The brief

Your local greengrocer has asked you to produce a point-of-sale display above the fruit and vegetables in their shop.  They want the display to be seen from the street through the shop window to attract passing shoppers.  The final reproduction size will be 2 x A1 landscape.

Spider diagram

The local greengrocer is a small precinct with passing traffic of mothers taking their children to school, school children and general shoppers.  The point of display needs to attract the shoppers from the street and convey the information that there is a greengrocer inside.  Initially, I thought of doing an illustration of recipe ideas with fruit and vegetables but realised that it could possibly distract from what the grocer’s products are.  It could be mistaken for a restaurant or a smoothie bar.   

I will focus on illustrating fruit and vegetables and keep the background off-white to convey freshness and health.  I am considering using the font Duke Charming as the serifs are flowing and resemble the shapes of leaves.  

I considered wording and wrote down whatever came to mind with the idea of refining it later.  I will use digital painting to create this illustration which will be ideal for a large format.  I will keep it as simple as possible to be effective and clear from a distance.  The text needs to be big enough to read from a distance.

Visual reference

I have photographed fruits and vegetables on a white background to use as a reference and also collected photos from Unsplash, a stock photography website. 

I knew this project was coming up, so I photographed my own fruits- and vegetable meals to get more ideas and reference material.

Creative Process

This time I tried a different creative process.  I made digital drawings of the fruits and vegetables most suited for the illustration and then sized and moved them around to find the ideal composition.

The fruit illustration was done by creating a greyscale image and then colouring it with the ‘color’ blending mode.  I tried a different method with the vegetable illustration.  I used greyscale textures from photographs and pasted them as an ‘underpainting’ in my drawings.  Once I had a greyscale illustration, I used the ‘color’ blending mode to add colour.

Figure 3 shows how the composition changed while working on the piece.  Picture 1 is still my preferred choice, but I had to compromise to make the text more significant to be cohesive with the vegetable illustration.  I think pictures 2 and 3 lack perspective.  I will still try to make picture 1 work.  It flows better compared to picture 4, which seems fragmented.  The white background in picture 4 might be too stark.  An organic feel is essential and will work better with a slightly softer, off-white background.

It is insightful to see how the text comes alive when slightly enlarged.  I am overall happy with this composition and will leave it at that.

Finished illustrations

The main objective was to keep the illustration simple and realistic.  The fruit and vegetables should look appetising; when it’s too abstract, they might not look that appealing and edible anymore.

I have tried two different techniques on each poster.  I have done this for experimental purposes, but I would use the same method on both posters if this were for a real-life project.  I think the technique I used on the fruit poster worked the best.

I am overall pleased with the illustration, but the rendering needs more refinement.  I have learned a few digital lessons along the way that will help me in the future.  I would like to do these illustrations in gouache to see the outcomes.  Going forward, I will still do my small thumbnails to establish placing and composition.  Even though I was working digitally and it was easy to move elements around, it was still not ideal.  It creates a lot of unnecessary work if your composition is not established before starting the rendering process.  In the future, I will focus more on resolving and refining edges and smaller details, especially if it will be seen on a larger scale.

Reflecting my work

There are a few things I decided to change in this piece.  I feel the illustration and the overall design need more refinement.  It should communicate that the point of sale is a grocery store.  The white background needs more warmth and an organic/earthy feel.  I used hand-lettering to create a logo with the wording “Whole Foods Grocery”.  The hand-lettering will give the piece an organic feel.  I used two line weights on a banner illustration to create contrast and emphasise “Food”.  The san-serif lettering pairs well with the script style of the word “Grocery”.  The banner contrasts the dark green of the letter to create a hierarchy to the name.

Resolving the layout

Now that there are new elements to add to the design, I am reconsidering the layout.  I duplicated the existing design and moved the pieces around until I was satisfied with the layout and composition.  Once I had the layout the way I wanted, I returned to the original design and moved the element without resizing to avoid losing resolution.

Changing the background and text

I am changing the background to a paper bag texture to tie in with the feel and mood of a grocery store.  I am also changing the existing text to emphasise certain words that need to stand out more.  I made the vegetable illustration’s colouring brighter to be more cohesive with the fruit illustration and refined the illustration even more.  I ensured there were no untidy areas that could be visible on a big scale.  

In this exercise, I created the illustration first (instead of downloading it from stock), then moved it around to find the right composition.  By creating my own image, I can take full advantage of making the pictures exactly how I want them and customising them to fit the design.  I am pleased with the improvements and feel the display communicates better with the audience by conveying a more organic feel and is more specific with the wording.