Summerbelle Final Art

Summerbelle Final Art (detail)- Greg Newbold- digital

I just finished up the illustration for the Summerbelle fruit carton. It's always fun to work with John Ball at BDG. I really enjoyed the process and it turned out to be one of my favorite jobs of the year so far with virtually no changes. I have to reinforce the fact that I followed all the steps that I have taught to students in the past which basically follows the basic recipe for illustration success. I have outlined it before, but it bears repeating:

1-Think. Get the idea right in your mind before you start, so you have a target you are shooting for. Think of possible alternate solutions and list them. On this job, it was pretty clear what the intention was, but I brought the idea of the umbrella to the solution which ultimately was what worked best.

2- Thumbnail Sketches. This is the most basic form of ideation on paper. Don't just chicken scratch out something vague and indecipherable. Take some care to get proportions, shape relationships, angles, POV, and value patterns defined at this stage. No details yet, but the "skeleton" is established. I made sure the angles of the pose were as dynamic as possible given the parameters of the space.

Final Summerbelle Art by Greg Newbold with graphic design by John Ball

3- Reference Gathering. In this case, I went to the trouble of renting a real costume and props from a professional theater resource. It cost a little more, but this was a good paying project and it was worth the added expense. I posed my model based on my thumbnail ideas and took lots of photos. I gave myself 2-3 alternate poses as well in case the client did not like what I proposed. I submitted two versions for consideration and the umbrella pose won out. Having great photo reference saved endless headaches and guessing.

4- Final Drawing. I draw my final drawings by hand despite the fact that this project and most of my illustration work is painted digitally. This gives me a chance to make adjustments and edits that deviate from the reference material, to stylize and to generally put my personal fingerprints on a piece.

5- Value Study. I made sure that my final drawing had the values and shadows established in a monochromatic fashion. My actual physical drawing has a certain amount of value in it and I reinforced it with multiply layer glazes of gray before stepping to color.

Summerbelle carton looking sweet with art on three sides

6- Color Study. I work out the color plan before diving in. When I don't, disasters happen. I've been doing this for a long time, so I admit that sometimes this is a mental color study for me. I thought about how I wanted the colors to pop based on the input from the client. The overall desire was that it wanted to fell light and summery. I did a quick Photoshop paint over on top of my sketch at a small size just to reinforce my instincts and then dove into the final art.

  

7- Final Art. At this point, most of the questions had been asked and answered. It was just a matter of getting all the details painted and then making sure the nuances were appealing. For instance, I went back into the shadows of the skin tones to bring some cool light into the up facing planes and warming up the down facing planes or adding reflected color as in the underside of the arm picking up the orange glow of the citrus fruit.