Click on the thumbnails to see a larger image. Production notes can be found at the bottom of the page.

When I was in graduate school in the mid-1970s, I began illustrating to supplement my poverty-level student income. Because of my fine arts background I moonlighted as a magazine illustrator—secretly, since we fine arts students thought creating commercial artwork was prostitution. Even though we studied art history, somehow we missed the fact that all the greatest artists from Leonardo to Velasquez were, in effect, commercial artists working for paying patrons (usually the church or rich noblemen). After graduation and a few years of living abroad, I decided to become an illustrator full-time. Needing to earn a living trumped my grad school snootiness.

When I started my business the personal computer hadn’t made a mark in the graphic design world (the tiny Mac Classic didn’t arrive until 1984 with its puny 2 megabytes of RAM). I remember in the early 1980s receiving a survey in the mail asking how I anticipated the computer would change my industry. I remember thinking, “What a bizarre question. What are they thinking?” My airbrush was all I needed, and I used it 8 to 12 hours a day, with semi-regular all-nighters thrown in for good measure. I stayed busy because I could illustrate in almost any style that my clients requested, from hyper-realism to New Yorker–style cartoons, to car engine cut-aways and romance novel book covers. Many times I was asked to “ape” someone else’s style, which meant creating an illustration that copied another illustrator’s work (usually identified in a dog-eared illustration annual). I’m not too proud to admit I obliged. I also provided airbrushed photo retouching, illustrated logos and black and white line art using Rapidograph pens. Finally, and perhaps most archaic by today’s standards, I created airbrushed color gradations which were color separated with production cameras, and used by graphic designers in their layouts (no scanners yet).

Illustrating was a physical function requiring natural hand-eye coordination, and because it was heavily based on realism, a lot of the illustrators working today in less realistic styles would have had a hard time of it. Everything had to be drawn from scratch, and once it was down on illustration board it was a pain in the you-know-what to make revisions. There were no graphics programs like Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop allowing designers to pull off passable illustrations by layering images and applying filters. For years after the computer made an impact in the graphic arts industry I continued my traditional illustration work, since a lot of the earliest versions of the software had artistic and technical limitations.

That was then and this is now. Today I wonder if I could even launch a career solely as an illustrator. Due in part to the explosion of low-cost stock illustration the market has deteriorated. I actually got paid more money for a magazine cover 25 years ago than I’m offered today. And there are just so many more illustrators out there vying for a shrinking market. Shrinking? Yes, print is shrinking. Magazines and newspapers, once the bastion of illustrators’ work, are going out of business left and right.

So do I think it was better in the good ‘ole days? No way! I don’t miss the all-nighters and the airbrush fumes in the least. Although the tools have changed, the talent level of many of today’s young illustrators is very high. In fact, there is a much broader diversity of illustration styles today than when I started, and I believe there will always be a market for outstanding illustration.

So to you young people starting a career in illustration I have some parting suggestions:

1. Define your illustration style; don’t have it defined by your digital tools.
2. Make sure you are communicating a concept first and foremost. That is the purpose of commercial illustration, not just making cool images.
3. Market yourselves continually. Today you can work for clients all over the world but you have to stay before your buyers continuously.
4. Aim for a signature style that is yours alone.
5. Be passionate about illustration. Without a total commitment to the medium, it will be difficult to make it for the long haul.

Production notes:

Top: This illustration (complete with airbrushed lettering) was inspired by the Raiders of the Lost Ark franchise. It was used on a poster that sold archival microfilm services to libraries. Even though there were drum scanners for imaging reflective art at the time, this illustration was sent to a prepress company in South Carolina and was color separated using a production camera. It was the last painting of mine that ever got color separated by a camera, and I remember the quality of the reproduction was superb. Medium: Airbrush. 1991

Second: I produced several paintings for cover art for a 3-book western-themed series of novels. This was the best painting of the lot, and as far as I can remember the series of paintings for this client was the last artwork I did using the airbrush. The author’s friend was the model for the lead character (who shot an awful lot of folks in the story). I used to do a lot of this kind of book cover artwork, but no more. Medium: Airbrush. 2005

Third: This illustration was used on a magazine cover for a religious magazine, and the lead article was entitled something like “Good Christians and Better Sex.” The publisher wanted a kind of Henri Rousseau look and feel. Medium: Airbrush. 1987

Fourth: Feeling I needed a  stylistic change for my cartoon work, this was an attempt to develop a more contemporary approach. I did a lot of this type of cartoon work in the early 1990s. Medium: Airbrush. 1993

Fifth: Entitled “It’s How You Play the Game,” this illustration highlighted a magazine article about how parents get overly passionate about their kids’ activities. Medium: Airbrush. 1992

Sixth: This was the first illustration that led to my current style. It grew out of a mid-life crisis, where I felt I wasn’t relevant as an illustrator and I needed a more current approach. The artwork accompanied an article about switching careers and was entitled “Could a Change Do you Good?” it was done as a two-color, full-page interior illustration. Medium: Vector. 1999

Seventh: This is one of my favorite illustrations in my signature style. This piece has been well received and won more awards than any of my other illustrations.  I’m sure this style will change with time, but for now I am very satisfied with continuing to explore this visual approach. Medium: Vector. 2007

Tags: airbrush, Dave Hile, illustration

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 7th, 2009 at 2:48 pm and is filed under Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.