ARTG 241 - Weekly Illos

Hey there! This blog will be documenting my weekly illustrations for the term ARTG 241 at VIU. Enjoy! :)

[kristinakoslow]

The First Sprout

For this final explorative illustration, I wanted to combine my admiration for space, my love for paper crafting, and the whimsical art style of children's books. My goal was to create a digital papercut aesthetic that evokes the nostalgia of hearing stories about space for the first time. My process began by creating the tunnel effect to achieve a dramatic depth of field. I built the layers from front to back, positioning planets and stars to emphasize the distance. To add a narrative element, I placed a seedling inside a glass dome in the foreground—a symbol of life in the void.

The biggest challenge was translating the tactile feel of physical paper into a digital medium. I overcame this by applying specific paper texture overlays and carefully manipulating drop shadows to separate the planes using clipping masks. This technical struggle turned into my favorite part of the experience. The final result definitely reflects my growth throughout the course and makes it my favorite illustration so far.

[kristinakoslow]

The Flow

People love sports! Different people coming together to do the same activity seemed like the perfect fit for the theme “People Doing Things & Texture.” Swimming was a great choice to combine fluid human movements with the dynamic surface of water. I used a top-down perspective to align the swimmers with the pool lines, creating a rhythmic geometry. To establish a clear focal point, I chose one person swimming in the opposite direction in a bright yellow swimsuit to create a complementary contrast against the blue water.

My biggest challenge was definitely the texturing process of the water. To make it feel alive, I manually warped the lane lines underwater to simulate refraction and used different textured watercolor brushes to achieve the look of a realistic water surface. To add even more realism, I varied the water contact of each body to create interesting layering and depth. As a final touch, I incorporated dramatic sunlight beaming into the room, giving the whole scene a polished feel. This process taught me a lot about how to combine texture and lighting to make a scene feel dynamic and alive, and I’m looking forward to using these techniques in the future.

[kristinakoslow]

The Pantry Party

My idea for the “Raster & Colour” theme was sparked by a recent trip to the grocery store. I noticed how colorful all the products looked together, and I realized this was the perfect concept: a “gallery wall” full of colorful pantry products. The connection to the theme with the "Colour" is in the vibrant labels, and the "Raster" is represented by the grid-like arrangement of the items.

As an enthusiastic doodler, I wanted to get back into using outlines. I’d never used Photoshop for drawing before, but I tried the Brush Pen and immediately fell in love with its chunky and organic look, which renewed my enthusiasm for outline-based illustration. The biggest challenge I faced was color balance. With so many different products, the illustration could have easily looked chaotic. My method to overcome this was to make each item stand out but also feel cohesive. I achieved this by strategically distributing a core set of colors across the entire product range. This "mix and matching" of colors created a balanced distribution that makes the whole composition feel unified and harmonious.

[kristinakoslow]

The Rising Giant

For this week's theme on “Tension & Focal Point,” I immediately had the idea of a giant wave forming in front of a surfer standing on a beach. This concept seemed perfect for reflecting the theme. I never painted waves before and texturing was always a difficult part of illustrating for me, so that was a new technical challenge I wanted to tackle. I tried to mimic an analog painting style for the wave, using different rough brushes to build up the form and achieve the dynamic power of the water. In comparison, the small figure of the surfer with his yellow surfboard creates a powerful focal point. This gets emphasised through a few key choices: the massive scale of the wave, the choice of complementary colors and the strong contrast in lights and shadows right at the center. The challenge to avoid distraction from the surfer by adding too much detail to the wave was a big one. But I learned a lot about how to use different brushes and blending to help guide the viewer’s eye and achieve the impactful end result.

[kristinakoslow]

The Midnight Snack

Recently when I was on my way home at night from a hiking day I drove by a vending machine standing isolated in front of a dark building, glowing in the dark. So I thought that it would be the perfect scene for this week's topic for my illustration: a basic shape. I decided on rectangles for the shapes and used them all over the illustration to enhance the theme. By intentionally choosing a deep blue color palette for the background and warm tones for the vending machine a strong warm-cold-color contrast is created, making the vending machine very inviting in the cold night environment. Additionally to achieve the moody night setting  the glowing light from the vending machine is the only bright spot in the illustration, creating a great contrast to guide the eyes straight to the midnight snacks. 

This illustration really got me into working with Adobe Illustrator, because I haven’t tried vector illustration much before, so it was a great learning curve for me on how to use the tools and effects of the program to create the end result. It really motivates me to try out more different techniques in the future on my illustration journey, but first: grab a snack!

[kristinakoslow]

The lonely seagull

I've always been fascinated by concept artists who can create entire landscapes with just a few brushstrokes. I wanted to try this minimalist approach for this illustration. My concept was a natural cliff formation on a coastline, where a lonely seagull looks out over the sea towards a flock of other gulls, all bathed in the soft light of the golden hour. The positioning of the cliffs and the curve of the beach were intended to guide the viewer's eye from the seagull in the foreground along a natural leading line to the flock in the distance. Using a deliberately limited color palette, I tried to implement this concept with simple shapes. This wasn't as easy as it sounds, as I often had to resist the temptation to add more detail. Placing the shadows correctly also proved to be more challenging than I initially thought, due to the specific lighting in the illustration. However, exploring the interplay between the foreground and background, the colors, and the overall composition was a very interesting process.

[kristinakoslow]

The Plane Fields

I stumbled upon the idea for this illustration while scrolling through Instagram, where I saw a post by Victoria Rose Richards, who creates beautiful cross-stitched aerial landscapes. My concept was to divide my landscape into two layers: the analog and the digital. To achieve this, I painted the fields and bodies of water using watercolors, creating an organic and textured look. In contrast, the top layer represents the digital realm, composed of clean-edged clouds and geometric shapes. A red airplane, positioned according to the golden ratio, serves as the focal point of the illustration. This fusion adds a depth to the overall picture that wouldn't be possible with a single medium. Although the two layers are so distinct, they complement each other perfectly, resulting in the beautiful composition I had envisioned.

[kristinakoslow]

The Highway Tunes

Music - that was the first thing that came to my mind when I read the topic "Composition & Scale". My goal was to combine the visual definition with the musical one. The idea of having cars drive as musical notes on staves seemed very exciting, and I wanted to illustrate it in a style I had never tried before: isometric. With this style I had the option to choose this unique perspective with the diagonal leading lines to achieve my vision. I was inspired by the mobile game "Crossy Road," which has a similar look and theme. As someone who usually works with more details, I challenged myself to use simple shapes and colors for this illustration, which was a great approach to learn something new and expand my drawing skills.