Interview: Dave Cross

Schoolgirl Evelyn (opposite page)

“This was originally a photo of my daughter from her first day at school, and has been transformed into a chalk-style drawing using the tutorial from Photoshop Creative issue 13. I enjoyed building up the layers and experimenting with brush shapes and opacity. People often ask if it is a real chalk drawing!”

Blackpool Tower (above)

“I mainly illustrate people and animals and I was asked if I had ever considered inanimate objects. I live near Blackpool and had recently visited the Tower with my daughter, so it was a natural subject for me!”

Eye Eye! (left)

“I found a beautiful picture of an eye on sxc. hu and decided to create a vector. I wanted to see if I could make the eye look realistic.”

Athena and Kitten

“A commission for a b3ta friend. Athena is a young American who does beautiful work for b3ta and tattyworld. She asked me to draw her and her cat, so I obliged!”

Mr Johnson (below)

“A vector portrait of a friend.

I’d never done a parrot before – so that was fun! He liked it so much he asked me to do a portrait of his girlfriend too.”

03 Move between layers Because the Poster Edges layer was at the top, I could turn it off to check progress. Here it’s at the halfway stage – all the basic shapes were there, but there’s no shading. I also had the copy photograph layer for detailed areas like the eyes. I made sure that the layers were in order – skin, then clothes, then the hair. 04 Finishing touches This is the finished illustration. I’ve added shadows and highlights to the skin and hair, changed the background and added a tag. I usually play around with the opacity of the shadow and highlight layers, so that they have a soft, blended effect – rather than harsh colour boundaries.