"Silly Me... I Haven't Yet Figured It Out!"

Illustrated design for a audio/visual convention.

Still working on my new, old website. In it is a section I call, "Potpourri" because it has a little bit of miscellaneous stuff that doesn't always fit other disciplines. I found this set design I created for a design firm for an audio visual convention while going through my sample cd's. If my memory serves me correctly, it was a twenty-four hour turnaround and the art director's "vision/scribble left much to the imagination. In a way, those type of instructions allows for more creative thinking. I was pretty happy with this overall design and I asked the client if they were happy with the piece. I requested a photo of the finished set on location, since I would not be a part of the actual construction... if indeed, they were gonna use my design to build the actual display.

Silly me.

It is a real conundrum to do what I do when I draw "stuff." Inevitably, it involves so much more than my illustrative skills, yet when looking for work, people assume you're an illustrator/storyboard artist and not much more. Someone please tell me, is this illustration just a drawing skill or much more? What about the concept? Other than the art director instructing me to "make it urban," in the process of drawing these things, one has to create that environment and design it to fit within the limited space of a convention center. Company logo notwithstanding, what about signage and the many urban icons added to create a mood to market to a certain demographic. Are all these things expected as a part of the process and then, only later, to be forgotten. 

To this day, I am convinced that illustrators, for the most part, make the best visual communicators, that is, graphic and package designers, set designers, painters, art directors, photographers, etc.

An art director at Saatchi and Saatchi, once told me that my problem was that few people understood how to use me! She said,"Ben, it is a marketing problem only you can really solve!" 

She was right... and I feel, I still haven't really figured it all out yet!

Copyright 2012-2013/ Ben Bensen III