It’s Nice That | Artist Benji Human uses illustration and painting to inspire their filmmaking
July 2021
July 2021
‘My signature style came out of trying to emulate traditional artists’ styles but coming up in a digital age and being inspired the the 90s idea of what the future would look like. A constant battle between, and blending of, analogue and digital. I would draw in my sketchbook, scan the linework, and colour pieces digitally in Photoshop. I had a cheap tablet and never found it easy to draw straight up digitally so I had this really laborious process of drawing, scanning, fixing bits of linework in post, colouring digitally and applying my own handmade textures from my sketchbook or from discarded paper.
It really informed my style to have this messy and convoluted way of working. It feels very reflective of how my brain works, always jumping around in different areas and finding it difficult to settle. This way, I could piece things together once I had all the elements separately. I really prefer working by hand but it wasn’t practical when I was working on commissions and trying to get things done quickly. So the mashup of styles came out of that.’
It really informed my style to have this messy and convoluted way of working. It feels very reflective of how my brain works, always jumping around in different areas and finding it difficult to settle. This way, I could piece things together once I had all the elements separately. I really prefer working by hand but it wasn’t practical when I was working on commissions and trying to get things done quickly. So the mashup of styles came out of that.’