Computer Arts Projects - Issue 57 / 2004
Adobe Design Achievement Awards 2004 / Illustration Category

Excuse the pun but let's face it, in illustration you need to make your mark. A vital fact of life for every budding digital image-maker is that with nil recognition there will be nil commission. It really is that straight forward, the art director, creative director, designer those that demand the best of contemporary illustration need to know that you and your work exists. Illustrators live and die by their portfolios and the quality of their promotional material, there will be no positions vacant, no half-page job ad reaching out for your services, no one-stop formulaic CV-centred interview. Without, the tried and tested career routes, as witnessed in other categories of design, it is crucial that you hit the ground running. Where better than right here, with the Adobe Achievement Awards 2004…

Illustration has remained a cool subject and a hot topic for some time now. Once seen as the poorer wayward cousin to graphic design, the discipline has stepped right back under the spotlight during the last five years. The reasons for this may be complex, but at its heart it has been the successful mix of innovative young image-makers, not constrained by the baggage of a previous generation of illustrators, getting to grips with what digital technology has had to offer. Running for cover just a decade or so ago, most illustrators appeared to want very little to do with the digital, a frightening combination of both luddite and ostrich! Graphic designers led the way, utilising digital hardware and software, themselves creating images that pushed the technology but somehow didn't always push the right buttons. How the creative landscape has changed, illustration has played catch-up and today much of the truly innovative images in design are being created by illustrators, by digital image-makers, by graphic artists - call them what you will.

The very best of the work being created right now, just a like a malt whiskey or fine coffee for those still underage, is a subtle blend. Truly outstanding illustration mixes innovative techniques, inspiring subject matter, a personal unique and individual visual language (style is a dirty word!), conceptual know-how as well as both tip-top artistic skills and a professional approach. To really make it as a successful illustrator the full range needs to be in attendance.

Last year's winner of the Illustration Category in the Adobe Design Achievement Awards was, at the time, a junior student at the New Media Academy of Art College in California. Yasushi Umibe was just a little shocked but nonetheless enthralled at winning, 'I had been majoring in new media arts, focussing on designing for the web and interactive media, so it was quite a shock to receive the first place award in the illustration category,' he explains, 'I love creating vector illustrations but hadn't really even seen myself as an illustrator!' Yasushi, though, has recognised, through his success in the competition, a side to his work that may have remained undiscovered if not for his entry, 'the biggest aspect of winning the award was the great confidence it gave me in my work' he states, 'I was a little questioning of my approach at the time, asking myself whether I was going in the right direction or if I would find work…' Both are conundrums that have since been solved as Yasushi has picked up design and illustration freelance work from clients keen to commission him across a range of media, he has been turning his hand to creating websites, brochures and posters recently even landing a part-time design job whilst concluding his studies. Yasushi's tutor was as excited by the award as Yasushi was himself, 'I know that he was thrilled and must have felt great satisfaction' explains Bob Rigel, Assistant Director at the college. 'but as tutor I felt very happy indeed, for me it meant that the assignment was also worthy for consideration. I spend a lot of time creating and preparing projects so the fact that one of my assignments enabled a student to shine is the best feeling I can get as an instructor' he continues with a broad smile.

Getting to a professional level in illustration will always take time, commitment and energy but it can also be about that all-important personal approach. For those illustrators that made it as finalists, last time around, a vital but real thread that connects their approach is about just how individual their own take on illustration really is. No one finalist produced work that looks, at all, like another. From Yasushi's clean-swept vector drawn images of the San Francisco metro system, re-badged as the 'Dream Line' to Heesun Shin's beautifully hand drawn images 'Life of Toothbrushes' and onto Joeng-kwon Gye's photo-montages 'Me become lotus, lotus becomes me' the illustrations represent a wide facet of the work currently being created by today's illustrators (see http://www.adobe.com/education/winners/main.html).

It is noticeable and commendable just how broad a church the field of illustration has become in recent years, the discipline really has moved forward. Illustrators today have the freedom to move seamlessly between analogue and digital processes, harnessing the best of both mediums. Illustrators inhabit the digital world, delivering artwork around the globe for clients from all four corners of the planet but create their own individual take on the world around them. Encouraging an appetite for seeing and recording, for invention and risk-taking alongside providing a real understanding of working methods whilst demystifying processes is all part and parcel of art and design education. Not gone unnoticed by the Adobe Awards.

So, just what is the secret to winning in the Illustration category of the awards? That is not an easy one to answer… A tip straight from the lips of last year's winner, 'I always do a lot of research, sketch out everything and then get onto the computer,' explains Yasushi, 'as for advice… see the world, develop an individual approach, and work hard!' You can't really say fairer than that.

© Lawrence Zeegen