9Li

very interesting work from this guy. i'm not familiar with him but glad you've pointed me in his direction.
i hear what your saying about the colours, and by no means do they have to be CMYK, its so hot right now. i do believe they will be wanting something fairly popular and "cool", but by no means do we have to do what everyone else is doing. i think bright and pop-esque is something to be considered, but no certainties.
i am into dense designs, and at the moment am a big fan of the symmetry of some of the latest posts. this makes the iumagery almost more like a banner/identity rather than a one-off. perhaps thats something to be considered.
i am a fan of hand-drawn to digitally filled work, but like you say, its too often done badly. 9Li is doing it well because he is using some gradients and strokes instead of simply using block colour.