Illustration and Animation: Workbook’s Best of 2018

Posted on December 6, 2018

We asked our contributors to share their best projects of 2018 with us.

We’ll continue to share more of the best from 2018, so follow us on Instagram!

Bill Mayer loved creating this character for the NYT Children's Edition. It doesn't get more high-profile than the NYT.

Howard McWilliam told us his favorite job of 2018 was illustrating the book Elbow Grease by John Cena "simply for the joy my two young sons have taken in me drawing monster trucks for days on end, as well as providing regular technical consultations!"

Judy Reed Silver says her piece for publishers WW. Norton was one of her favorites because she hadn't done a book cove in a while,"... It would be the first textbook cover for the U.S. Congress in over 40 years and would probably be in print for another 40 years."

Giuilio Bonasera sent us this image which is one of a series for an article in Nautilus about how the simplest and earliest act of construction with something as simple as a wooden stick would go on to change the course of human evolution. "Great topic, great layout, wonderful art direction," he says, made it one of his favorite jobs of 2018.

The Vitro agency team asked Federico Gastaldi to work on great new UCSD campaign called Look Deeper, which focused on the success stories of 11 different alumni. Each image is composed of two halves; one element that typically represents the city of San Diego while the other half reflects the extraordinary success stories of each individual alumnus.

Jean Tuttle sent us this image and says, "My favorite assignment this past year was an illustration for the Denver Metro Media 2018 Winter Dining Guide. I used to live in Denver, so imagining a midnight feast hidden in the woods outside of the city was great fun, and sparked feelings of nostalgia for the happy adventures I had back there."

Shannon Abbey had the opportunity to visit the Bohan Ranch Guest House in north western Sonoma County early on in the process of creating art for branding material and a trail map for the opening of the guest house to visitors. Shannon says, "The client wanted the native animals and surrounding land represented accurately and yet whimsically. It was good fun trying to figure out exactly how a rabbit would hold a glass of wine."

Ivan Canu submitted this cover image and told us,"5 years ago I started to work with the Italian publisher Feltrinelli for a series of works by Catalan author Manuel Vàzquez Montalbàn, guided by the AD Cristiano Guerri. This one came after a year of researching Soviet art and design. It was selected for the NY Society of Illustrators exhibit and annual where in the past 3 years, I've exhibited almost the entire cover series."

It wasn’t his biggest job of the year, nor the highest paying. But, Colin Hayes says, "What makes it the best, in my mind, was that it was a fun problem to solve. The technology aspect of the story was interesting. I worked with a very good and easy to work with art director (Jeff Kibler), who doesn’t over-direct. I had plenty of freedom in how to develop the image to support the text. I’ve done several jobs for him, and all of them seem to turn out well."

Open Video

A. Richard Allen recently worked with Publicis New York to create the illustrations for “Lea Goes to School.” This short animated film, from CoorDown, Italy’s national organization for people with Down syndrome, has been getting a lot of attention from websites like Adweek, The Drum, Shoot Online and Little Black Book.

Raul Colon's new book Imagine! is his person favorite from 2018. It's also gotten rave reviews from the NYT, Wall Street Journal and Publisher's Weekly. It's a wordless picture book that draws it's inspiration from his own experiences with fine art and trips to the museum.

I Am New York is a 2018 favorite for Carlos Stagna. This is Carlo's newest book from his I am the City collection, published by Moleskine. It will be out soon.