Introduction to Illustration

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During the course you will create a portfolio of work using a range of media and be given an insight into what's involved in setting up an illustration practice.

• Drawing exercises and a self portrait exercise
• Materials and mark making: experimenting with pen and ink, collage watercolour, pastel and mixed media in order to create imagery
• Editorial illustration: Analysis of existing editorial illustration, survey of contemporary editorial illustration, exploration of relationship between text and image, working on an editorial brief
• Editorial continued: Completing mixed media editorial brief including analysis and discussion of selecting appropriate materials and colours
• Narrative illustration: Exercise involving converting a written story into a panel or 8 images. Narrative illustration brief where students use randomly selected words to create a simple narrative which will be developed into a 6 page book
• Narrative illustration: Work continued working on completing book project
• Narrative illustration: Completion and group critique of book project. Then demonstrations on book cover illustration, hand drawn type and model making
• Book cover/ 3d illustration: students to work individually to create either a book cover image or a model based on their book
• Overview and discussion of contemporary Illustration Market, self-editing and creating a portfolio
• Photoshop basics: scanning and cleaning up work to create a series of jpegs for a web/print portfolio

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

• research, generate and communicate ideas to answer a brief
• explore working with a wide range of media, select medium appropriate to subject matter
• explore the relationship between text and image, evaluate context
• communicate a narrative through a single image and sequential narratives
• develop a print/ web portfolio