Illustration for the December issue of Go!

Here is illustration for the December issue of Go! magazine. I deviated a bit from my usual style of bold outlines. The main reason being that I cleaned my Lamy fountain pen and really wanted to use it again. In this article, Toast Coetzer  revels in the delightful details of a South African December.

"The inviting prospect of the year’s final school bell. Long-awaited leave which is about to commence. Starting the car early one morning with your sights set on the seaside. Yup, nothing quite beats that December feeling..."

Interesting project

November has turned out to be marathon length sprint, packed with interesting projects and manic deadlines. Among them, a three day graphic facilitation for Bain and company, South Africa (www.bain.com). It was an interesting job, for an interesting client with interesting content and the interesting thing is that I am not allowed to say anything about it because of the sensitivity of the information. So the best I can do is to post my drawings of the the workshop attendees and the view from the ninth floor of the hotel.

Educational illustration

I recently completed an educational project with a publishing house. My relationship with educational illustration is decidedly love-hate: Deadlines and budgets are always extremely tight and the illustrator has very little to no conceptual input.

On the flipside, I get a huge kick out of the practical application of the illustrations. Kids from everywhere in South Africa- some in remote areas  with very little visual stimulation - will see and use these illustrations. So the illustrations HAVE to be good enough. I still remember the influence that some textbook illustrations had on me as a child - especially biological and historical sketches that looked unfathomably difficult to draw. So I am very aware that kids will see this, maybe try and copy it (like I did) and base some of their perceptions on it. Which sometimes freaks me out and sometimes excites me.

Below are some drawings portraying a Xhosa wedding. And here, a link to the wonderful blog of the photographer Monica Dart  (www.monicadart.co.za) whose Xhosa wedding images I used as reference.

Big thumbs up to Conceptual eyes!

I recently collaborated with a company called Conceptual eyes (www.conceptualeyes.co.za)
And was I impressed. Conceptual eyes is a one of a kind South African company. They use all kinds of creative techniques (graphic facilitation, graffiti artists etc)  and methods to tailor make creative communication solutions for businesses. Obviously, the part that I am the most interested in is that they use graphic facilitation as one of their strategies – which is what I was sub contracted for.

Compared to the overseas market, graphic facilitation is relatively unknown in South Africa, with only a few practitioners going it on their own as freelancers. Conceptual eyes bridge a very important gap for me. They do the hard yards in terms of hustling the corporate market and bring in the creatives to do what they are good at.

Most importantly, they are educating the market about graphic facilitation and what it can do and is simultaneously creating an appetite for it in the marketplace. And as a result, everybody benefits.

And they treat you like absolute royalty.A big thumbs up to conceptual eyes!

Hepstar whiteboard animation

Fine-line recently produced a whiteboard animation for Hepstar, a digital travel insurance distributor. The animation was used at a trade show in Singapore, to highlight the details of what Hepstar has to offer. It was lot of fun and I learned quite a few about how the travel business works. 

So go ahead, have a look!

2015 - almost done

To me, it still feels to like April, as if the year is just getting momentum. But somehow we're in November already and time is running out for tying up the loose ends of 2015. Good luck with the end of year craziness - It's enough to drive any one to carbs.

Welcome Fine-line's brand new blog!

Fine-line now also has a blog - to keep you updated with what's going on behind the scenes. 

I do a monthly editorial illustration for Go! magazine, which is an awesome client to work for. They allow me do almost whatever I want - I don't even have to send rough sketches. As it is a travel magazine, the articles can drive one mad with jealousy. People get paid to travel (!) and I get paid to draw what they write about what they experienced - which is also not bad.

So November's article by Kate Sherry was about the spoils of a hot bath after hard travelling, as the blurb states:

"Life’s simplest pleasures – like taking a hot bath – can be its greatest pleasures too. Just as long as there’s really hot water in the pipes, and if you can figure out which tap is the hot one, before it’s too late…"