Michael Halbert

Assembly line to line art: This former autoworker's detailed illustrations resemble traditional engravings. There was a time when illustrator Michael Halbert thought he might spend the rest of his life hefting spare tires on a Chrysler assembly line. But these days, Halbert's detailed line art illustrations are featured in food packaging, point of purchase displays, print ads, annual reports, and books. Halbert sometimes begins his illustrations with a scratchboard rendering, where a black surface is scraped away to reveal white areas. The resulting images often resemble traditional engravings. Halbert scans the images and adds color in Adobe Photoshop.

Though Halbert enjoys his freelance success, he hasn't let it go to his head. He still works out of a room in his St. Louis house (which you can tour on his Web site), and remains modest. His interests include WWII-era artifacts, and he's now in the process of using Adobe Illustrator to create detailed illustrations of WWII vehicles, which he plans to sell over the Internet.

Does he ever miss his job installing spare tires on Chryslers? "No," Halbert responds. "I wish I could go back there for a week just to make me appreciate what I have now."

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