#45 A MEDLEY OF PORTFOLIO ILLUSTRATIONS

I have enjoyed sharing about my illustration career. On this blog there are over 2,200 images. I find the blog format fascinating, as my stories about my illustration career “unfolded” in their own way. I had no idea when I started writing my blog where it would go.

All of my stories, tips and information move forward from the first post. For this post, it is important for me to explain a few things that I have shared earlier on my blog. There are people reading this who might not have not seen anything else I’ve written.

I’ve already shared many of my portfolio pieces, but they have been scattered all over. It seemed like a good idea to group them all together for this medley of portfolio illustrations. For those who are not familiar with my painting techniques, most of my illustrations are completed with Dr. PH Martin dyes. I also use Prismacolor pencils and Badger Air Opaque acrylics for details. Some of my illustrations are done using only Admarkers (with additions of colored pencil and acrylic,  such as the Banana Split below.)

A NEW BEGINNING FOR ME

From the time I graduated college until the present time, I considered myself an illustrator. My career suited me perfectly, because I was able to balance many things in addition to being an artist.

At times, being an illustrator was very stressful. There was a lot of “performance anxiety,” that went along with ridiculous deadlines and the pressure to please many people involved in projects. I often worked with people who all disagreed with one another and gave me conflicting art direction! However, I was always reliable and tried hard to do my best. I improved over the many decades as an illustrator.

I reached a pinnacle and felt very competent illustrating food, florals, and any still life object I could find reference for.

But then there was a time when most of my commissioned work stopped. It turned out it wasn’t a bad thing. During that lull of not receiving assignments, I discovered how much I loved sharing what I’ve learned with other people.

It gave me a lot of purpose and meaning to write about those lessons in my life. On this blog, I write about those lessons from being an illustrator, and on my other blog www.myjourneysinsight.com, I write about other life lessons I have faced.

I was very blessed to have had such a wonderful career as an illustrator!

My portfolio painting named ‘Perfume Medley.”

If you look carefully, you can see me holding a camera in the reflection on this bottle.

I love the textures and colors in this painting!

PORTFOLIO ILLUSTRATIONS

When people see any of the illustrations in my portfolio I am often asked this question: “These paintings look like photographs? Why not just take a picture instead?”

Here is my answer:

1. Using an illustrator was often cheaper than photography. (No stylist, retouching, photo-shoots required). Sometimes the products did not even exist to photograph.

2. It was much easier to fit an illustration into the design of a packaging label.

3. And this was my favorite answer: I liked to think that my paintings were more than just a photograph. They were idealistic, because I attempted to make my images look exciting – shinier, more brilliant and more perfect. I tried to achieve this through the use of color, contrast and simple composition.

When I graduated college, I had no idea that I would specialize and become a “food illustrator.” However, I did have two pieces in my portfolio that steered me in that direction. One I called, “Vegetable Medley.” For some reason, I liked using the word “medley” to name many of my portfolio pieces. The other was a black and white painting of liquid pouring into a glass.

My portfolio painting named “Vegetable Medley.” I did perfect water droplets later on in my career.

My portfolio painting named “Black and White Glass.”

My portfolio was initially about sharing my best paintings. That never changed throughout my career; it was always more important than proving I had published work.

Therefore, my definition of a “Portfolio Piece” was a painting that would showcase and sell my abilities as an illustrator. It needed to be something that depicted my “strengths” and displayed what I could do best.

I kept my portfolio simple and didn’t show anything that might be detrimental – even though art directors were notorious in wanting to see examples of something close to a job they were looking for. Most illustrators know that clients often lack imagination about making a leap in subject matter.

Statements like these made me laugh and I heard them so often!

“I see you have a chocolate bar, but do you have any examples of melted chocolate?”

“I see you have tortilla chips, but can you do potato chips?”

“You’ve done cold cereal, but can you do hot cereal?”

Artist representatives told me only to share portfolio pieces of the work I wanted to do. That was perplexing at times because I had some nice paintings of beverages, but didn’t really want to illustrate them under a lot of time pressure (they are VERY complex). I demonstrated that I could do lettering on products, but always hated that part of illustrating.

When I began my career, I used to take my portfolio to appointments with local art directors. I painted two of what would probably be the most important paintings to guide my style of illustrating. It was my Nestle Crunch bar and Coca Cola glass. Those paintings opened up a lot of doors for me.

I had done the lettering by hand on both of them, and in the advertising domain it was not considered “perfect” enough. I had to find a way to create perfect lettering.

Eventually, I did.

After that, I indulged myself to create paintings that truly allowed me to explore what I loved through textures, colors, and contrast. I used my own photography as my reference and painted a “Portfolio Piece” every year or two. My purpose for these paintings would be to use them for self-promotion.

Because I was usually busy with assignments coming in, I wasn’t always that motivated to paint something for which I wouldn’t be paid. However, it was important for me to advertise almost every year in a “Source Book” for art directors to see my work.

Below are some examples of my ads that were very useful for gaining credibility with art directors and for getting jobs:

This was my very first ad in “The Workbook.” It was very expensive for me at that time – about $3,500.

I received a lot of compliments for this ad design. I t made a huge difference when I hired a graphic designer to put my ad together for me.

This was my last printed ad in The Workbook. I designed it myself and incorporated the nice lettering from a designer’s prior ad.

Painting portfolio pieces helped create colorful advertisements  that showcased my style. Printed job examples were also important, but they were never as impressive as something that I created to please myself.

I still have boxes of the expensive ads that I had printed. There is no need for me to do time consuming “envelope stuffing” anymore. The Internet is a far easier way for an art director to find me, and most of the places I used to mail my samples to have gone out of business.

I did design my own ads for many years, but with success I decided that even the ad design needed to be more professional. Because I was never very comfortable with graphic design, I hired a designer for the last six ads that I did. It made a huge difference. I always had admiration for designers, and even more so after that because I saw what an improvement it was over my own “boring” placement of images.

My postcard promotion with my Snickers and Nestlé’s candy bars was also very helpful for my career. It was often easier to share a postcard than a larger tearsheet.

So much of what I have shared is not relevant in today’s career marketplace. I don’t know if there will be more projects for me “down the road.” Working digitally is certainly much faster and easier on my eyes.

For me, my journey into becoming an artist started when I was very young. I do not believe that talent alone guarantees success.

My passion to do my best is what truly guided me.

I continue to do that now as I pursue writing and music.

My portfolio painting named “Coca Cola.”

Ice becomes very abstract when illustrated up close. Someone thought this looked like an angry face!

This is an example of my hand lettering using white gouache and a tiny brush.

Since I hand lettered, my sketch needed to be very accurate.

My portfolio painting named “Coca Cola Classic.”

My photo reference for the Coca Cola Classic can.

This was painted using custom rub-down letters as a mask. I provided a lab with a black a white map for the letters. I had to cut away areas where there were droplets.

There were many interesting shades of brown in this painting.

My portfolio painting named “Herdez.” Later on, I digitally removed the jar so I could use the illustration as a stock image.

My stock image named “Taco Scene.”

I loved painting the reflection of the melon in the sunglasses.

I sure felt like a kid setting up my photo reference in a sandbox!

It was fun putting this sandwich together! There were lots of leftovers.

I liked this loose marker sketch so much, that I decided to do another tighter version.

I began a painting for my Banana Split, but decided I preferred my marker version. The whipped cream is a good example of how there are many colors even in a subject that is basically white.

My finished painting of a Nestle Crunch Bar.

The photo reference for my Nestle Crunch Bar painting.

My portfolio painting named “Candy Medley.”

My tracing for Candy Medley.

I started this painting over when I wasn’t satisfied with how the watercolor paper was working.

My photo reference for the Brach Candy Medley illustration.

A toothbrush was always handy when I needed to splatter texture.

My portfolio painting named “Flower Medley.”

My sketch for the Flower Medley painting.

My portfolio painting named “Fruit Stripe.” It’s hard for me to appreciate how long this painting is. I usually work fairly small and this was approximately two feet wide.

To create the photographs for my “Fruit Stripe” painting, I ended up with a lot of leftover fruit.

This is an example of a stock image that was taken from my extremely horizontal Fruit Stripe painting.

This cantaloupe texture was definitely challenging.

My portfolio painting named “Fruit L-Shaped.”

My portfolio painting named “Dessert Medley.”

This is my photo reference for the painting “Dessert Medley.”

Once again, I used a lot of delicate colors in the whipped cream, even though it was white.

My portfolio painting named “Snickers Bar.”

I used my photo to create a template for custom rub-down lettering. It was a white mask that I removed later on.

In 1992, I won the gold medal award in the “Unpublished Category” for my Snickers Bar illustration at the annual Society of Illustrators, Los Angeles “Illustration West” show.