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I just found a really good article today. I thought about it accumulate some thinking write some stuff and thought I would share it with you guys.

The line often blur half of the time between being a Concept artist and an illustrator.
Good illustration doesn't make it a good concept art piece to solve the puzzle.
Likewise, great concept art piece doesn't make it a decent illustration either.
So what make them differ?
What define concept art?
What define Illustration?


Concept Artist vs. Illustrator

Concept Art define:
Concept art is a form of (rough or detail) illustration where the main goal is to convey a visual representation of a design, idea, and/or mood for use in movies, video games, animation, or comic books before it is put into the final product. Concept art is also referred to as visual development and/or concept design.
A concept artist is an individual who generates a visual design for an item, character, or area that does not yet exist. This includes, but is not limited to, film production, animation production and more recently video game production. A concept artist may be required for nothing more than preliminary artwork, or may be required to be part of a creative team until a project reaches fruition. While it is necessary to have the skills of a fine artist, a concept artist must also be able to work to strict deadlines in the capacity of a graphic designer. Interpretation of ideas and how they are realised is where the concept artist's individual creativity is most evident, as subject matter is often beyond their control.
Term of concept art is base on reference to preproduction design is ambiguous at best, but it may have come about as part of automotive design or as part of the animation industry. Certainly, both industries had need for people who did this job even if the term had not come into use.

Illustration:
An illustration is a visualization such as a drawing, painting, photograph or other work of art that stresses subject more than form. The aim of an illustration is to elucidate or decorate textual information (such as a story, poem or newspaper article) by providing a visual representation.
An illustrator is a graphic artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text. The illustration may be intended to clarify complicated concepts or objects that are difficult to describe textually, or the illustration may be intended for entertainment, as in greeting cards, or cover art or interior art for books and magazines, or for advertisement, as on posters.

In the game industry and elsewhere, there is a position called "concept artist". The job responsibility for a concept artist is to communicate to the development team what the game will look like. It is a simple task to define, but there are few people who excel at it. Even worse, most people who are hiring or working with concept artists don't really understand what makes good concept art.

The root of this problem is that most people do not understand the difference between a piece of concept art and an illustration. Yes, they are both static, graphic depictions of something. But the difference in intent could not be larger.

An illustration is an end in itself. It is meant to be presented directly to the final audience. The audience is meant to see an illustration, and come away with a certain feeling or understanding of a visual event. This directly implies a hard division between what is and is not important in illustrative work.

It is important that an illustration be attractive. It must use color and shading in a way that evokes the desired response in the audience. It should been constructed so that line weight and spatial contrast work to convey certain feelings about the different portions of the drawing.