Check, Please! Y4 Kickstarter illustration process [part 2]

The further adventures of this illustration I drew for Ngozi's Check, Please! Year 4 Kickstarter! You can find part 1, where I talk about using reference and photobashing, here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/54517065

So, where were we? Ah yes, this monstrosity: 

Now it's time to take this unrecognizeable mess and turn it into something befitting of an actual commissioned illustration. 

When I'm working on big complicated backgrounds I like to break it up into areas, like the traditional "foreground" "midground" "background", and work on them as separate groups. 

I lower the opacity of the photobash background and start LOSELY drawing over it. You'll notice my drawing here really doesn't follow the details of the bash all that closely, that's the important part! The photobash is really just there to give you a place to start! Whatever you're making should take on a life of its own. 

Here are my groups. Note: this is a full-bleed illustration, meaning it will go all the way to the edge of the paper once printed. The cyan guides let me know what may or may not get cut off when the paper is trimmed, so I keep all the important stuff inside the lines. 

Background: 

Midground: 

Foreground: 

Figures: 

At this point, I usually dispose of the photobash because I've now created a new base to work from. All my future decisions for this illustration will be based on these rough pencils. 

Moving forward into inks with a very detailed background like this, I'm keeping several things in mind: 

👏👏 Establishing patterns and repetition, grouping elements 

👏👏 Breaking patterns and repetition, isolating elements

👏👏 Areas of contrast and color (but we'll talk about color later!) 

What do I mean by that?? Basically, draw a bunch of similar shapes and then draw a shape that is different, lol. Build a pattern and then break it. This is an easy way to craft a complicated image without overwhelming it with a million unique details. 

I'll use my inks as the example. Sometimes I do a second pencil pass to hammer out important details before I start to ink, but I didn't want the fish to look super realistic and boxes are easy to draw so I just went straight to final inks. 

Like the pencils, the foreground, midground and background are separated into different groups (I'm using photoshop btw). 

Here are areas where I'm establishing repetition, patterns, and groups. 

And areas where I'm breaking patterns and isolating elements

The case can be made that adding lots of similarly-shaped pattern-breaking elements are ALSO A PATTERN IN THEMSELVES. Galaxy brain stuff, I know. Anyhoo, this is just one of the ways I try to keep a very detailed background looking coherent! 

And now the figures, which DID get a second pencil pass because they looked like little blob people at first. 

Some final adjustments, took out a few figures, and then we've got finished inks for the whole illustration! 

The main trio are the ULTIMATE PATTERN BREAKER, as they are made up of bigger unbroken shapes compared to the very detailed background. This makes them easy to see and prevents them from getting lost in the detail sauce. 

The trio is heading more or less TOWARDS the camera, while the environmental perspective is more or less moving backwards into space, so that's ANOTHER way to create areas of contrast. 

So now we've gotten all the way through inks! Next will be color! Thanks for tuning in! 

If you'd like me to go further into detail on any part of this process, please let me know! 

-Mad