Anatomical Illustration: Kidneys with IVC Placement Anomaly

This greyscale anatomical illustration is based on a fixed kidney specimen displayed in Grant’s Museum. The kidney used as visual reference had an inferior vena cava placement anomaly (seen to the left side of the abdominal aorta instead of the right side), which was kept in the final piece.

Client: Prof. Dave Mazierski & Prof. Shelley Wall
Media: Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
Format: Anatomy textbook figure
Audience: Anatomy students
Date: February 2021

Process work

Grant’s Museum Sketch

I created this sketch based on direct observation of the kidney specimen in Grant’s Museum.



Cleaned Sketch

The specimen’s position was distorted due to the container it was in, so I cleaned and repositioned some of the structures based on anatomical references and instructor feedback.

Final Rendering

Adobe Illustrator was used to create separate flat vector shapes for each element, which was then brought into Adobe Photoshop for the final rendering of the texture, shadows, and highlights.