London-based illustrator Tom Gilmour creates detailed hand drawn black and white pieces. His work draws inspiration from a ranges of sources including tattoo art, native folk art, and Asian patterns. Mr. Gilmour’s marries rather morbid subject matters and symbology with beautiful intricate patterns to create intrigue. See more of Tom Gilmour’s work on his website.

Fred Fixler was born in Hungary, although his family migrated to America when he was very young, and was raised in the Bronx. After perusing other careers, in the early 1950s, Mr. Fixler turned his attention to art. He attended The Art Students League in New York, then later studied Cubism at the The Academie Julian in Paris.

Mr. Fixler began his illustration career working at publishers Brandon House, painting for their pulp paperback covers. So successful and identifiable was his style that he became Brandon House’s foremost illustrator.

Following a successful career, Mr. Fixler turned his hand to teaching. He taught at The Brandes Art Institute, and The California Art Institute influencing a new generation of illustrators who carry on in his teachings today.

His ex-student, Greg Pro, has set up a website showcasing some of Mr. Fixler’s body of work. It includes a lot of his handouts, note, and laws in the section titled Cave 22, which is a treasure trove of great tips.

Jing Zhang is an illustrator, typographer and designer from southern China and currently living in trendy London. Her infographics are exceptional, and her experiments with 3D illustrated type are very powerful. I cannot express enough how inspiring her portfolio of work is, so visit her website or Behance to drool over the rest of her portfolio.

Fernando Vicente is such a talented, versatile illustrator that it would probably take ten posts on The Lounge to cover his abilities. But to summarise, he specialises in fashion illustration, children’s illustration, pin-ups, technical illustrations, maps and caricatures. Some of his finest work depicts pin-up girls with segments of their inner anatomy displayed. Visit his website, or alternatively his Behance page to see more.

Dinosaur Art: The World’s Greatest Paleoart is a unique blend of breathtaking artwork – some never before seen – and cutting edge science.

Bringing to life the distant past requires a unique artistic skill that blends imagination and paleontology — the study of prehistoric animals. Now, for the first time, Dinosaur Art: The World’s Greatest Paleoart showcases a selection of skillful, innovative artwork produced for movies, television programmes (Jurassic Park, When Dinosaurs Roamed America and Dinosaur Planet) and for museums around the world, alongside exclusive interviews with the artists, in which they reveal the sources of their inspiration, their working methods and the influence of digital multimedia on their artwork.

With a Foreword by paleontologist & museum curator Philip J. Currie, and an Introduction by paleontologist & evolutionary biologist Scott D. Sampson DinosaurArt brings a unique, insightful perspective to the prehistoric landscapes of the Earth’s past. Steve White writes: “Dinosaur Art will appeal to anyone – from child to adult enthusiast – who loves dinosaurs and
all the other spectacular creatures from our planet’s evolution”.

The impressive lineup of the world’s leading paleoartists artists feature: Mauricio Anton, John Conway, Julius Csotonyi, Douglas Henderson, Todd Marshall, Raul Martin, Robert Nicholls, Gregory S Paul, Luis Rey, John Sibbick. Steve White edits the collection.

The Book Review:

From the offset this book declares itself as an art book first and science second. It goes into detail to explain each illustrator’s history, strength and techniques. Every page has beautifully reproduced images—some fully rendered masterpieces, others just a sketch or an idea. I particularly enjoyed looking at the sketches of all the featured illustrators, as they are like a “behind the scenes” of their draftmanship. If, like me, you are a newcomer to the paleoart world, you may not be familiar with most of the illustrators in the book, but I assure you would recognise their work.

Not one to pick favourites, I did take a notable liking to the work of John Conway. His work has a softer approach and seems less concerned with every speck and pore, and more of the creatures shape and their habitats. You get a definite sense that Conway’s approach is very different from some of the other illustrators.

It is a stunning book, filled with knowledge and a level of skill that you can only find in scientific illustration—plus it has the added bonus of having raging reptiles with flesh hanging from their teeth. It is perfectly presented with a lush cover, and fascinating supporting text. This book makes a concerted effort to not be aimed solely at pubescent boys, as so often is the case with dinosaur books, but instead presents itself in a much more mature and forthcoming manner. In short, most illustrators can pick this book up this book and enjoy it, as a good resource of ideas and inspiration for both form and technique. It is available now from Amazon and is priced at around £14.

New Zealander Glenn Jones designs some clever, quirky t-shirts with really well executed illustrations. I love his Humpty Dumpty piece! He started selling t-shirts on Threadless and now has his own company which sells to over 80 countries around the world. It’s always reassuring to know originality can pay off, even for illustrators in a saturated market such as t-shirts.

Tadaomi Shibuya is a Japanese illustrator with an incredible geometric style. What I find amazing about this style is that it can be deployed to portraits just as well as more abstract subjects. Shibuya says he is influenced heavily by hip hop and artificial factory products.

Clients include Nike, Givenchy, Diesel and New Scientist.

Visit Shibuya’s MySpace page.