Anabelly the Smelly Squid

Posted on November 3, 2014 by Rob

Earlier in the year, I had the pleasure of illustrating the picture book “Anabelly the Smelly Squid” by first-time author Meghan Carlile. It’s a cute anti-bullying story set in an underwater school.

Since a large part of the story took place in the classroom, I had to make sure the room was consistent throughout the story. I briefly considered building and photographing a model classroom like I did for Bye, Bye Boogeyman. But I wanted to add shells and little coral reef-inspired details to the classroom and I knew it would be nearly impossible to keep those straight in multiple angles. So I decided to place the characters into the same classroom background– similar to the way they do it in animation. I have deliberately avoided doing this in the past because I didn’t want the book to look like it was simply cut and paste or that I was taking shortcuts.

I drew the classroom wider than a double-page spread so that I’d have the freedom to move it around and be able to crop it differently on every page.

And then I added the characters into the scene. Notice that I made sure to redraw all the characters for every page–even with the re-used background set, I didn’t want any page to look too similar. (The blank area over the window in this image and the chalkboard in another one are where the text was placed.)

And, just in case you still think I was cutting corners on this book, here is another double-page spread from a different section.

This book was also my first time working with the publisher Zebra Ginko, who is relatively new to the publishing world. They had one of their own designers handle the text placement and book design aspects of this project– which is usually I task that I insist on doing myself. And there are a few things that I would have done differently had I done it myself, but they did a pretty good job with it overall.

If you’re interested in the book, you can find it on Amazon:

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Making of The Mad Monster Museum

Posted on October 27, 2014 by Rob

Last week, I talked a little about my new Halloween book with author Donna Davies, Halloween Night at the Mad Monster Museum.

Now, I’d like to take you behind the scenes of the creation of the big masquerade ball image from the book.

I knew that with all ten characters plus assorted background figures, this double page spread would be the most challenging and time consuming part of the book. So, even though it’s towards the end of the story, I began work on it first.

I started out with a few small thumbnail sketches to work out placement of things. I settled on this one, which seemed to do have room for everything I needed.

I scanned the thumbnail, enlarged it to print size, and placed the text it in’s approximate position. It still seemed like a good composition, so I turned the sketch to blue in Photoshop and printed it out at full size. And I drew a better sketch atop the original sketch. The blue lines made it easier for me to distinguish between the two as I drew. I worked around the page, making sure that the major characters were all given the right spotlight and that the reader’s eye would be drawn properly around the page.

When I was happy with the sketch, I scanned it into Photoshop. I have a simple Photoshop action that pulled out the blue lines, leaving the pencil sketch behind. A little touch ups here and there, and it was time to show the sketch to Donna.

In this case, Donna was happy with the sketch and didn’t request any changes. That’s a huge advantage of working with a the same author on multiple projects– you develop a trust in the working relationship that makes things easier. I probably wouldn’t have been able to get away with such a loose sketch (especially in the background characters) with some of my past clients.

So with the sketch approved, I recolored the lines blue (as I did earlier), and printed onto 11×17 Bristol paper to ink the final art. For this project, I primarily inked with my trusty Rapidograph technical pens.

The completed inks were then scanned and the blue lines removed in Photoshop. After a few touch ups, the result looked like this:

Then it was time for the one part of this process that I find a little tedious, laying in the flat colors. With this many figures, it took me a day or so to flat everything. At this stage, I make sure that the colors help the eye move through the piece. Color can direct the eye and change the focal point, so it’s vital to keep things both balanced and moving (I hope that makes sense.)

Let’s see if I can explain that better. Here is a graphic showing the 3 major colors in this piece: orange, red, and green. Orange and green each form a similar arc that guides the eye through the piece. The darker reds create an inverse arc to give a counter balance to everything. I don’t always have the time to put this much thought and planning into a piece, but it makes a drastic difference when I can.

And then the really fun part, laying in the tone and shadows. With so many characters, it’s easy for me to get lost in the details and lose the implied motion I so deliberately created in the flat color stage. I’ve done that more than once and wound up with a non-descript grey blob of an image, which no one wants in their children’s book. So it’s important for me as I paint (and even though it’s all Photoshop at this point, it’s still painting) to keep pulling back and zooming out to view the whole image and not just the parts. You’ll notice there are a few places that I changed the colors on from the flat color (like the vampire’s inner cape changed from blue to red) to further reinforce the color balance I was trying for.

And so here’s the final page:

And that’s how I create a page (or in this case, a double page spread) for a picture book.

You can see this spread in all it’s glory in the book Halloween Night at the Mad Monster Museum, which includes this brand new story and the 4 Halloween tales previously written by Donna Davies and illustrated by me. You can buy the new book on Amazon.com. (If you hurry, you can probably still get it before the 31st!)

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Halloween Night at the Mad Monster Museum

Posted on October 20, 2014 by Rob

I have neglected this blog for far too long. It’s been a really busy year and every Monday, for the next few weeks at least, I’m going show off one on my projects.

First off, is my most recent published work: Halloween Night at the Mad Monster Museum.

MonsterMuseumCover-Front

A few years ago, author Donna Davies contacted me to illustrate her first picture book “The Halloween Queen Who Lost Her Scream.” This is the 5th Halloween themed book I’ve worked on with her, and I must say that this has been one of the most enjoyable and rewarding collaboration I’ve had with an author. And to commemorate our five books together, Night at the Mad Monster Museum is a huge 136 page volume that contains not only this new story, but the last four books as well. It’s a huge chunk of Halloween goodness.

This book features two young people (younger versions of Donna and I) who visit the “Mad Monster Museum” and get far more than they expect when the monsters come to life! I got to draw my own takes on some classic movie monsters and even a surprise guest! (I won’t spoil the surprise, you’ll have to buy the book to see who it is.)

Both this new story and the original book The Halloween Queen Who Lost Her Scream include a monster-themed dance. I hadn’t realized how much my artwork had changed over the years until I flipped through the whole book and compared those two pages with each other.

Here’s the new page from Night at the Mad Monster Museum:

And here’s a similar dance from The Halloween Queen Who Lost Her Scream:

If anything, there’s a lot more figures in that new scene.

You can buy the new book on Amazon.com.

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And come back next Monday for another spotlight on my new work.

Charlie Croc: Private Eye #3

Posted on February 5, 2014 by Rob

If you like a little mystery and humor in your comics, then you can get your comic reading pleasure from Charlie Croc: Private Eye #3 on comiXology Submit! It’s the Mad Masquerade Mystery and it’s one of my favorites. I know you’ll love it!

http://cmxl.gy/1ibHSMa

Bye, Bye Boogeyman Room

Posted on January 13, 2014 by Rob

I’m pretty sure I promised this post back in October, but I’m just finally getting around to writing it. So thanks for waiting patiently for so long.

When I was illustrating the book Bye, Bye Boogeyman (written by the incomparable Donna Davies) I had a challenge in the little girl’s bedroom. In most of my books, I play fast and loose with the architecture. But this book takes place entirely in one room. So I had to keep the room dimensions and furniture locations consistent throughout.

And my first few sketches proved that was a bigger challenge than I expected.

So I called my mother and had her send me some of my sister’s old doll furniture. The bed she found was coincidentally the same style I had already planned to draw. Perfect. I set up this little scene with cardboard walls and a playing card for the rug.
And then I took nearly 50 photos of the room.