Winning Science Covers Among Digital Works on Display in New Exhibit

The cover of the 3 August 2007 issue of Science

[Artwork by Chris Bickel, Science staff illustrator]

View larger versions of these images

The beauty of science might not be consciously studied by scientists, but for scientific illustrators armed with cutting edge digital tools, creating science-based yet visually dramatic scientific images can involve intense study of far-flung fields including microbiology and particle physics.

Such is the case for Science staff illustrator Chris Bickel, who will receive a gold award for his 3 August 2007 journal cover featuring a digital depiction of various immune cells. The gold-winning cover, along with two other of Bickel's Science covers, have been accepted into the prestigious Illustrators Club Exhibition.

Bickel's work will be displayed with 109 other pieces of art from magazines, advertisements, newspapers and brochures designed by 46 illustrators in the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area. The free, public exhibit runs 8 May until 27 June at Pepco's Edison Place Gallery, 702 Eighth St. NW, Washington, D.C. A public opening will be held 8 May from 6:00-8:30 p.m.

"The journal Science is known for striking covers," said Monica Bradford, executive editor of Science. "We've known that scientists eagerly await their issues so that they can try to guess what scientific research is depicted so artistically on the cover. Receiving the accolades of professional illustrators and art directors is a great honor and makes our efforts to highlight the beauty of science all the more rewarding."

What's in a Science cover? It must be eye-catching and aesthetically-pleasing, yet informative and accurate to please its technical readership. "The challenge in creating a cover is the balance between scientific accuracy and artistic integrity," said Bickel, who has a degree in medical illustration. "It's not as subjective as other art forms, and it has to have a grounding in science."

During the four-year medical illustration program, Bickel took all basic biology classes as well as specialized art classes, such as molecular illustration, figure drawing and 3-D animation. Bickel, who graduated from the Rochester Institute of Technology's program in 2004, also learned to use various drawing tools and materials to produce digital artworks. "Sometimes people think the computer builds the art for you," he said. "But it's just a tool like other art tools."

Bickel's gold winning cover, which appeared on the 3 August 2007 "Challenges in Immunology" issue of Science, features a circle of common immune cells that seem to hover above a stark white background. The depth of the cells' color and the presence of their shadows and reflections against the white background give the cells three-dimensional characteristics, an aspect of illustration for which Bickel is particularly well-known.

As a starting point for the illustration, Bickel studied commonly found pictures of immune cells, including antibody-making B cells and macrophages. "Google is a great place to find images," he said. "I can use classic scientific visualization to help construct the illustrations." Then Bickel created the cover by using a digital pen, software programs with 3-dimensional illustrating capabilities and Adobe Photoshop for color enhancement.

But not all covers begin with existing images. One of the challenging aspects of his job, Bickel said, is that sometimes the scientific study is so cutting edge that no background images exist and he doesn't have any way to visualize it. "Authors sometimes have background reference materials, but some things are so new that there might be no information," he said.

The cover of the 3 August 2007 issue of Science, "Catching the Cosmic Clues"

[Artwork by Chris Bickel, Science staff illustrator]

View larger versions of these images

Such was the case in Bickel's 5 January 2007 "Catching the Cosmic Clues" cover, which earned a certificate of merit in the Illustrators Club Exhibition. The cover illustrated a new project in which photodetectors implanted below ice at the South Pole are being used to detect elusive neutrinos, tiny near-light-speed particles believed to contribute to the 95% of undefined mass in the universe.

The Science perspective, written by University of Wisconsin theoretician Francis Halzen and published in a special section on particle astrophysics, described how researchers were building a neutrino telescope under Antarctic ice where the telescope's detectors would be isolated from stray, non-neutrino particles. The photodetectors in the telescope are designed to measure the small flashes of light that neutrinos produce when they interact with other matter

The cosmic clues cover is Bickel's favorite among his projects for Science, because it was such a unique scientific endeavor. High-pressure drills were used to melt Antarctic ice with hot water, producing channels about half a meter wide and 2.5 kilometers deep. Like a strand of beads, cables with basketball-sized detectors were lowered into the channels. "The cover involved visualizing the drilling process and how the detectors are laid down in channels," Bickel said.

In that sense, the cover is truly conceptual in that it is a graphic representation from the mind of the artist of something that exists but cannot easily be photographed or otherwise depicted.

"The Cosmic Clues cover is a wonderful example of this kind of conceptual work, as Chris succeeded in making the image both technically accurate and visually appealing," said Kelly Buckheit Krause, art director at Science. Krause selected the covers to submit to the competition. "That's why this cover stands out: It's gorgeous but also informs the reader."

The third Science cover in the Illustrators Club Exhibition features the planet Mercury and is another example of an artist's conception of a scientific finding as well as another demonstration of Bickel's 3-D drawing skills.

The cover of the 4 May 2007 issue of Science

[Artwork by Chris Bickel, Science staff illustrator]

View larger versions of these images

The cover illustrates a 4 May 2007 research article in which high-precision radar data combined with Mercury's rotation pattern showed that this "quick planet"—which zips around the sun in 88 days—has at least a partially molten center. In his cover, Bickel depicted a bisection of the planet Mercury with the planet's glowing core protruding against a dark, star-flecked background with other planets in the distance.

Since joining Science as a technical illustrator in 2005, Bickel has done 12 covers, which can take 20 to 40 hours each to illustrate. He also does posters, foldouts and supplemental graphics for the news section of the journal as well as figures for the online AAAS publication Science Signaling.

Science covers have appeared in previous years' Illustrator Club shows, including the 2006 show in which works by Bickel and fellow Science illustrator Katharine Sutliff received certificates of merit.

The Illustrators Club Exhibition is hosted by the non-profit trade organization Illustrators Club of D.C., Maryland and Virginia. Founded in 1986, the group formed to provide networking opportunities for local illustrators who typically work alone at home studios. Their illustration competition and exhibition emerged a couple of years later, and it is now a biannual show for professional illustrators.

"I would call it a showcase of illustration that has been done in the past two years in the Washington area," said Randy Lyhus, a long time Illustrators Club member and current show committee member. "Where 20 years ago the show contained mostly traditional art forms, including watercolors, airbrushes and oil paintings, many of the pieces in recent shows have been created by digital tools."

Molly McElroy

7 May 2008