Editorial
I recently moved with my family from London to Amsterdam. I never learned to ride a bike as a kid and see balancing on two wheels as a significant challenge! So the cycling culture here is inspiring.
From kids to adults, from heavily-pregnant mums-to-be to newborns strapped snuggly to their parent's chest, all the way to octogenarians... cycling is second nature.
So when you notice children standing on the back of a bike - without a helmet in sight - it looks as natural as if they were walking on the ground.
I wanted to capture how comfortable Dutch cyclists are as they go about their day, whatever the weather.
Sketches
I start with simple shapes, and build up to more detail as the pose of the figures get closer to what I have in my head. Then I clean up the sketch and refine the line work. As I add colour, I erase small areas of the line work to let the drawing 'breathe' a little.
Colour
We moved in autumn when it's windy and starting to get a little 'fresh'. I chose a colour palette that reminded me of this - pastels and purples. I usually like to stick to 4 or 5 colours from a set palette. This ties the illustration together. I then adjust the tints, shades, and saturation until there's enough variety to keep it interesting.
Process
As I'm not a cyclist myself (yet!), it took a few iterations to get the posture 'feeling' right while sketching. When I draw with the Apple Pencil it feels so natural that there's very little 'tech' getting in the way while I process my thoughts.
Timelapse of the illustration process
