Early in 2014, I had the distinct fortune of working with the Tarsus Group for the 2nd year in a row producing illustrations for the Label Expo. This year, their theme centered on The Great Outdoors for the convention being held in Chicago, and will allow me to work on a multitude of pieces for them. In this set, you'll see a super wide landscape used for multimedia and online. Its definitely one of my favorites!

The process for creating this illustration was fairly straightforward, though I must admit I was having a ton of fun with the super wide format. Anytime I get to work on these types of cinematic images I have a hard time wanting to stop! I started with 2 variations off the basic idea: a backpacker checking his gps (later changed to a compass) as he embarks into the great outdoors. As with the earlier illustrations, the landscape had to encompass a number of environments you wouldn't typically find in a single scene. Making them all work together well was the fun challenge!

With the final sketch in place, we moved onto my favorite part, color! The brief called for a sunrise and when I set out to color it, I realized a sunrise and sunset look extremely similar. I came up with a handful of options based on photos I've taken of our Colorado sunrises and these are what I came up with:

In the end, the client chose the color option they felt best represented what they were looking for, and the rest was history! I had a great time working on this one and am please with the results. Here are some detail shots of some of my favorite parts of the illustration:

Big thanks to Adam Evans from Tarsus for the direction and great project! Be sure to check out the interactive version here: http://www.labelexpo-americas.com/ ​​​​​​​