ILLUSTRATION, DESIGN & ART DIRECTION / Sydney, Australia
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Free Speech Cover Art

This week's cover art for The Spectator Australia focuses on the free speech debate instigated by the recent Andrew Bolt trial. In his article, George Brandis focuses more on the media's reaction and the bigger picture of journalism and the right to opinion - politically correct or not. Please click all images for a closer view...

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011


The Process

Thumbnails

Quick turnaround on this one, so I came up with three thumbs, but only two concepts: thumbs 1 and 2 are variations on the same theme (Editor's direction: "Focus more on judicial puritans and less Bolt"), while thumb 3 is a little different.

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

The editor liked both #1 and #3, and let me decide which I'd like to draw. I felt like cracking out the brush and ink, and thought that #1 would make for a nice, loose inked illustration. Also, having the figures peeking over the masthead can help readers pick up the mag in the newsagent - something to consider.


Sketches and Roughs

I worked up the sketch a little digitally to make sure it worked in the space, and then used my screen as a lightbox to trace onto paper. (As colleague Luke Watson noted, the Wacom Cintiq is the most expensive lightbox ever!)

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

So then I draw the sketch up on paper and scan it back in, adding a light wash and inserting it into the template. I've kept it nice and loose so I don't lose the energy in the inking.

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011


Inks

I drew this using a Winsor Newton Series 7 #2 brush and india ink. As it's going to be touched up a little after scanning, I don't worry too much about a few bum lines... I just try to do it as fast as possible to keep up with the deadline.

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

As you can see, I added a few ink splatter up the top right to use as background spatter and texture.


Colour

So I scan the inks into Photoshop, clean them up a bit, and drop in a flat colour underneath, plus some ground.

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

I also want a dry brush background, so I get the old brush pen out, and using a watercolour, rougher paper I draw up some outlines that I can scan and use:

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

And the next step is do colour the different areas. I try not to use too many different colours here...

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

And then I select the colour areas and add a bit of shading to bring it to life. With strong linework, it's best to keep the colours flatter, rather than heavily toned... so I just give it a pretty light wash, adding subtle texture and spatter to the background. Please see finished art, below. Please click for a closer look.

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

And the published cover, below:

'Free Speech' art for The Spectator Australia © Anton Emdin 2011

Thanks for looking!

Anton