Illustrations for Ignite Your Research Mojo book
It was a great privilege and heaps of fun working with researcher and author Dilip Chetan to produce the illustrations for his book: Ignite Your Research Mojo. The themes and lessons in the book have a lot to do with the customer-first research mindset, keeping your sanity as a researcher, and helping research to have a much bigger impact in business.
There's lots to argue about in customer research!
In customer research, everyone has an opinion about what to do...
Early sketches and concepts
Rough sketching was a super effective part of this project. It not only helped me to refine each individual illustration and the look and feel, it also truly became part of the creative process for the whole book itself. Sketching was part of several conversations between Dilip and I, where rough sketches would trigger new thoughts and ideas for him and the points he wanted to get across in the book.
Look and feel
I'd been playing around with various vintage retro styles in drawing for a while when Dilip approached me to illustrate his book, and thankfully he was delighted at the idea of his illustrations having this sort of style. This light quirky style complemented the voice and tone of his book really well.
It was fun illustrating the various 'personas' of researchers around: The Do-it-all, the Mystic, the Car salesman, and the One-trick wonder!
Customer research is a labour of love, which many people within the business don't fully appreciate. Ignite Your Research Mojo included lots of tips and tricks to avoid the frustration of stakeholders ignoring your research, and instead taking it on and acting on it.
It was nice being able to help out with the cover as well. After a few different designs, we opted for the more eye-catching white text on teal:
