When I was in undergrad, I wanted to double major in graphic design and illustration. I was quickly shot down by my freshman advisor, whom, coincidentally, was also my first year drawing teacher. I immediately became offended when he said, “you cannot double major in these two subjects.” I got defensive and said, “What do you mean I canNOT?” He chuckled and said, “No, it’s not that I don’t think you can, it’s that it’s physically impossible to double major in two studio subjects.” He then offered me the next best thing: major in graphic design and minor in figurative illustration. It would be hard, but doable. I took it.
I was 100% the outsider there. Not entirely in a bad way—the faculty in that department loved that I was there because they felt like the two would marry well. The GD faculty, not so much. I had one of my professors tell me, “I’ll talk you out of it before you get to junior year.” Yes, Larry, I still remember you saying that to me, but we won’t talk about that side of the fence.
Anyway, tons of positive things came from being a minor in the Illustration department: I got to see TOP talent in action and learn from them (and I don’t mean just the faculty, I mean my fellow classmates!), made some great friends with other students and a few faculty members (like Rosae, who is like…one of my BFFs now), went on cool trips to museums, and just had an amazing time!
I graduated a semester after completing my minor ( no one talked me out of it. Sorry, Larry) and that was it. I did some crude digital illustrations for The Onion while I interned there post-grad, and one beautiful action pose of a human figure for a physical therapy practice, a few small personal things (like the Wario Amiibo I made) but other than that, I didn’t really do anything with my minor.
Until now.
My cousin, Kim, sends me a text one day saying she referred me to one of her friends from school (ironically, both Kim and her friend are DPT, so my first thought was, “shit, I have to do another illustration for a PT practice?” Luckily, it was not for anything physical therapy-related, but it did involve the human figure.
Shortly after, I got a text message from a girl named Takiara who let me know she got my info from Kim. She and I texted back and forth for a while and I strongly agreed to take on the job. She emailed me all of the inspo she pulled along with what she was looking for. How hard could it be? This was in August.
It is now January and the other day got the final sign off, which is why I’m writing this blog post.
I’d like to preface the remainder of this post by saying this is not one of those “omg the client sucked” posts. Au contrair, it’s one of those “omg the designer sucks” posts.
Takiara told me if I’m too busy, it’s no big deal, she can find someone else. I told her it should be fine. Oh, ho, ho, I shot myself in the foot. My final semester started a couple weeks after and let’s just say she is a GODSEND when it comes to clients. She was SO understanding and she said she wasn’t in a hurry and she was a student not that long ago so she understands. Let me also mention she paid my full ask UP FRONT, which also put me in an odd spot.
I made sure to touch base with her throughout and show her my slow, but forward-moving progression. I gave her whatever time she needed to review the screenshots and she gave me direction if she felt she wanted something a bit different.
The logo, which is ultimately what this is, was presented verbally as Jesus (black Jesus, specifically) with the words “Black Jesus Entertainment” and below a tagline “He will always walk with you!” What was interesting about the whole thing is she wanted the Jesus figure to be illustrated and in an anime style. I don’t have any aversions to anime-style. In fact, I LOVE the anime style of illustration (I like manga better, but alas), but for starters I’m not Japanese. There’s no rule that says non-Japanese artists shouldn’t do Japanese-style art, but when it’s not created by a Japanese artist, it sort of loses its magic, yanno?
I asked her, out of curiosity, “why anime?” And she, without skipping a beat, gave me a clear, to-the-point answer if I ever heard one for “why anime?” She said she loves anime and everyone else does, too. Anime is something anybody can like, it’s not just for a specific group of people—much like Jesus. Jesus is for everybody, and Jesus is cool.
Mic drop.
I thanked her for her insight, and went about my work.
Sketching the figure and deciding the layout wasn’t the hard part…per se. I couldn’t figure out the hands, my perspective was askew, and it just didn’t look good. Regardless, digitizing the art was the hard part. I was working with just a mouse (or the trackpad on my laptop if I wasn’t at home and didn’t pack a mouse). I had to try and figure out light and shadow and I struggled HARD. Even though I drew all the time growing up, took as many art classes in grade school as possible, went to an art school for college and minored in illustration, I am still really elementary in my skill. Or, at least, I feel that way.
Takiara liked my drawing, though, and would tell me things like, “yo, that’s fire.” or “That’s so dope!” I took those as Ws and pushed on.
I held my breath when I showed her the final screen shot, packed up the files accordingly and emailed her what I was hoping would be the final package. I told her if there’s anything that needs to be fixed, to let me know. I waited most of the week when randomly a text came through: “I don’t see anything wrong with what you sent, so we’re good to go!”
I shouted in elation, catching the attention of my boyfriend who saw the last of what I worked on before I sent it to Takiara. He high-fived me and I let out a sigh of relief.
It’s not bad, but it’s not great. The light and shadows need work, the pose needs work, the anatomy needs work, his face needs work, the whole thing needs work… but it’s not bad.
In fact, I like it enough to post it here and feature it as a highlight. It’s the first illustration I did in years—both in general and digitally.
I have enough confidence from this project to finally begin my second illustration project in years: entries for the Pokémon illustration contest. I’m nervous and I’ll be up against some formidable contestants from both the US and Japan, but I have my eyes on the prize: having a promo card printed with the winning art. Sure, the monetary prize is nice, but…the promo card. Only I will see the money, but many people will see the card and it will be RARE because promo cards don’t circulate too long and the number printed is usually small.
I may revisit Jesus to work on him a bit more. If and when I do, I’ll send the revision to Takiara so she has the latest and greatest. Hopefully by then I’ll have a nice tablet—that’s crossed my mind several times. Perhaps having a nice new Wacom would solve my woes. (It won’t—the tool is only as good as the user.)
Until then, I’m leaving sleeping dogs lie.