Academics

ILLUSTRATION: Expressing ideas in visual terms

What is Illustration all about?

Drawing and illustration are of the most immediate and powerful creative forms to express your ideas in visual terms.  The ability to articulate ideas visually is the most important skill an illustrator could have and drawing is fundamental to such articulation.

Students following this course will have a thorough understanding of the application of illustration techniques and styles in related creative disciplines, for example Graphic Design, Animation and Interactive Media Design.

This course teaches students to produce market-related illustrations, and as in other creative disciplines, students will create original artworks to decorate or to convey information.

Illustrators use art to communicate a message to a specific audience. They therefore need to be authoritative and knowledgeable on a vast range of topics and subjects.

What will you do in the course?

• Develop operative skills that are associated with contemporary illustration and utilise a range of media, both traditional and digital.

• Apply creative processing to visual communication problems and the innovative use of design.

• Produce market-related illustrations according to a specific brief.

• Create conceptually challenging illustrations for commercial purposes.

• Successfully combine graphics, text and images in various fields of illustration.

• Interpret, plan and complete an illustration project addressing the specifications of a particular brief.

Why study Illustration at The Open Window?

A multidisciplinary curriculum 

To succeed as an illustrator, the creative has to have a multidisciplinary background. The integration of computers and the application of relevant software knowledge within the field of illustration enable illustrators to prepare their art in digital format.

An environment that teaches collaboration

Illustrators are visual artists who use their creative skills to illustrate and conceptualise a variety of themes and products to be finally applied in print and digital media for commercial clients.

Hands-on experience

Students experiment with various media in the field of illustration in order to create conceptually challenging illustrations for commercial use.

Awareness of the latest illustration trends

Students are not only encouraged to be well informed on the historical role and styles of illustration but also the contemporary prominence thereof in the print media.

Career possibilities?

• Illustrators create images for books, magazines, newsletters, websites, brochures, stamps and various commercial items in permanent positions or as freelancers.

• The shifting and blurring of boundaries between the visual and media industries allows the illustrator to move between an array of creative disciplines.

• Project management and visual directing.