As the Brisbane water cools and warms the whales leave and return to Hervey Bay’s waters. The magnificence of the animals creates great excitement around the bay. This year BCM commissioned photorealistic illustrator, Otto Schmidinger, to capture the magnificence and excitement in the one illustration.

Otto has been expressing his love for water and animals for the majority of his career. He has expressed his love for the water with airbrush, digital art and arguably most accurately when he shapes and rides his own surf and sail boards. Otto explains that he developed his passion for animals through his daughter’s love for them. As she grew up he noted her love for the animal kingdom and so he painted, airbrushed and rendered them for the reward of her happiness. Now she has grown up she can draw them herself, but as you can see from Otto’s latest work his daughters love for animals has grown inside him.

So when Otto started this project we couldn’t wait to see the results because the brief became the rendezvous of these two great passions. Some aspects worth paying particular attention to is the way the water falls off the breaching whale and the subtle smile Otto put into the eyes and mouth without trivializing the natural beauty of the animal in reality.