I want to say that you should have a professional designer for every job, but I realize that some companies don’t. Whether it’s a budget issue or a general disdain for people in the artistic community, the reason doesn’t really matter. You’ve decided to take on the job of a graphic designer and need some advice. Well, here are a few simple tips.

Break Up Your Copy
Break up your text into smaller digestible chunks. You can separate out your text by making columns, headlines, captions or just smaller text blocks or paragraphs. It’s good to think of your text as a shape or various individual shapes. This will help you draw out your layout.

Sketch Your Layout
It’s good to create a little sketch of what you want your layout to look like. I’m not talking about anything detailed just a general blueprint with simple shapes or boxes that represent images or text. Think of your layout as a bunch of empty boxes or rectangles that need filled with images or text.

Think About Order of Information
Imagine that the viewer isn’t going to read everything on the page and organize the information accordingly. What is the most important information that you want to make sure your viewer sees? What is the least important? Do your headlines separate from the body copy? Are your captions competing for too much attention. Things that are important are usually larger than the unimportant information.

Get Great Images
Great images will help your design look professional. You can choose from thousands of great images for cheap at many of the microstock sites like istockphoto.com. It’s worth it to get the right image that fits the theme of your design. Also, getting an image at the proper resolution will make sure that your image prints properly.

Keep it Simple and Organized
Try to keep your design simple and organized. You want your design to looked planned and uniform. Limit yourself to a few colors, fonts and font sizes. Make sure things line up at the edges. Keep items of similar importance the exact same size. The best designs are often the simplest. Don’t try to overwhelm people with too much information or images.

Well, that’s all my tips for the amateur designer. Remember if you make a mess of your layout, the professionals are always eagerly waiting to clean up your disaster. Best of luck!

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com. Content copyright 2007 Cory Thoman.

You may have heard the expression, “It’s not what you know, but who you know.” Well, that is the basic premise behind networking. It’s all about making contacts in your field that could lead to work in the future. But if your antisocial and curmudgeonly like me, the outside world frightens and confuses you. I don’t care what they say. Keeping those whippersnappers off my lawn is a full time job. All joking aside, here a few ways to go out and meet other artists. 

Conferences
No matter what your into, there is probably a conference for it. Conferences are a great way to learn new things and meet people in your industry. The only problem is many of them are expensive and outside of town. 

MeetUp.com
If you’re looking for something closer to home, then try meetup.com. I recently found a figure drawing group near my house that was a lot of fun. If you’re feeling real ambitious, you could probably start your own group. 

MySpace
Apparently, MySpace isn’t just for kids anymore. I read that the average user was 35. That being said, MySpace is a great way to keep up with your friends that are scattered all over the country. I recently contacted a bunch of friends from art school to see what they have been up to since school. One of my friends had been working at the Cartoon Network and ended up getting me a freelance job there. Who would have guessed that being friendly would pay off. 

Forums
There are many great forums and other online communities where artist gather to show their work and talk shop. iStockphoto, a microstock site, has a pretty active forum community. They also have regular conference events. 

Hopefully, that helps you get out and make some contacts and friends. It’s nice to have other artists to talk with about your work. Best of luck!

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.comContent copyright 2007 Cory Thoman. 

Gradients seem to be one of the most abused features in Adobe Illustrator. With that said, I thought I’d create a gradient demo, so you can abuse them in a whole new way. You might want to look at my 4 Step Gradient tutorial before you read this demo. Enjoy!

Before I start the tutorial, here is a detail of the finished illustration.

I start by placing my sketch in Illustrator. Go to File > Place and choose the sketch. Since I’m going to want to have easy access to the sketch as I refer back to it, I put it on its own layer. Then I trace around the outline of the sketch and fill it with a solid dark color. I chose a dark brown because I wanted the illustration to have a old classic monster feel.

Next, I start creating the bandages from my sketch. To create the bandages, I draw a long thin curved shape that comes to a point on each end. Then, I take this shape and copy it several times with each shape slightly overlapping. I copy it by holding down option (ALT) and dragging it. I do this until it is the proper height of the individual bandage. Once it is the correct height and any minor tweaking is made, I select all the shapes that belong to the one bandage and Unite them with the pathfinder palette. To open the pathfinder palette go to Window and choose Pathfinder. The Unite is the first button on the top left. With the shapes selected, hit the Unite button and expand.

I draw the other bandage shapes the same way, then add a radial gradient to them. I use the same dark brown I used earlier for the darkest color in my gradient. I also pick a yellowish beige for the lightest color. Finally, I choose a brownish color that is in between my light and dark color. I use the gradient tool to adjust the direction of the light on each piece. The gradient tool is located on the tool bar. Once you have the gradient tool selected, select the piece you want to adjust and then click and drag in the direction you want the light to go.

Next, I draw the shapes for the cheeks and mouth. After those are drawn, I add the same gradient as I used for the bandages. I use the gradient tool to adjust the direction of the light and adjust the gradient if I think it needs to be darker or lighter.

I wanted the cheek bones to pop out a little more and the nose area to recede, so I created additional shapes for those. Again, I used the same gradient for the new shapes, but I lightened the cheek bones 2 lighter colors and darkened the noses 2 lighter colors. Also for the cheek bones, I added another color after my darkest color on my gradient slider. The color was slightly lighter than the darkest color. This gives me a nice half light.

I continue with the same process for the eyes. Again, I lightened my gradient slightly and added a half light.

I draw a circle for the irises of the eyes and create a shape that will be a drop shadow on the eyes. I went with a slightly greener gradient for the irises. For the drop shadow over the eyes I used a flat color that was darker than the eyes.

Next, I draw more circles for the pupils. The pupil gradient has two steps. The dark brown I’ve been using and a lighter color. Using the gradient tool on the pupil, I pull a very short line to get an abrupt contrast between the light and dark color. This gives me a nice highlight dot on the pupil.

Finally I add the nose hole and a few detail like facial creases and liver spots. The facial creases are drawn the same way as the bandages were and the liver spots are just different sized circles.

Well, that is basically it. Hopefully, that helps you create some better gradients.

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com. Content copyright 2008 Cory Thoman.

Here is a simple way to create great gradients in Adobe Illustrator. It is a four step gradient consisting of a highlight, light, shadow and half light.

The sphere has a radial gradient and the cylinder uses a linear gradient. I added an extra light step on the cylinder, so it would look a little darker on the edge. Check out my gradient tutorial to see gradients in action.

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com Content copyright 2007 Cory Thoman.

Below is a tutorial I’ve written for a cartoon character created in Adobe Illustrator. Feel free to check out my other tutorials here. Enjoy! I start with placing a scanned pencil sketch in Illustrator. Go to File > Place and choose the sketch file. I usually use 72 dpi grayscale scans.

Next, I use the pen tool to trace over my scan. I like to use a color stroked line because it is easier to see. I also close all my paths, so each piece is an individual complete shape.

I remove the sketch once I’m finished tracing.

After I finish tracing, I eliminate the stroke and fill everything with black. With all my shapes still selected, I use object > offset path and set that to -1 pt. This will copy the shapes only 1 pt smaller. These new shapes I fill with white, so I can see them.

Next, I usually like to thicken up my black line by using the offset path again. I also like to scale the new black shapes to get a little line weight variation. Once I have my line weights correct, I zoom in close to make sure that none of my pieces have moved out of place.

Once my black and white lines look right, I start coloring. I start by filling my white shapes with basic flat colors.

After I’ve picked out the flat colors, I start drawing my shadow shapes with the pen tool. Remember to close the path on those too, so they are complete shapes.

Now, I use the pathfinder tools. Go to Window > Pathfinder to make sure the Pathfinder palette is open. The Pathfinder tools are used to combine or cut up two separate shapes. For this example, I’m going to use the Intersect Shape Areas.

First, I need to duplicate the the orange shell shape. I start by selecting the orange shell shape, then double click on the rotate symbol in the tool bar. This will bring up a dialogue box. I set the degrees to 0 and click COPY. This will create a duplicate orange shell shape in the exact same spot.

Next, I select my shadow shape and go to Object > Arrange > Send to Back. With the shadow shape still selected, I shift click on the orange shell. Now that I have both shapes selected, I go to the pathfinder palette and click on Intersect and then Expand. This creates a new shape where the two shapes intersected. I fill this shape with a slightly darker color to make it look like a shadow.

I repeat the last step with the yellow body, the eyes and the drop shadow under the shell.

After I finish the shadows, I can also add in highlights if necessary.

I hope this tutorial helps you create some great characters in Illustrator. Illustrator is great for creating cartoons like this, and also when you need to create files for online brochure printing or printed postcards.

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com. Content copyright 2010 Cory Thoman. This post contains advertising links. Please read the About & Policies for more information.

I don’t claim to be the master of drawing. I don’t have my own show where I paint “happy trees”, but these are tips that have helped me over the years.

Simplify Everything
Illustration is about finishing things on a deadline. Don’t waste time on details that aren’t necessary. Break your drawing down into simpler shapes, lines, details and shadows. If it doesn’t work as a simple line drawing, it doesn’t matter how much detail you slap on it. I used to draw every miniscule muscle sinew, but I realized those details weren’t adding to my drawings. I like to keep my lines and shapes simpler now. I try to remember that I’m drawing a cartoon not giving an anatomy lesson. Also, Keep your details simple. You don’t have to draw every strand of hair or wrinkle on a persons head. I’ve seen people add lots of detail to a drawing that lacked a quality basic shape. Finally, keep your shading simple. Think of your shadows as one flat tone shape. You can always add in highlights and half lights later if you think it needs it.

Draw Through Objects
No, I’m not referring to some kind of super power that allows you to pass through solid matter. I’m talking about drawing underlying guidelines and shapes to establish the overall form of an object or person. Even though you don’t see bones and muscles on every person, they are there. Think of it like building a house. You don’t build the roof and then the walls. You build the frame, then add all the exterior details. Think of your sketch as the blueprint for the final illustration. Although you’re probably going to simplify things for a cartoon, having an anatomy book as reference is a good idea.

Exaggerated Lie
Yeah, I know what your Momma said about lying, but just tell her about this quote from Picasso. “Art is a lie that tells the truth.” Illustration is a representation of reality, so you want your cartoons to be an exaggeration of reality. Cartoon characters having three fingers is a good example. I had a client ask me why my characters only had three fingers and I said it just looked better. Think about what elements should be exaggerated to have your drawing make more sense. What things aren’t important or should be down played. Sometimes a little lie isn’t so bad.

Redraw
You don’t have to achieve perfection on the first shot. Redraw things or move objects around to get a better drawing or composition. I think of illustrators as professional tracers because we’re always redrawing or tweaking things. Sometimes for yourself or for clients. I’ll often do head studies or do composition thumbnails on a separate sheet before I start my sketch. If I like any of the head studies, then I’ll trace them into my sketch. Lets just say I love my light table.

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com Content copyright 2007 Cory Thoman.

Before I share my microstock earnings for October, I wanted to give a brief explanation of what microstock is. Microstock companies are very similar to regular stock photography and illustration companies. Artists resell their images as royalty free for a commission. The main difference between stock and microstock is the price. Microstock sites sell images at a much lower price. The philosophy is that the prices are more affordable, so you should get more sales. Think of them as the Walmarts of the stock industry. I have been uploading images for about a year, and, so far, microstock has been fairly profitable for me.I have images at several different microstock sites. Here is the breakdown of my earnings from October 2007: 

Shutterstock – 44%
iStockphoto – 37%
Dreamstime – 11%
StockXpert – 4%
Big Stock Photo – 2%
Fotolia – 2% 

My portfolio is all illustrations, so photography may sell better or worse on some sites. Also, I didn’t want to put an exact dollar figure or how many images I have in my gallery because everyone’s work will sell a little differently. All that said, this should give you a rough idea of which sites are the best earners.

This post was written on IllustrationInfo.com Content copyright 2007 Cory Thoman.

[tags]Microstock, Stock, iStock, Earnings, Passive Income, Illustration[/tags]