My Own Illustration Completed in the Style of Arturo Elena

Having finished my own illustration in the style of Hanna Muller, I am now going to do the same for Arturo Elena.  Even though Arturo's work is a lot more digital, I decided that I wanted to produce a hand painted illustration using watercolour before proceeding with my digital illustration.  Although this is quite a time-consuming process, I feel that it will be valuable as it will allow me to compare my hand painted illustration with my digital work.  My hand painted illustration is displayed below and I chose this particular pose because Arturo's drawing style always reflects sophistication and his illustrations usually feature formalwear which is why I decided to use formal attire in my own illustration.  I feel that I have executed his exaggerated style successfully by lengthening the form of my illustration.  Arturo is famous for his attention to detail and I feel that I have incorporated this into my own illustration and as a whole, I believe the illustration suggests elegance.

My illustration in the style of Arturo Elena which has
been completed by hand using watercolour paints

I do feel that my illustration demonstrates a similar style to Arturo's however I definitely want to experiment further using Photoshop to create a digital version of the illustration as I think that this will be more relevant for Arturo's style.  When completing Hanna Muller's illustration, I scanned in the image and worked on top of it on Photoshop and this technique worked very well so I am going to do the same thing again and I will talk you through the process step by step.

I began by opening up a new page in Photoshop, and I then proceeded by setting up my paint brush and smudge tool in the same way as before and I have included a screenshot of this process below however for more information, please refer to the third paragraph of the posting entitled 'My Own Illustration Completed in the Style of Hanna Muller'.

Screenshot illustrating the brush set up process

I then scanned my watercolour illustration and after opening the image in Photoshop, I dragged in onto my new page where I proceeded by creating a new layer.  Using the same paint and smudge technique which was used for my last illustration in the style of Hanna, I began by painting different tones of purples and pinks on top of the dress, before using the smudge tool to blend the colour together.

Screenshot which shows the colour which was
painted and smudged to create the dress

I repeated this process for the tuxedo, shirt and bow tie and I think that this technique worked extremely well as it allowed me to add definition which improved the realism of the garment and my result is shown in the screenshot below

 

Screenshot which show the paint which was applied to the tuxedo
before being smudged to create the watercolour effect

I then created another layer and built up the facial features including the eyes, lips, eyebrows etc. using the paintbrush as shown in the screenshot below.  It was essential for me to draw these details at this stage to make it easier when adding the skin tone.

Screenshot showing the development of the facial details

The final step involved working on the skin tone, footwear and hair and I decided to carry out this process in the same way as before which involved selecting my original drawing on layer one and then using the smudge tool to blend the paint to create a smooth finish as shown in the following screenshots.

Screenshot showing the process of blending the skintone

Screenshot showing the process of smudging the
skin tone on the legs as well as the footwear

On my illustration for Hanna Muller, I altered the opacity of some layers to create a softer effect on my illustration however Arturo's style is very striking so I have decided to maintain full opacity on all layers as I think that this will help to maximise the impact of my illustration.

My finished illustration is displayed below and I think that it has turned out extremely well.  I definitely prefer my Photoshop version because unlike my hand painted version, the expressions are captivating and realistic which are two of the key attributes of Arturo's work therefore I feel I have successfully incorporated his style into my own illustration.

My final illustration which has been completed in the style of
Arturo Elena using watercolour paints and Photoshop