Geoff Thompson
Ever since my childhood I have had an interest in insects; to this day I remain amazed by the beauty of their structure, form, colour, texture and sheer variety. As a student I had to deal with what I thought were conflicting interests in art and entomology. These two skills were soon to prove an excellent combination.
In 1975, I was lucky enough to gain a job as a research assistant to an eminent entomologist, the late Dr Tom Woodward at the University of Queensland in Brisbane. Within a short time, I was sent to learn skills in illustrating from Sybil Curtis at CSIRO.
Because insects are so minute, I had to learn to use a camera lucida attached to a stereomicroscope. Over the two years I worked at the University of Queensland, I illustrated a number of scientific papers between insect collecting and rearing duties.
In 1982, I started work at the Queensland Museum as an assistant to one of the Curators of Entomology, Dr Geoff Monteith, helping to maintain and enlarge the insect collection. The collection now contains more than one million specimens.
Hand-done illustrations are fast becoming a thing of the past and modern illustrators use powerful digital illustration programs to create their images entirely on the computer. Digital illustration is just another technique and part of the tool kit for an illustrator.