| I find a relatively high res photo of the target car, and import it into Macromedia Freehand (a program just like Adobe Illustrator). Here I've imported a F150 Concept truck. I imported a 2nd pic for reference so I can better understand the contour and details. I put this on a background layer in Freehand and lock it. On cars where the only reference photo I can find is in a color, like red or blue, I will sometimes create a grayscale version with increased contrast in Photoshop and import that grayscale version into Freehand as additional reference. |
| I start drawing the vector points around the overall shape of the car. The vector path is shown here in red. |
| Keep laying points on the path... |
| Ok, my path is completed, I now have a closed object. Objects like this one are the building blocks of the illustration. This car will end up with 97 objects when it is complete; each object has a specific "fill" and "stroke" to make up the illusion of a 3-dimensional object. |
| I can fill in the object with gray, and add a black 8pt stroke so the illustration will stand out against a white background. |
| Next I start on the major features, the windows, lights, grill and bumper openings. |
| Here I've shaded in the window elements. Although a lot more detail is available within the front window to render, I try to limit the number of shapes to make the overall illustration more of a graphic piece, not just a photorealistic copy. Basically I have to walk a fine line between capturing detail and simplifying the shapes. |
| Here are the vector paths drawn for the grill, headlights and bumper openings. The grill and bumper openings are always colored with black on my cars because these are major markers the viewer uses to identify a car. The windows are also major markers, so they are usually between 100% to 70% black in color. |
| The grill, emblem, and headlights are completed. |
| The grill and two of three bumper openings are filled in black. I've started to lay down paths that represent the shaded areas of the front of the truck -- the top of the bumper, and areas around the upper and lower grills are darker than the rest of the truck. |
| Here I've completed drawing and filling in the shadows on the truck shape. Notice the openings on the hood are black as well. |
| After shadows are complete, I add the shapes that will make up the highlights. This is one of the most important elements to add because without the highlights the contour of the car is lost and makes the car harder to recognize. |
| Here I've started to draw the paths that will make up the wheels, the area in the wheel well, and the ground. |
| The outside of the wheels are completed. The general shape of the rest of the tires will be black. The eye really doesn't care about the rest of the tires, so they should fade away into the background and also with the black ground color. |
| The ground is added. Notice it does not match up to anything in the photo. The ground is important to anchor the car as a graphic element. Without it the car floats and looks odd. |
| Disable the view of the reference photo, and we're complete! |
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Here is a "keyline" view of just the vector paths. Fun huh? Overall it takes about 4-6 hours for each car, not including time to find good reference photos (that can sometimes be the hardest part). Well hope you enjoyed this little walkthru. Click here to see a sample .swf export of the Defender -- right click to zoom in. |