Jellyfish, commissioned by Adobe

I’m pleased to share with you “Jellyfish” the piece I have created for Adobe Illustrator Identity Collection. Using Illustrator as my primary tool, the commission was to create an inspiring work that would evoke these keywords: shape and space. The brief just said the illustration should be intense, eye-catching, and inventive.

The Adobe Studio team asked me to create something that I felt would not only show off Illustrator’s potential but also represent me. That’s the reason why my imagination quickly turned to the sea. Jellyfish and underwater animal world in general is a central part of my imagination. The mythological world they inhabit in the ocean depths fascinates me. Jellyfish especially inspire me, as gelatinous creatures with long tentacles that drift along, deep down…a beast from the abyss that gives off color and light and illuminates the darkness.

I wanted to have an iconic element against a monochrome background, generating an explosion of color. I created the initial composition in black and white, using geometric shapes. They bring order to a composition and make the end result much easier to understand. In this piece, geometry also allowed me to consider creating an op art–style optical illusion for the viewer. The Blend tool was key to achieving the desired effect. This tool builds the transitions between different geometric shapes—for example, within the tentacles and heads of the jellyfish. When I finished with the bulk of his illustration, I moved to Adobe Photoshop CC, where I refined shadows, highlights, and textures.

In the end, I provided two color options for the jellyfish image: one on a black-and-white background, and one on an aqua background—the latter was the direction selected by the Studio creative team.