Research point - Digital illustration

The early digital illustrations in 50 years of Illustration have a retro feel to them as though the artists didn’t want to shock their audiences too much by introducing too many new ideas at once. They remind me of Saul Bass and early 1960’s cartoons like Top Cat and The Flintstones.

It’s a useful way of testing colour combinations or to learn about the use of colour but digitally applied colour often looks a bit flat so it isn’t appropriate for everything. It’s a lot easier to add collaged elements in a digital image and this has become a more common feature of illustrations.

Is there a clear distinction between digital and non-digital illustration? This might be in terms of style, production or the use of interactivity. Picking up on Steven Heller’s quote, what is the future for digital illustration? 

My first thoughts are to question whether, in 2018, there are any non-digital illustrations? Work may be made in an analogue way with paint and paper but to be marketed it will be scanned. Unless the picture is perfect it will probably receive some sort of Photoshop treatment to prepare it for publication. I think that rather than a binary situation of digital vs non-digital there is a scale ranging from work which has been entirely computer generated to more traditional images that are largely unchanged from the original paper copy. With new forms of technology such as iPads and graphic tablets the illustrator is drawing straight into a digital form but using the same skills as Picasso or Michelangelo. This is digital and non-digital all at once. 

Computer programs mean that artists don’t need to be able to draw to convey a complex visual image so more diverse ideas are generated and published. This is like opening up education to women and minorities, anyone who has a visual idea can realise it if they are prepared to learn the technology. Maybe people will be as reluctant to invest the time and effort into learning a computer program as many are to practice drawing or painting.

“Can we really say with confidence that the computer will only be a silent partner? Can’t some visionary artist create an illustration form that is unprecedented? Or is illustration an antiquated art that defies change and so will vanish? Film is an integral storytelling medium that bears no relationship to painting. Can the computer be an integral medium that changes the way we perceive and practice illustration?” 

Steven Heller 2000 

Steven Heller asks if the computer will be just a silent partner, is he thinking of artificial intelligence or some sort of randomness like the effects that an experienced painter can get with watercolour? If he is means artificial intelligence will we be able to make a computer innovative enough to keep its audience interested and if we reach that point will there be any distinction between humans and computers? We will either be partners or we will be redundant.

I don’t think that there will be a sudden leap to a radically different form of illustration because there are so many diverse practitioners out there change will be incremental as they feed off each other’s different ideas and build on those influences. This change can happen quite rapidly because we are linked by the internet, and because there are a lot of people looking for a new idea and a new way to express themselves. 

Illustration has its roots as an antiquated art but it has survived so far because it is a way of explaining complex ideas in an easy to understand way. Humans are visual animals who are heavily dependent on sight. (In contrast dogs are much more reliant on their sense of smell).  Even if we create a world where technology is universal, illustrations are a way to quickly convey an idea or a concept whether on a computer screen or some sort of virtual reality device. 

Heller was writing in the year 2000, trying to see into the future. I think that his final statement has come true, computing has changed the way that we perceive and practice illustration, and it will continue to do so for years to come. People will expect more interactivity in the world around them. We have quickly adapted to touch screens which have become the norm (look at this toddler)so that we expect to be able to enlarge an image to view it better or look up a word that we’re not familiar with. We will expect more of this, more things that move and rotate, more animations and 3D images (like this).Things that we can feel that we have stepped into or walked through.

I bought the July 2018 issue of Computer Arts and found the content really interesting. I think that I’ve seen it in the very distant past when it was very geeky and a lot of the content was about art for video gaming though I might be mixing it up with another magazine. There were articles about branding and visual identity, merchandising and side projects. There are some very creative and hardworking people out there.