Sometimes things don't go exactly to plan. You're commissioned for a job, the artwork is delivered to the client, but then plans change, for one reason or another it never sees the light of publication. Sometimes the work is a preliminary sample for a project which is later dropped, sometimes the production budget disappears or other outside circumstances interfere, occasionally the job is cleared by the art department, only for the company boss to veto at the last minute. It's usual for 'hiccups' to be sorted out at sketch stage, however very occasionally it happens after the production of finished artwork.
I thought it might be interesting to show some production anvils, some "Jobs that Never Were".
Case 1. Hooter's Island
The drawings in this post are all for a book that was never published. Some years ago I was commissioned to illustrate a children's novel with black and white drawings by an editor who had previously worked for one of the biggest character licensing companies in Japan (think of a certain cute kitten...). The story had originally been written as the plot to an animated film but shelved with the 1990's economic crisis. By the time I was approached the editor had started his own company and planned to publish the story as a novel. What he didn't explain was that he had written the story himself under a pen name - it was his own pet project - the printing and distribution was to be funded purely out of his own pocket. It was, in essence, a self-published book.
After dragging their pod transporter ashore squabbling ensues and they divide into rival factions.
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