A Mad Hatter's Guide to Illustration Systems
First off, I hate reading Blogs. But even more so, I hate writing them.
This blog is my first (excruciating) attempt to write, and I'm doing this for the sole reason that I'm so tired of explaining to people what an illustration system is, how do you know if you need it, who works on it and just the general ins and outs of it.
I will write this down once in the way I wish someone had told me.
I hope you find this helpful. If not, just a new and intriguing ball of knowledge in the drawer stacks of your mind.
So let's start with what is well defined (you can skip this if you are aware of these terms):
Brand Design creates a distinct identity for a business, product, service or person. It should be memorable, distinguishable and evoke some emotion from the customers.
Product Design- It is the process of creating a product or service that solves a problem of the target user and meets a specific market need (Check out more here)
Design systems- A design system is a set of standards to manage design at scale by reducing redundancy while creating a shared language and visual consistency across different pages and channels. (Check out more here.)
Now for the main event:
Illustration systems- Just copy the definition of design system and change "design" to "illustrations."
I'm just kidding
Here we go….
Illustration Systems
When it comes to animated series, have you ever wondered how hundreds of different artists can replicate the same style over thousands of episodes?
Illustration systems Standardise!
While illustration systems do standardise and manage illustrations at scale by reducing redundancy and creating a shared visual language across different channels, When it comes to Product design, the purpose of an illustration is to amplify the product experience:
- When a feature is being bypassed, misused or underused
- When the user is frustrated and doesn't know what to do next
- When there is too much text, or the text is not being understood
- When you want another means to speak to your user
- When you want to congratulate or celebrate with your user
(save that for later, even if I don't memorise this stuff)
Illustration systems Amplify!
While it is vital to enhance product journeys, it is equally important to represent the Brand correctly. To be memorable, distinguishable and evoke a sense of relatability from people is to be known and to set your place in history.
Illustration systems Monumentalize!
So, three factors largely influence an illustration system:
- Internal Productivity
- User Needs
- Brand identity
To sum it up:
Empowering brands with a strategic framework for visual content creation, illustration systems ensure brand consistency, deliver targeted messaging, and evoke users’ intended emotions and responses, enhancing productivity and user engagement.
Thanks, chatgpt.
How do illustration systems fit into the ecosystem?
Illustration systems are a part of Brand design but also have a foot in product design:
Now, let's get to the juicy part!
Let's talk about existing Illustration systems that just hit the spot!
Gojek:
Regarding the three factors, Brand, user and efficiency, Gojek just gets it right!
Their style is easy to recreate, scalable and straightforward, but simultaneously very relatable to the audience and expressive. It's part of their guidelines, but it is also apparent.
My favourite part is how they take reference from real people. check it out here: Gojek Behance
It also translates very well onto their apps:
And best of all, it is culturally rooted in Indonesia; I'm jealous of the people who can understand and enjoy this.
Duolingo
Duolingo is one Brand that has been using illustrations for the longest time and is an excellent example of how an illustration system can take your Brand to great heights.
Duolingo has one of the largest customer bases as it is a Language learning tool; people from all around the world use Duolingo. So, the system needed to be something that could cater to a vast audience. Having a diverse team is critical to creating something like this.
But people love Duolingo, and it's because all the characters have so much personality; they seem like real people. The characters come alive and are so relatable, and they have to be. They cater to the user in a way that the user has a good audience cheering them on when they are learning a new language, and they are people they know and relate to.
Check out the fan art on Instagram; it's one of the only brands with fan art. #duofanart
Duolingo also experiments with their illustrations a lot, and you may see them using different styles for marketing campaigns, But they always remain true to Brand.
There are many more Illustrations systems out there, but these two really resonate with me. They have taught me how far you can take a system but still get the basics right.
To see more Illustration systems, check out this wonderfully curated website: https://illustrationsuniverse.com
An excellent exercise would be to see if you can identify a good brand illustration system over those built with little thought to the factors we discussed above.
You can think about things like:
- Does the illustration style seem consistent on different platforms? Is it suitable for those platforms, or does it get pixelated, distorted or not legible?
- Do the illustrations look distinguishable, and do they match the Brand?
- Who is their target audience? Does the illustration appeal to them?
- Do these illustrations seem recreateable? or were they made just by one person?
- Is this style easy to document?
Let me know in the comments your favourite illustration system and why you like it!
Or you can also drop me a DM on Twitter @unsjaya.
There are a lot more questions to answer:
- What are the critical components of an illustration system?
- What knowledge do you need to build one?
- What steps do you take before building?
- How far does the documentation go?
- How do you maintain quality in an extensive system?
As an essential part of the brand identity, illustration systems make sure that people remember the Brand and have a good time using the products by also making sure that the people creating the illustrations have it easy.
I hope this article went easy on your mind ( and I'm not saying I'm glad it's over). There's much more to come, and this is just the beginning of my (torturous) journey to write more. I hope it's worth something to you.
If you want to join our team, go ahead and contact us at designlab@freecharge.com!
Author: Uns Jaya Pandit
