I always get excited when I hear the ping of an email notification and see that it's from Sacramento Magazine's Art Director, Gabriel Teague. 

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Illustrating for the magazine was slightly different this time around, as I was being asked to take on the cover, an opening spread and multiple portraits in a fairly short time frame. But of course, I happily agreed. This was my first time illustrating a magazine cover and I was both incredibly nervous and excited. 

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Gabriel’s concept for this issue’s cover illustration about the natural wine movement was to reveal a quintessential Sacramento landscape through a wine bottle silhouette in grapevines. I thought this was a unique idea and immediately began brainstorming ideas and researching images to draw from. 

 

After reading through some detailed notes and ideas from Gabriel, I got started on the sketches. I do most of my illustrations on Procreate, and decided to use pen for the line work and watercolor brushes to add color. The overall goal was to portray the essence of the natural wine movement with a detailed, yet organic illustrations.

 

The whole process, from creating multiple initial sketches to adding the finishing touches, lead us to a very engaging final composition. We went with muted colors to stick with the "natural" look, and even muted the landscape significantly to make the bottle silhouette more pronounced. I also used the river rock to further outline the bottom of the bottle.

 

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