Igor Šćekić is a rare breed of graphic designer who is heavily influenced by traditional surreal artists like Salvador Dali, Rembrandt, and others. This influence translates onto his canvas into a stunning blend of traditional and new age digital art. This interview is a fun and informative one. Let's check it out!
1. Welcome to Psdtuts+, please introduce yourself. Could you tell us where you're from and how you got started in the field?
Hello, my name is Igor Šćekić. I'm student of graphic design and I live in Zagreb, Croatia. I started messing around with Photoshop about 5 years ago in my last year of high school. My classmate was making some cool
photo manipulations with faces of people from our class. He was putting them on movie posters and movie heroes. I found that cool and funny, so I started playing around in Photoshop. Then I got into a graphic design university and started making more and more digital work, so here am I now.
2. Your art looks traditional, like it is meant to be on a canvas. Why do you prefer that look apposed to something more clean and digital?
It is hard to tell that I like a traditional look more than a smooth and clean look. Sometimes I prefer a textured and painted look to a clean and polished one. I like traditional paintings because of the raw personal touch they have. It is harder to achieve that when working in digital medias, especially if you are making photo manipulation or 3D artwork. I try to use drawings and custom made elements/effects as much as possible, which give more of my personal touch to the work. Pure photo manipulation is too cold for me, it often doesn’t have soul, so it should be combined with other techniques to become more personal.
3. From your portfolio I've noticed you have done your fair share of collaborations with other designers. What do you think are the positives and negatives to sharing an illustration with another designer?
I like making collaborations with other artists because the final result will be a fusion of different styles and that could be very interesting. One artist couldn’t make something like that. I like collaborations because they are often unpredictable and without any strict rules. Of course there should be some rough theme or concept but there shouldn’t be limitations in using different techniques and styles.
So almost everything is allowed in achieving a new and original look. Working with others is fun and both artists can learn something from each other. In my opinion there aren't any negatives in making collaborations with other artists. Maybe some artists work better alone than in collabs, but I don’t see any problem in making some great work with some cool artist. That is a great experience.
4. "Stardust No 13" is a breathtaking design with stunning flow and vibrant coloring. Walk us through how you created this illustration.
Well this one was supposed to be only experimenting with different shapes, but it turned into a work that took me a lot of time to finish, so it will be hard to explain how it was made. Most of my works is well planned, but this one was total freestyle. I started with few different shapes. Then I started making more and more shapes. Some of them are made with copying and merging, then arranging them to flow.
Once I finished with arranging shapes, I painted and made lighting effects. After that I worked more on the lighting and colors. Good lighting is very important to define the focal point. I usually set a layer on overlay blending mode and paint with black and white on it to lighten or darken different areas of the piece and to give more contrast. Then I merge all into a single layer, copy and blur it. On this piece I added a layer mask and deleted unnecessary parts on it to achieve depth of field with the blurred areas.
5. Who or what were your main influences that made you pursue the field of designing?
Hmmm...hard one. I always liked art. Then I discovered there is a way to earn some money with making graphic design. I have a lot influences from fields of traditional and digital art. I'm not trying to copy them, but I just like their work and maybe get some inspiration from them. My favorite traditional artists are Giorgio de Chirico, Salvador Dali, Rene Magritte, Rembrandt, Carravagio. My favorite digital artists and graphic designers are: Jerico Santander, Peter Jaworowski, Pawel Nolbert, David Fuhrer, Si Scott and Alex Trochut.
6. Are you a self taught Photoshoper or did you attend a school to learn the art of designing?
Well most things that I know about Photoshop and other software I learned by myself with playing around with programs or from watching tutorials. I’m also going to graphic design university, so I also learned some theoretical stuff about graphic design and art there, but not so much about software. The best way to learn is to play and experiment as much as possible.
7. What would you say is the most interesting thing about graphic design?
To me the most interesting thing about graphic design is that you can make good looking and attractive design even if you aren’t so good with drawing. This was impossible a few decades ago when graphic designs weren’t made on the computer. Then you had to have been a great artist to become a quality graphic designer, now you can make miracles with all the cool programs and you don’t even need to know how to draw...Of course being good at drawing can help you a lot in making good design.
And one more interesting thing is that you can’t say you are amazingly great artist/designer and you know everything because there will always be people who knows more. So design is constant improvement of your artistic and design skills. The sky is the limit.
8. Thanks again for providing Psdtuts++ with this opportunity to interview you. Any final thoughts for our readers?
Thank you for interviewing me; it is my pleasure to be featured on Psdtuts++.
Just keep experimenting and don’t be afraid to try new things. You can’t say you can’t make something if you haven’t tried it. Just keep pushing your limits to the max, because possibilities of software are endless. You just need to have a good idea of what to make. With a bit of knowledge and experimenting it can be done. Cheers!
Where to find Igor on the Web
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