Step 1: Pick a Reference Image
Using Adobe Illustrator, I pick an image that I’d like to be the focus of my work, this is what I’m going to use to trace everything, and I’m going to set the opacity to 50% so I can see my work underneath it.
Step 2: Tracing the Main Pieces
From here, you’ll want to take the pen tool, and going around all the biggest sections with a midtone color. Here I’m carving out the hills, the helmet, the mountains, and the sky. The shadows, highlights and details are going to be overlaid on top afterward. For the sky, I used a gradient from dark blue to light blue, keeping this a fairly neutral color, as I will be adding a lot on top of it.
Step 3: Shadows and Highlights
This is where your poster will really start to come to life. It is quite a lengthy step, but try not to rush it, as it will have a very large effect on the product as a whole. Use your reference for this, and make bold highlights and shadows. The style is simple, so don’t feel like you need to add too many layers here.
Step 4: Add Big Bold Text
This is where you’ll finally establish this as a travel poster instead of stylistic artwork. Bold text for the location and a nice cursive font for the word ‘visit’ will capture the genre here. A drop shadow helps sell the effect as well.
Step 5: Final Details
By this point, the poster looks great, but I like to go back through and add some nice details here and there to give it a finished look. The biggest addition is the grass in the foreground, which I mostly copy and pasted in groups and in different colors, the clouds in the background, and the space ship as well. And just like that, you’re done! I made this one as a Christmas present for a friend, and I highly recommend it.