in my opinion, and it works much better with the album cover, as it has a very similar theme.

I chose this concept to be put through experimentation with Adobe Photoshop in one of my earlier blogs, and this allowed for some very interesting results, one of them is featured below.



The use of using concept #2 as a standalone editorial piece, I feel would be very bold, and striking.

The image works perfectly in the dimensions stated by the brief, but in order to stick with the black and white theme (like my album), I will submit my final editorial illustration as black and white.

I feel that it reflects my album nicely, as well as my hypothetical interview which discusses the album. 












Thomas.

Final Editorial Design

Over the past few weeks, I have been planning and developing my final editorial illustration.

All of my concepts have taken a different approach to each other, some more contrasted to my previous development work, others closely more resembling it.

I began the research by looking at existing forms of real life editorial illustration.

Editorial illustration can be found in such items as magazines, tabloids, and newspapers.

It is common for editorial illustrations to feature some kind of portrait of the artist/band, however I wanted to distance my illustration away from this type of illustration, as I personally feel it is overused sometimes, and since Kate Bush is already an established artist, this is unnecessary.
Fair enough, for a debut/emerging artist this makes sense, but this is another matter, since she is so recognised in music.

Seeing different types of illustrations, in an array of different sizes, made me think about how my brief-set square shaped illustration could possibly work with text in an article.

My editorial illustration would of course feature in an article that discusses Kate Bush, and the album 'Hounds of Love'.

As part of my editorial research, I picked up a magazine that featured a large article on Kate Bush.

My final editorial with a 5mm bleed.

Thomas.

Editorial Development #2 (Concepts)

I have come up with a few concepts to work toward my final interview editorial illustration, based on my album choice.
I want to go back to my research and themes that I touched upon in my brainstorm book.

I wanted to create some of my editorial concepts around the theme of dance, and movement.
Interview illustrations generally use a portrait theme, however, with Kate Bush already being a well known, and established artist, I wanted to experiment with a slightly different, and more unique approach, of using an editorial illustration to support the topic, that being the album 'Hounds Of Love', over imagery of herself.

Also, I think it also refers to her personality, as she is quite secretive, and is not seen in public often.

Concept #1:

I love the two tone design that this concept has, as well as how it captures an element of Kate's dancing.

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Concept #2:

Original illustration.

I originally created this illustration as part of my album cover development, but I think that it could be worth considering using it as one of my editorial concepts, since I feel that it would work so well, as it will be more connected to the album design, compared to the other concepts.

Another thing is that it would be able to be sized to 150mm x 150mm very easily, and I could add some colour, or tweak the illustration in digital software such as adobe Photoshop, to allow it to be bolder than it is in its current form.

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Concept #3:

This concept takes a lot of inspiration from the song, 'Hounds of Love'.
There is a clear image of a hound in this concept design, and the borderless hound is made up entirely of eyes, referring to the theme of paranoia found in 'Hounds of Love'.

I think that this is a very strong editorial concept, and it appears to work well with a few of my other final pieces from other topics, such as the album cover for example.

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Concept #4:

Like concept #2, I originally created this illustration as part of my rear album cover development.
The illustration went on to be included as part of my rear cover, but it is such a good piece in my opinion, that I thought I could include it with my editorial concepts. I believe this image could work great as a stand alone illustration for editorial.


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Concept #5

Concept #5 features a design that takes influences from 'Running up that Hill', in the way that the song is trying to convey a sense of struggle and dominance.

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Concept #6

This concept is very heavily typography oriented, and features a lot of themes and imagery from concepts found in my other project developments.

It is also a very bold design, and using the fine red pen to colour the iris, allows for the eye to stand out, compared to the contrasting white background, and the black typography.

I really do like this concept, however I think that I can look more into different fonts if I decide to refine this concept in the next stage of development.

Thomas.

Editorial Development #3 (Refining Concepts)

In the last blog developing on the subject of editorial illustration, I created a number of different editorial concept designs, based on imagery of the album, as I wanted my illustration to support the article, that being all about the 'Hounds of Love' album, by Kate Bush.

Through this next stage of development, I will pick the concepts that I think have the best chance of working as my final editorial illustration.

In my opinion these are the editorial concepts that I feel work the best out of all of my concepts.


Concept #2:



The concept above, I originally created for the development of my 'Hounds of Love' album cover, I did end up using the design on a part of my final album, as you can see on the rear cover.

Illustration used on the rear album cover.

I really do like this design though, and I do feel that it will work really well as a stand alone editorial illustration.

It ties in well with the album choice.


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Concept #3:



This concept incorporates several themes taken from the album, and like concept #2, has a very similar look to the album cover design.

The imagery of the hound, is taken directly from my interpretation of the song 'Hounds of Love', and like the leaf, it is border-less, as the eyes define the edges and lines of the image.

It is very contemporary, which is a must for my editorial illustration.



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Concept #6:

My last chosen concept again uses themes taken from the song 'Hounds of Love', with the imagery of eyes symbolising paranoia.
There are themes taken from the song 'Hello Earth' which can be seen in the background of space, and the circle containing the eyes is supposed to refer to the shape of the Earth.



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In the next stage of development, I will be putting my chosen concepts through experimentation, using digital manipulation via Adobe Photoshop.






Thomas.

Editorial Development #1 (initial thoughts)

My editorial piece will be focused on the promotion of the album, via an hypothetical interview.

My album choice is 'Hounds Of Love', and I was thinking instead of using the plain imagery of Kate Bush, since she is already established enough to be recognised, I could use imagery to support the article, and since it is based on my album, it will reflect the content.

I figured just because the criteria stated an interview editorial, that didn't mean that I had to make a portrait of Kate, I personally want to try something new, and more exciting.

An editorial illustration can be used in for example, a magazine, a newspaper, or an online article.

http://nerdprint.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Middle-Boop-Editorial-Design.jpg < image reference at this link.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/designrelated-images-final/portfolio_file_items/251/6816/original_scaled/relevant_mag_1.jpg < image reference at this link.

I have been looking at a few existing examples of editorial illustrations, from a number of different editorials.

For example, I have been looking at a few magazines and newspapers, highlighting the use of editorial illustration via post it notes.

Looking at primary research has been very beneficial to me, as well as my development on my editorial illustration.

I want my editorial illustration to have a similar style to that of my album cover, but I don't want a direct copy of the album's design.
I would like something a bit different, something that makes the editorial stand out from the others.

I want to come up with an editorial illustration that carries the same black and white style, which I adore, as I think suits the music, audience, and is importantly contemporary in style.

The editorial illustration will be based upon how an image would be displayed next to an article. In my case, my illustration will support a theoretical article revolving around an interview with the artist Kate Bush, on the 'Hounds Of Love' album.

My final editorial illustration must be submitted at a size of 150mm x 150mm, and at a DPI of 300.

Basically, in the shape of a square.

I will come up with some square shaped concepts, based on what I could work with toward my final editorial illustration.






Thomas.

Editorial Illustration

As well as the task of creating an album cover, I have also been assigned with the task of looking into the field of editorial illustration.

Official Nintendo Magazine

Assortment of magazines.

Editorial illustration is illustrations that appear alongside articles, for example in magazines, newspapers and catalogues etc.

When I thought about the definition of editorial illustration, I thought of some of my favourite magazines, such as Official Nintendo Magazine, and Wired, which the latter is a computer & electronics magazine.

http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine < Screenshot taken from this link.

http://cdn2.business2community.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/ferran-adria-wired-magazine-cover.jpg < image reference at this link.

I found a great website by an illustrator that has in the past commissioned work for Wired.
http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ <

Mike Mcquade has over 9 years experience as a multidisciplinary designer & illustrator. He produces for top clients such as Nike, New York Times, Wired, Delta Airlines, Groupon, and Siemens.
Some of his editorial illustrations for Wired magazine, I will display below.

http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ < image reference at this link.

http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ < image reference at this link.

http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ < image reference at this link.

http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ < image reference at his link.

http://mikemcquade.com/wiredmagazine/ < image reference at this link.

Wondering what the real world market was like, I contacted Mike Mcquade via twitter, asking about how he got into the market.

Hopefully he will reply to me, as his input would be great to have as part of my research. I will of course update this blog if he does.

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UPDATE: Sadly he never got back to me, which is understandable since he is most likely very busy.

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Below I feature editorial illustration in a newspaper.

I used 'The Independent' newspaper to provide an example of editorial illustration in tabloids.







It's worth noting that I found a good website listing many of the difference markets in illustration, (45 to be precise).

http://www.commarts.com/columns/markets-illustration < image reference at this link.

Useful to this research, (and as just a general guide), as right at the very top of the page, a feature on editorial, advertising and publishing.


Editorial illustration is a massive field in the world of commercial illustration, so it is very worth looking into deeply.







Thomas.