Interview with Illustrator and Creative Director Ricardo Martinez

What are 5 tips you can give to other illustrators that are just starting in the industry?

Develop a personal technique, something that makes your work stand out from others; Work on the sketch thinking that in it lies a great drawing. There are schools of illustration and comics and commercial art, but the best way to learn is looking at the work of the great artists around you and from the past. Spend lots of time developing a concept that is different and that it hasn’t been done before. This is hard, and sometimes impossible, but you can try. Looking at the ILLUSTRATORS annual is very inspiring, but NEVER steal the ideas of other artists.

Over the last years you have been dedicated to your style of illustrations, what do you think about this media and what can we expect from you in the future?

I used to keep an archive of visual information for the illustrations. Now with Google you can get any image you want really fast. Web pages, apps, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc. are wonderful tools to have. But the artist has to try to use these tools to create a personal atmosphere. I work on paper or scratchboard, but I know most artists nowadays are using computers to do the final art. That’s fine, but make sure you keep it different from others.