A Little about my “Sketchbooked” process. A lot of people have been asking me if my illustrations are watercolor, marker and paper… Not quite… I use illustrator and my nifty Intuous 4 tablet for everything—mostly for quick a turnover time, and I generally do them one day ahead of schedule, to give myself some breathing room and potential editing time.

I use some custom settings with the pen tool for tilt and pressure for diameter and stroke. For the fills, I layer shapes drawn with the pencil tool, with some custom settings and transparency. The “marker” and watercolor look reflects my analog style I have developed and use in my personal sketchbooks. I try to keep a sloppy hand style and a free stream of consciousness approach to making these, and try not to sweat details. Basically I build up a composition with coarse and sketchy gestures. Above you can see how the pieces are all really vector lines and shapes, as well as the amount of detail I am able to get with this process.

It will take me anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour to make one of my illustrations, I usually keep a desktop folder handy for collecting reference photos for my subjects. I find it difficult to find just the right pictures to reflect someone’s personality, and that actually may take longer than to illustrate.

So far this exercise in one a day illustrations has really improved my style and aesthetic. I have also noticed a big difference in the way I approach a lot of my design work. In addition, I have had a number of great conversations with my subjects after posting them—via social media / phone / etc, basically reconnecting in some way shape or form outside the occasional wall post… People have been very supportive of my efforts, and I hope I am able to continue throughout the year.

If you are reading this, thank you for viewing my fun little project. It has done a lot to keep me sane these past few weeks :).