Nate Otto and I made a new Basecamp homepage illustration based on a vector drawing I made in Adobe Illustrator. Initially I didn’t intend it to be hand drawn. I thought I’d refine the vector drawing. Somewhere in the middle it turned into “herding cats”. In the end the spirit of the concept was intact, but the result very different from what I’d envisioned.
Here’s how we got to the final idea: Basecamp helps you wrangle people with different roles, responsibilities, and objectives toward a common goal: Finishing a project together.
This process took about one day of back and forth (in Basecamp) between me and Nate. So, that’s how we made the illustration for the idea: Basecamp helps you wrangle people with different roles, responsibilities, and objectives toward a common goal: Finishing a project together.
Jure
on 27 Feb 15Great insight. I really like the new illustration and the concept behind it!
luca
on 28 Feb 15I wouldn’t understand the ‘herding cats’ concept, while the last one is at the same time beautiful and clear
Laidlaw
on 28 Feb 15Jamie, I love the concept, can you tell me more about the physical process? Did you still draw in Photoshop or Painter, or was this something that you literally drew on paper (colored pencils? markers? and then scanned in somehow? If you scanned it, was there a specific process you took to make it ready for the web afterwords? Thanks for any insight, illustration is my weak point!
Nate
on 02 Mar 15Laidlow, the images that look hand drawn were drawn by hand by me. For the Basecamp stuff I use Micron pens and Tombo markers. I like to use the same marker brand so the colors are consistent. I scan the drawings and then share them with the designers, who then prep it for whatever their use is. One thing they always have to do is make the background white. I got the same scanner for my home and the office so the scans are consistent whether I’m working from my dining room table or from the splendid Chicago office. We have been working this way together for over a year now and the process has evolved. Now I generally scan a black and white version of each drawing so I can print out an image and make revisions and different color choices if need be. One of the challenges with working on paper is that it is not as conducive for revisions. Sometimes revising an image means starting from scratch. But the advantages are that it gives a nice human touch to the images and in many cases I am able to whip up a drawing much more quickly than it could be done in Illustrator.
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