Off to College

I did this illustration for a story about what to take and what not to take when you go to college. The general idea I'm trying to get across is "you don't have to bring everything! Travel light." The story (here) is more helpful than that.

I left the underdrawings in because I like underdrawings. I will confess that in several places I have faked underdrawings where I accidentally deleted the originals. When I leave underdrawings in my work I will go further and avow that I tidy up, recolor, erase and redraw the underdrawings if they don't look right to me. Why not? I think it looks cool and no one will ever know!

I was asked for spot illustrations to go on the inside pages. We could have cropped in on parts of the main art, repeating portions of the image and saving work, but I've never been fond of that treatment. As a member of the audience, I don't want to open the page and look at bits and pieces of something that I looked at on the front.

These were quick work for me and a lot of fun. I don't know if these are "my style" or not, they look different to me than my regular work, but I'm not sure what "my style" is.

I just scrolled down the page and I wonder how my work comes across. I see a variety of approaches with a similar flavor, but then I see things that look like they've been imported from another artist entirely.

Is this guy versatile or unfocused? Maybe both.

The End

Here is how it looked in the paper: