Jim Hatch recently completed this great project for Volkswagen, featuring finely detailed and rendered cutaway illustrations of their entire vehicle lineup. After the break, he shares some insight on working on a project of this scale, some process work, and lots of beautiful final illustrations.
Corvette Cutaway Illustration by David Kimble © Copyright General Motors
Davvi wrote in to tell me about this somewhat hidden collection of technical illustrations and photography of the Chevy Volt. Very cool stuff, hopefully that link doesn’t disappear!
From there I found my way to GM’s excellent media portal which provides official content and high resolution images for news and editorial outlets. Digging around in the photo section yielded some awesome finds like the huge David Kimble airbrushed cutaway illustration above. Try searching for illustration, cutaway, and rendering, you’ll love what you find!
Know of any other manufacturers with public media portals? Let us know in the comments!
Master technical illustrator David Kimble makes a cameo in this mini-documentary about Marfa, Texas. This has me wishing for a full-length documentary on the prolific artist himself.
Much more info on Mr. Kimble via Kevin Hulsey
Traditionally painted cross-section of a space ship from Star Wars Episode II
There are many unique forms of technical illustration out there. Some illustrators from time to time get to expand the realm of technical illustration by depicting not only what exists in our real world and what makes it work, but get the opportunity to reveal the inner workings of fictional vehicles and worlds.
Richard Chasemore has worked for various clients throughout the years producing detailed work and is well known for his works featured in DK publishing and Lucas Books’ Star Wars: Complete Cross Sections and Star Wars: Complete Locations. I recently had the opportunity to ask him a few questions:
What is your background? What inspired/got you into the field of technical illustration?
I did a four year course in technical illustration at Bournemouth and Poole College of Art and Design. I came across the course quite by accident when I jumped on a school bus that took me to the Art College and when I saw the technical illustration department I just said to myself that’s what I want to do.
How did you start working for DK publishing? What were some of the projects that you did for them?
I was working on the See Inside series of books for DK when Hans started work on the Star Wars Project and I was brought in to help out.
What led you to produce the Star Wars Complete Locations and Complete Cross Sections books as well as later works for Indiana Jones? What was it like working for Lucas?
The locations books were incredibly hard work, but great fun as was the Indiana Jones arts. Everyone at Lucas Films were amazingly kind to us, letting Hans and I work in the art department alongside their amazing artists. We did meet Mr. Lucas and he was a really nice guy.
What is your process like?
Starting with very simple pencil works, building up to a complicated finished pencil which is then inked and painted in gouache.
What was your favorite thing you’ve worked on or best experience you’ve had so far as a technical illustrator?
I am working on Incredible Cross Sections Clone Wars at the moment which is all done in 3D and is looking amazing.
Any advice to technical illustrators just starting out?
Just keep working, day and night!
Richard’s work can be found at RichardChasemore.co.uk
“Any subject-matter is no more, or less, complicated than any other if you break it into small enough sections. A big, complex object like a car, plane or ship is just 30 or 40 small illustrations that happen to occupy the same space.”
The career of technical illustrator extraordinaire Kevin Hulsey is nothing short of prolific. His client list reads like a roll call of the world’s major transportation, technology, manufacturing and entertainment companies. His work has been recognized with numerous awards from Belding, Best in the West, Communication Arts Magazine, and the Art Directors Club Of Los Angeles. He began his trade with an airbrush in hand, then traded it in for a Wacom tablet and made the leap to digital media. And his website is an abundant source of inspiration, with illustrations of mind-boggling complexity and accuracy and myriad resources, articles and tutorials.
This all keeps Mr. Hulsey rather busy—unfortunately for us too busy for an interview. However, with his permission, I’ve collected some links to images, resources, and an interview he did with another site:
Pickup Truck Cutaway – Copyright © 2010 Kevin Hulsey Illustration, Inc. All rights reserved.
Motor Illustration – Copyright © 2010 Kevin Hulsey Illustration, Inc. All rights reserved.
“Even after nearly thirty years, and thousands of illustrations, it is still fun to see your work on a billboard or in a magazine, particularly when you aren’t expecting it.”
Big thanks to Mr. Hulsey for sharing his time and work with us, and all the amazing resources on his site!
Update: Wacom case-study on Mr. Hulsey. (now on Internet Archive)
All images copyright © 2010 Kevin Hulsey Illustration, Inc. All rights reserved.
The biggest news story of the past two months is highly technical and happening beneath 5,000 feet of water. These obstacles make technical illustration the obvious medium for telling the story. Collected here are illustrations and graphics from various sources, showing their visual approach to communicating the information. (Mouseover for source, click for larger version)
The New York Times‘ illustrations are well designed and executed in a graphic style typical for newspapers. Black lines delineate the key information, both a visual strategy and a production consideration (black prints well on grainy paper in fast presses, since it’s a single plate). Deep-red lines and arrows call the eye’s attention to important details. Light colour tones provide additional information such as material, dimension/shading, or simply visual separation. A variety of views are used, elevations, isometrics, perspectives, whatever suits the content. Nice stuff here.
Infographic World‘s ambitious graphic attempts to tell the entire story, relying heavily on text, but ends up feeling cluttered, unfocused and disorganized. The individual illustrations feel underdeveloped.
NOLA/Times-Picayune‘s graphics are similar in style to The Times’, but with a much thicker line weight which makes me think they might have appeared smaller in print. The multitude of arrows really get in the way of the information. A bit heavy handed.
The Economist is a weekly news magazine, but the illustration doesn’t have much to show for the extra time (to be fair, there’s no telling what sort of turnaround time the illustrator was given).
BP employs slick [no pun intended] 3D renderings to communicate the company’s repair efforts and give the impression of openness and transparency. I have two problems with this. First, they feel expensive. I imagine BP already had a 3D model library of all their equipment for planning and presentation purposes, so this may very well be the most cost-effective visual solution for them. But the impression these polished 3D renderings give is that they’re spending a lot on visuals, when they should be devoting all their resources to the repair and cleanup process.
Secondly, 3D renderings feel like constructed illusions rather than explanatory depictions of their efforts. Maybe it’s my bias towards illustration since both are just as artifical (ie. not photographs or videos), but I find The Times’ illustrations more trustworthy than BP’s 3D world.
The New York Times. “Methods That Have Been Tried to Stop the Leaking Oil”
Infographic World. “Crude Awakening”
NOLA.com. “Oil Spill Graphics”
The Economist. “Mudslinging”
Unified Command for the BP Oil Spill. “Graphics”
BP. “Gulf of Mexico Response”
Have you seen any additional illustrations of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill? Let us know in the comments!
Bill Fehr is a technical illustration veteran, with 20 years experience in the field. In this interview, we discuss the technical skills, the ongoing learning of new software and technologies, and the exploration of new business models necessary for a sustainable career in illustration.
What is your background? How did you get into technical illustration?
I have worked and lived in St. Louis my whole life. I graduated in 1982 with an Associate in Applied Science degree in Technical Illustration from Meramec Community College here in St. Louis. I later went back and got my Bachelors in Business Management.
Since I was in High School I knew that I wanted to become a technical illustrator. That idea came to me when I was in drafting class and in the text book we were using was a description of what a technical illustrator does. It was accompanied by a photo of a guy using an airbrush to create a concept rendering of a car. That was it for me.
I was lucky enough to land a job as a technical illustrator before I graduated with my illustration degree. This was in the 80’s mind you so there were no computers. Everything was hand drawn. I was lucky enough back then to work for a small company where I had to learned to wear many hats. It was there that I learned to spec type, create photostats, airbrush, knockout backgrounds in photos, take photos, and paste up documents by hand.
In the eighties we didn’t have the advantages we have today of tracing digital photos or importing CAD data. Illustrations were created by extracting dimensions from blue prints or measuring actual parts. We would draw out the illustration in pencil first on a sheet of velum. We would then lay over that a sheet of mylar and “ink” the illustration using technical pens and templates. Inking was an art all by itself and one that I still miss to this day.
I have seen many changes over the 20-plus years that I have been doing this. The one thing that has never changed is the need for visual communication. The only difference between then and now is how it is created and how it is delivered.
How do you work? Employed, freelance or somewhere in between?
Currently I am employed by American Power Conversion as a technical writing manager. Our department creates installation, operation, maintenance, and service documents, just to name a few. In the evenings and weekend creating stock illustrations and photographs. I do very little freelance work. It requires much more time than I am willing to give these days.
What’s your favorite kind of project?
I still find black and white line art to be the most fun. Though at first it seems like it would be the easiest I find the opposite can to be true. You don’t have color, transparency, or animation to get you out of tough situations. All that you have to use to communicate is a black line. What you do with that line, now that is what makes all the difference. To me it’s very Zen-like.
Any advice for technical illustrators just starting out?
Experience with software is secondary to technical knowledge. Anyone can learn software. The ones that can get themselves out of tough situations without using software in as a crutch are the ones that I respect the most. That’s not to say the you don’t need to know how to use Illustrator, or CorelDRAW, or whatever. In fact, the better you know the software the better you can illustrate because the software is not “getting in your way.” I’m just saying that you shouldn’t rely on the software to replace technical knowledge. There were many times where I had to rely on my technical training to get me through projects that had no reference photos or CAD data. All I had was a rough prototype and some napkin sketches.
What is your software of choice?
Everyone has their favorite software. This is usually the software that they have used the most and are most familiar with. For many years I have used CorelDRAW exclusively. Once I started getting into stock illustration however I started to migrate over to Adobe Illustrator because stock agencies require an Illustrator version 8 compatible EPS file. It was much easier to make the transition to AI than it was to go through the process of exporting Draw files over to Illustrator, make correction, then export to EPS. I also moved to an iMac recently so that drove my decision to move Illustrator as well.
I have used a few vector illustrations packages over the years, CorelDRAW, Corel Designer, Xara Xtreme, IsoDraw, Deneba Canvas, and Adobe Illustrator. I also have used Solid Edge, SoldWorks, AutoCad, Maya, 3D Studio Max, and Blender for 3D modeling and rendering work.
Most of my experience has been with CorelDRAW. It has, I believe, one of the best toolsets for technical black and white line art. It allows you to draw with much more precision and at a higher rate of speed than other programs. I have also created a custom technical illustration toolbar that I use within DRAW which helps me get through an illustration pretty fast. I also like that the overall file size is small. CorelDRAW is great for those just starting out because it is inexpensive.
The downside to CorelDRAW is that it is a bit buggy and will crash at the drop of a hat. I have learned to save versions of the file that I am working on just in case of such a crash. CorelDRAW does create backup files and crash recovery files but they are not always usable.
You sell stock illustration via iStockPhoto, Shutterstock and Dreamstime. What has your experience been with this?
I love the microstock business. It’s kind of the best of both worlds. On one hand I can create what I want when I want and still get paid. Of course the more your work aligns with the needs of the customers the more money you will make.
The stock photography and illustration business can be tough to define. What is going on is your trying to guess what somebody might need. You want to create images that can be incorporated into design pieces, film, advertising, mailers, etc. You can try to communicate concepts or ideas like space travel or a health care. It can be fun and challenging.
I think creating stock images fits my personality and lifestyle better than doing freelance work. I am under no pressure and I can work whenever I want. I have done my share of freelance and I don’t care for having to find the jobs during the day then working evenings, weekends and holidays to get it done.
Bill’s technical illustration work can be found at TekART Technical Illustration, and his fine art and photography at BillFehr.com.
Wallis Autogyro Cutaway
Flightglobal has scanned, digitized and made available every issue of Flight Magazine published between 1909 and 2005 – that’s 100 years of aviation history! Most notably, they have a section of the archives devoted to cutaways, where these images were found.
Some are full-color but most are linear, with exceptional control over line density and overall image balance—keep in mind that these were most likely done traditionally on vellum or illustration board with a technical pen!
Rolls Royce Dart Convair Conversion Cutaway
Bell XV 15 Cutaway
Airbus AD300 Airship Cutaway
Spacelab Cutaway
Westland Hovercraft Cutaway
Most people go to auto shows to see the latest bunch of cars they’ll never be able to afford. I go for things like this:
Bugatti Veyron - Máté Petrány
That’s a Bugatti Veyron stripped of it’s panels, and displayed in all it’s glory.
To me, displays like this are the best part of auto shows: the exploded and animated engine, the gutted drive train, the new Mustang that’s been cut in half so that you can walk between it. Seeing into everyday objects and learning how they work has always fascinated me.
I’ve also found that auto shows are a great opportunity for photo reference. Not only may you find a gem like this, but you can also observe all the various textures on the car under ideal lighting conditions.
You can see the rest of the pictures over at Jalopnik, here.
Top Dog Illustration - Bell Helmet Cutaway
Troy Doolittle is an award-winning illustrator by profession & outdoor adventurer at heart, and the artist behind Top Dog Illustration.
What is your background? How did you get into technical illustration?
I grew up in Iowa and for the first 8 years of my career I worked as an illustrator for a fairly large ad agency in Des Moines. I learned a ton there and it gave me a good sense of how to run a business. It also taught me how important the client/agency relationship is and what kind of pressure agencies are under to do good work and deliver on time. Missing a deadline is not an option and that discipline really helps me focus on my day-to-day work.
Top Dog Illustration - WTB Grips
Are you a freelancer or in-house illustrator?
While I was employed at the ad agency I started doing a lot of freelance illustration work for companies in the area. Once it got to the point that it was interfering with my day job, I decided to strike out on my own and start TopDog Illustration. Within a couple of years I decided I needed a larger metropolitan area to feed off of so I moved to Mountain View, California. That’s also about the time I started marketing my work nationally in the source books and that really helped diversify my client list. Since then, I moved a few miles south to San Jose and continue to do work for clients on the east coast as well as here in the Bay Area.
What software do you use to create your work?
After I do sketches I render everything in Adobe Illustrator. For my high-end cutaways I’ll then import that work into Photoshop, piece-by-piece. This helps me create the layers I need for rendering shadows, texture and highlights.
What are your favorite types of projects?
Over the last several years the bicycle industry has become a very important part of my business. I’m also an avid cyclist so it’s a great opportunity for me to combine my passions. When I look back at my work and think about which projects turned out the best and why, it’s almost always work for the bike industry. I attribute this to a couple of things; their passion comes through over the phone when they talk about their products and they completely trust that I’ll deliver what they want. Very few clients in other industries exhibit that kind of confidence. When someone believes in your work, you believe it yourself and the end result is a better illustration that in turn helps their company sell more product.
Top Dog Illustration - Helmet Cutaway Process
Any advice for illustrators just starting out?
There are a lot of headwinds facing content creators these days and it can be tough for artist to see how their individual decisions impact their fellow illustrators. But every decision every artist makes collectively has a tremendous impact on our trade. The only way to have a say in the future of illustration is to retain the copyright to their work. This at least gives you control over your creative content and won’t cheapen the future value of everyone’s work.
Whenever I have to review a contract for a project, I ask myself this: Could this potentially limit me in whom I can do work for or what I can create? If the answer is yes, I don’t sign it. If the answer is no, I sign it. Because if you want to protect the long-term value of your creative work and your business, you can’t let companies dictate who you work for or what type of creative work you hope to do in the future. Retaining the authorship rights (copyright) to your work is the only way to protect that.
Troy’s portfolio can be found at TopDog Illustration, and further information about his process at his blog.