The concept that was decided on was a salesperson walking into a strong wind, much like the cover used for the Managing in Turbulent Times book by Peter Drucker. I wish I could give you the illustrator's name but unfortunately I can't find it.
The first step in any illustration or design process is normally a number of thumbnail sketches exploring different ideas. I'm not going to run my mouth off on the benefits but they are really useful and can give you a strong sense early on if a composition will work or not. It's interesting, looking at these thumbnails, to see the different composition ideas I was considering.
As you can see, I started with a fairly close interpretation, but, after much deliberation, I decided the concept needed some development. In the end I settled on a figure walking in a desert landscape, struggling in some wind while trying to escape some impending storm clouds. The clouds were a nice additional element that I felt lent some drama to the illustration.
The next step was a larger line sketch, just to check that the composition would work on a larger scale. This was then followed up with a loose ink wash to play with tonal ideas and different rendering options. I've found that while I try to stick to a system of thumbnails, tonal studies, color studies and then the finished drawing, I tend to be loose with my approach to it and enjoy experimenting with different techniques while doing so. For instance, there are a million ways to do clouds, but you need to make sure what you do works in the context it will be seen. Playing with different mediums during this stage helps a lot.
Okay, so that pretty much wraps up the process at this point. Next up is a final drawing of the illustration, then rendering it. At this stage it looks like it will be a combination of traditional ink line work with some digital coloring. Maybe.
