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Isn't that awesome! First month of the year and Anna and Crocodile win a surprise honour.
I wrote a making-of feature for the Walker Books blog, you can read it here.
I wondered who these instructions were for. Was this a chapter from a pirate primer? Who was reading it now and why? I started to illustrate it, first imagining myself as a small child, practicing to sleep with my eyes open to make sure no one could steal the gold I hadn’t found yet.
“Get yourself a pet that will surprise you at night,” the story recommended. “A crocodile is ideal. Carry one with you wherever you go to build up your strength. Start with a young crocodile. It will grow.”
This was an idea taken from the Greek myth of Milo who carried a calf on his shoulders every day until it grew into a bull and he grew into a mighty Olympian. More importantly, one summer when I was tiny my mother bought me an inflatable crocodile in the supermarket. It was big enough to ride on and intended for the seaside. I carried it everywhere, dragging it by the tail until its snout wore through on the tarmac and it deflated before the holiday even started.
I drew a girl and her toy crocodile. It wasn’t quite right. They just seemed very quiet and small. - I drew them in on a new page and asked the girl some questions about the crocodile. She said it was called Rupert Maureen, and didn’t move unless she threw it and she wasn’t supposed to throw it. I didn’t expect that.
As promised, here is the first of a few MAKING OF posts about How To Find Gold, my new picture book that's just been published (go buy it, thanks)!
I was developing the characters of Anna and Crocodile by letting them act out some of the ideas I had for the book on paper. I had no idea who they were yet. Anna had my haircut (it grew out gradually while I was working on the book) and the crocodile was a toy which Anna had told me was bought from IKEA ("when we got the wardrobes").
This is from the second sketchbook (there were many).
So, yes, that's how I work... I recommend it, it's really rewarding to see what these little made-up people come out with when you just let them run wild.
Next: Painting Like A Child. Watch this Space.
0 Comments on MAKING OF "HOW TO FIND GOLD": letting the characters speak as of 1/1/1900
It’s always fascinating to see how the animation process is explained to the general public. Here’s the latest example: actor Steve Carell, who was last seen dressed as a cartoon character, talks about the making of Despicable Me 2.
Though I can’t show you the text I can show you were it is going to go. One of the tricks in illustrating a picture book is the leave space for the text without leaving a gaping whole in your illustration.
When I plan out an story illustration I always have a layer with the text on it in the size the publisher has said it will be. This way I don’t have to guess and hope it will fit in the end. This also goes for book covers. Where the text is going to appear you also want the colors to be low contrastThis means that the value of the colors in a particular area are relatively the same value so either dark with light text or vice versa.
Zooming in for Effect
When illustrating a picture book you don’t always have to have crazy angles for every shot. Take a queue from the film industry and go in for some close ups. If your working on a computer you don’t even have to re-sketch your scene just use a free-transform tool to expand your image. I wouldn’t advise doing this with a painted image in most cases because of pixelationPixelation is when you blow up or expand an image and the pixels, the bits of color information that make up your image, become jagged and much more visible..
Digital Tool Tip
When using the free-transform tool in Painter or Photoshop remember to hold down shift while moving the arrows on the box the tool creates. This will ensure your image scales proportionally.
This concludes the fourth segment of The Making of a Picture Book. Thank you for joining me on this journey and I hope you will join me again for further installments.
Publia asked me the other day about getting a Señor Calavera puppet like mine, and she decided to give a try to making one for her class. I made mine a while ago, but I found this picture I took while I was making it. I have marked some of the material I used to make him.
Basically my Señor Calavera is made out of pulp paper mache. The recipe I used called for ripping strips of paper (I used tissue paper for mine), boiling it with water over the stove fire, putting in the blender until it was of smoothie consistency, straining off the water, and finally mixing it with white glue, wallpaper paste, whiting, and linseed oil.
The result is a paste soft and sticky like clay.
Here are some fact about Señor Calavera Puppet:
It took me about a week to create it
I sculpted the head on plasticine first, the layered with news papers, until it was thick. Then I cut the head in two and took the placticine out leaving me with the newspapers shells only. I glued together the newspaper head and continued sculpting over with pulp paper mache
I did a lot of drying in my kitchen oven (paper mache can be dry safely at low temperature).
The spine is made out of wooden beads strung with thick wire
The feet carry fishing weights inside it as to make then flop down.
The limbs are attached with leather strips
The head, being hollow, it attached it to the spine with a special but simple mechanism that allows it to wobble (I learned how to do this from a master puppeteer).
Pulp paper mache has a rough finish. A lot of sanding is required.
I sealed the paper mache with a special formula of plaster of Paris, talcum powder, and glue.
One day one of Señor Calavera’s eyes popped off its socket right before I presented him to the kids, and I had to scramble to put the eye back in place before anybody screamed.
0 Comments on Making Señor Calavera as of 1/1/1900
It's nice to see your process. It amazes me how much work is involve in creating your illustrations and they come out very beautifully too.