An Effective Guide to Developing a Versatile Style!
Ajith’s Journey in his own words
I graduated in Fine Arts from the Raja Ravi Varma, college of Visual Arts, Alleppey, in 2016. After that, in 2017 I joined Reliance Education as a 2D tutor, which was a good time for me in terms of skill development. After a year, in 2018 I joined a creative agency called “Stick No Bills,“ a branding firm.
There, I did a number of projects related to kid’s clothing brands in particular. Two years later, I relocated to another branding start-up called “Pixpill” as Creative Director, where I worked on some interesting projects, mostly illustration-based. In 2022, however, I decided on trying out freelancing and now I’m a full-time freelance illustrator.
Honing his approach consciously, Ajith has been practicing diversity in his subjects and the way he projects and portrays them, so as to build and bring about a strong sense of versatility in his very style itself.
“Adapting and compositing will eventually create skill-sets which can be versatile in terms of style,” he says.
Album and Magazine Art
Ajith considers himself fortunate to have worked with some of the most talented musicians on their album art. Elaborating on them, he points out:
• CNR Mafia (UAE-based band):
The idea was to make an illustration with complexity and style which reflects the vibrancy of the band and its genre itself.
• Maarap-Matadoria (Kerala based band):
Here, the genre was so energetic and vibrant that I decided to create a motion through the illustration and its gradients. It eventually impressed the crew and we proceeded with the style.
• In the Dark: Vishnu Varma (an independent artist from Kerala) had an idea, the illustration topic was a man’s midnight dream projecting an emotional connection between him and an unknown girlfriend.
I decided to show the singer’s portrait to represent the dreamer and compose the dream through multiple slices of his head, thereby depicting the pain in the lyrics.
Ajith and 3D
Ask him about his 3D ventures and he says, “I’m a newcomer in the 3D style actually. I love to explore new and versatile media applications to develop my skills. I’m working on my 3D types on an application called, “Nomad Sculpt “ which is a small build software like Blender or Maya.”
Ajith’s Love for Portraits
Ajith has been trying to create portraits with emotional reflections. By compositing elements from personal life, the whole work can convey the story, he feels. Elaborating on this, he says, “I have loved to draw portraits since my college time.
I used to live-study people from college as a part of my studies. From there I’ve met and spent time with so many talented artists. I got to know more about the process of doing a portrait through immense observation. ‘Day-to-day practice and respectable time investment in research’ is Ajith’s mantra to success.
