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Computer Arts November 2008 www.computerarts.co.uk

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www.computerarts.co.uk Computer Arts December 2008

  Technique 87

02 Create theinitial drawing o thelea, starting with asilhouette. In this caseI’ve set the strokeweight to 1pt.

01  I particularly like towork with existingimages. A riend omine, Brandon Savoy, aphotographer based inLA, gave me this phototo work with. You canuse any image to makeyour own art, but Irecommend startingwith a strong, inspiringinitial idea. This willdenitely makecreating an appealingillustration easier.

03 Draw thinwhite lines, using thePen tool, to dene thelea. Start with abolder line and trail ito to a thinner line tolook like ink pen.

Illustrator CS2Photoshop CS2 and later

Creatingorganicillustration

Doug Alves revealsthe thinking and

methods behind hisincredible artworkI’m really into nature. Organic details always serve as an inspirationto me. When I was kid, I used to spend my vacations in a small,peaceul town that was nature-rich, and when I was researching ormy own style I just brought my childhood into my illustrations. Thisis particularly true or my illustrations o birds. My grandatherloved birds, and I always associated his image with them.

In this tutorial I’m going to share some o the techniquesI’ve been using on my projects to create plants and birds. This imagewas specially created or this tutorial.

Doug AlvesA sel-taught

Brazilian artist andillustrator based inLos Angeles, Dougworks acrossinteractive, print andvideo media. Hisclient list includes

Microsot Zune, theBBC, Burtonsnowboards, MTVand Coca-Cola. Tond out more visitwww.nacionale.net

SkillsCompositionAdding detailsCreating aninked pen look inIllustrator

04 Next, add small dots usingthe Ellipse tool to give to your lea moredepth and add a touch o realism.

On the discYou can nd Doug’snal Photoshop lein Disc Contents\Resources\Organic

Time needed4 hours

05 Create an organic-lookingnode using the Pen tool, and add moreleaves in dierent positions to begin tobring more detail to your plant design.

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12 To increase the sense o depth, add ashadow to the vine. I just duplicate the layer anduse the Perspective tool (Edit>Transorm>Perspective). Follow the vine like a shadow would– the Perspective tool is very dynamic but also verysensitive. Once you’re happy adjust the opacity othe new layer to 10%.

13 With all the elements in placein Photoshop, give your image a nalcheck or composition and balance.Make sure there’s enough spacebetween each element and that yourcentral character has room to breathe.

10 Open Photoshop and import yourmain image and any background you want to

use. You can import your Illustrator elementsas Smart Objects, but I preer to copy andpaste the elements as pixels, as this speedsup perormance. Group and label yourelements in Layer sets or quicker editing.

11 Using the Brush tool and a round brush,draw a central vine lea to wrap around the mainimage. Then start layering up the elements,experimenting with space and composition.

08 In this instance, however, I’ve chosen a blackfower. Combining all the fower elements, I came up withthis composition. Add your other elements, such as vinesand leaves, in Illustrator, but bear in mind that the nalcomposition needs balance.

07 Set the stroke to 0.5pt to beginwith and then experiment with dierentstroke weights. You can always reverse outthe colours rom white to black i your imagehas a lighter background.

09 I also decided to add a bird to my composition.Again in Illustrator, start out by creating a silhouette likewe did in step 2, then experiment with stroke weights,adding details until you’re happy with the look.

06 You can use the sametechnique to create the fowers.Experiment with initial sketches inIllustrator using an existing image as abase. Here I’ve added lines to make thefower more detailed.

Careful use of detail

  I you want to stay with awhite fower, rather than choose a blackone as I have in step 8, you might chooseto add more details. Little dots like we’veused in step 4, or instance, will give toyour fower more depth. More details arealways welcome, although be careul notgo overboard with this technique. There issuch a thing as detail overload, and youdon’t want your image to look messy.

Computer Arts December 2008 www.computerarts.co.uk

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