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Japan by Car: James Gilleard's illustrative journey through the Land of the Rising Sun

James Gilleard is an illustrator and animator from the UK, currently working as a freelancer in Japan. After studying illustration and animation at Kingston University, he worked in a myriad of agencies, from production houses to games companies and even in children's TV, before being able to take a leap of faith into full-time freelancing around four years ago.

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Geometric illustration of a Japanese street scene with red-roofed buildings, a utility pole and residential houses under a blue sky

Represented by Folio, an illustration agency, James produces work in a variation of mediums, including children's book and editorial illustration, advertising and TV and film concept art.

This particular series of images, entitled Japan by Car, will form part of a book depicting a journey around Japan.

The artist explains: "It is based on my travels around Japan while I have been here in Matsumoto, and staring out of the car window is one of my favourite things to do as we drive. The landscape is so different to what I am used to in the UK, I find it fascinating.

"I had the idea to do a Japan-based book for a while but couldn't really focus on one thing in particular. After a while I thought it would be a good idea to show no recognisable tourist attractions or monuments (I feel that stuff is quite popular in illustration at the moment), and show daily life instead. It's a side project I dip into when I have the time, but hopefully I will have something near completion by the summer.

"My working process for these is to take photographs and interpret them with simple geometry, often missing out details – as you would speeding past something in a car. Images are often based on around five photographs, the colours are changed and the scenery simplified. I create them in Adobe Illustrator as vectors and put them into Photoshop to add effects, textures and paints." To see more of James's work, visit jamesgilleard.com.

View from a car window of a rural Japanese town with a yellow building, utility poles and mountains in warm peachy tones
Brown car parked on a residential street lined with modest houses under a warm, hazy sky in James Gilleard's Japan by Car series
Stylised illustration of a rural Japanese landscape with terraced mountains, scattered buildings and geometric layers of green fields under a pale dawn sky
Road stretching into a stylised landscape of layered green mountains, with a bridge, buildings and utility poles under a pale sky in James Gilleard's Japan by Car series
Illustration of a modern Japanese building with a tall chimney beside a road lined with bollards, set against purple-toned mountains and sky
Colourful illustration of Japanese apartment buildings and commercial storefronts with a motion-blurred road in the foreground, viewed from a moving car
A stylised illustration of a rural Japanese town with colourful buildings and a church with a cross, set against layered purple mountains under a blue sky
Minimalist illustration of a Japanese landscape with layered mountains in the distance, a green field with yellow reeds in the foreground, and white lines across a blue sky
Stylised illustration of a Japanese urban street with geometric buildings in purple and blue tones at dusk or dawn, featuring a dark foreground
Sunset view of a Japanese town with illuminated buildings and houses silhouetted against a purple and orange sky, seen from a car window
Orange residential building illuminated at dusk with motion-blurred car lights streaking across the road in front, from James Gilleard's Japan by Car series
Illuminated convenience store with large windows at dusk on a Japanese street, surrounded by residential buildings under a blue sky
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