Illustration Process

When I set about creating a new illustration, I literally surround myself with things that help create the right atmosphere and get myself into the right creative groove. In this case, I want to do a Beauty and the Beast piece. My sketch of Belle's face is in the middle and I surround my canvas with things that inspire me: illustration styles or screen shots from the movie that are capturing the right emotions or styles. I'm also either playing the movie or music from the movie to get into the groove. If it's not a fan art, then I will surround my illustration with things that have some artistic value that plays into what I am creating.

Very similarly to this video, I'll find my self saying the quotes and singing the song from the movies.

What's also strange is that when creating characters, I almost never create the head/body at the same time. I tend to draw both separately and then put them together like some sort of whimsical frankensteining.

Also, it's most likely that I need more sketching time, but my characters almost always look much different than the sketch. I typically just get the sketch close to what I think I like, then jump into illustrator. Then, iterate and tweak until I like what I see. This can sometimes take ages.

I typically never showed a lot of process, because, honestly, it doesn't get a lot of praise or likes, making me think it doesn't have a lot of value. Actually, I think that process has MUCH more value than final shots because of its teaching nature.

I think Dribbble needs to see more process — I'm really interested in the process of others. I'd love to see more of this from the people who create amazing.