THE THREE BOOKS

DEADLINE FAILURE

2011-03-08T17:54:00.000Z

Whoops. Missed my deadline totally. I intended to get my books done and sent off before I went travelling. Needless to say that has´t happened. I´m writing this in a hostel in Rio, Brazil. We´ve been on the road for two and a half months and we are going to be hopefully, away for a year. Until I get back obviously my books will be on hold. I´ll be freelancing (give me a shout if you need any work doing!), setting up a new business venture and generally trying to make ends meet! A new deadline will spring forth that doesn´t have the stress of doing up my house, selling it, sorting out a personal work website, wrapping up my old work, and sorting out actually going travelling!

Watch this space!

ITS NOT KIDS BOOKS BUT I LIKE IT

2010-10-13T13:43:00.000+01:00

Ah well. A long time between posts and when one does come along it has nothing to do with the 3 books at all. My tour of the world is hurtling towards me and understandably there are oodles of things to sort out with that before we go. So the books unfortunately have taken a back seat. Which is a great shame because I wanted to have them done before I go. However my showreel, portfolio site are high up the list to be done before I go so I have nothing to worry about when I come back for getting back into working for a living. So where does that leave the kids books? Unfinished is a quick a simple answer to that. How far have you got with them though, are they close to being finished? Well, Sidney is Orange is so very close to being finished as a rough book I can sniff it. Then I would be looking to create 3 or so full colour finished pages. White Day is very very close too, and again, 3 or so full colour illustrations would be needed for that. Coolio is another story. Obviously. Its all a bit up in the air, undecided of style, layout, way of telling the story as well. A lot of work is done towards it though, so I would say I am kind of half way through. And again, 3 or so full colour illustrations for that would be needed. So quite a lot of work, and only 4 weeks left before we're due to leave. But that might and no doubt will change. So why not finish the close to being finished two and leave the other one till you get back? Well, because I just never imagined compromising, and if a thing is worth doing, its worth doing well, and the way you want to do it I say. And in this case it will be. Even if it means leaving it for a year. And, who keeps asking these questions? Erm...

Anyway, since I am creating work for my website/showreel/portfolio, the kids books will be in there, and I will need to get them to a certain level to include. So work will commence in some way on them soon I hope. I'm working on my showreel right now, and thought I would put up a bit of work I've been doing for an animation, kind of created a southern hic/gangster person who just happens to be a skull and crossbones. Not sure what he's going to do yet, but thought a before and after might be nice :O)

LAST BIT OF WONKA

2010-08-04T23:33:00.000+01:00

So, a final version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Far from perfect! A lot of the problem was the original drawing and its inaccuracies and then also not realising this would be a finished colouring eventually so cutting a few corners and rushing in at the start. Still, lessons learnt! Could do with some actual final shadows here and there to define everything and give it a bit more drama/interest. Hopefully get started on some of my finished artwork soon!

EVEN MORE WONKA

2010-07-31T19:09:00.000+01:00

Good lord there's no stoppin' the lad! I've been soldiering on in spare moments on my 'Charlie and the Choc factory' front cover. Seems to be shaping up pretty well. Bits need attention and not sure whether the whole balance of shading is a little heavy handed but ho-hum. Its only supposed to be a try out at the whole 'digital painting' malarky. The main building is a bit floaty at the mo since I haven't grounded it with shadows etc. Plus there's only a light wash over on the building frontage.

Also you may have noticed the blog itself has had a spruce up and gone a little bit more colourful. Been meaning to do it for a while but never got round to it.

No news on the grannies I'm afraid, their feet remain slightly disjointed and their hands are missing arms. Apart from that they're doing well and send their love.

A BIT MORE WONKA

2010-07-28T21:26:00.032+01:00

At long last managed to update. Last night I got all creative [about time] and with the aid of my wacom [graphics tablet] set about having a go at 'colouring in' . I bought the wacom with the idea of trying out some styles for my finished artwork for the 3 books. It was great, really had some fun splodging about [digitally]. Below are the few stages I've got to so far of colouring in the Charlie and the Choc factory cover I drew a while back. I've gone for a painty, splodgy style for this one and will no doubt try out some other styles on the Charlie cover. I'll post those up here as well as the final artwork, or further stages of this version. Also I've been adding arms and legs to my E4 granny characters. Coolio and the Moose remains in limbo unfortunately. I will pick it back up again soon but for now, its on hold!

Also using blogger draft at the moment which promised to be easier to use. Its flippin worse! Awful picture uploading, really bad blog construction tools [ie. where to put stuff, and then how to add more text but somewhere else], ugh. Only good thing about it is real previews with out posting.

A NEW LAYOUT

2010-06-12T17:44:00.003+01:00

Well now. I haven't just been twiddling my thumbs you know. Well I have, but only while looking out into the world and thinking of what to have for dinner. I've followed the course of my last two books originally thinking what order things would go in, and splitting text accordingly. Then making a dummy book in illustrator so I can see every page, and add roughs as I go along. I can also input the text on each page and it gives you an understanding of how it flows and whether I can chop text out or alter illustrations. It's worked a treat so far so why change now? SO below is an overview of Coolio so far, with all my rough scribblins plonked in. It's already thrown up oodles of problems and I have no idea of the answer to them at the moment. It has made me realise I want to mostly hand draw the text to blend it more into the drawings. Also I had originally thought this would be created on the computer after I had worked out layout in pencil/pen but I am really liking some of my drawings with my rotring art pen so maybe I'll stick to that. It does look a bit Quentin Blake though so maybe I won't!

click and it will get bigger [matron]

A BRAND SPANKING NEW POST

2010-05-05T20:26:00.010+01:00

Not a new post about spanking, in case you read that too quickly.

Huzzah! I've pulled my finger out, given myself a kick up the jacuzzi and blown the cobwebs off my blog. About time too. Hopefully this will be the first of many more [many more blog entries saying how I've updated at last and blown cobwebs off no doubt]. Anyway it better be or I'll give myself a good talking to and I wouldn't want to do that because, A. I don't like telling people off and B. I don't like being told off.

Well in all the time its been since I updated last I haven't just been laying about you know. No. I have been drawing, but they never seemed worth while to actually post. However they are very useful drawings. My character [moose] has changed quite a bit since the last post. I also have struggled a lot with how a moose looks like a moose without antlers and also viewed from the very front. So that was one of the reasons I changed the design. I still have those same problems, but i like the style I've gone for. It feels right now for the story. Which is silly, a little bit fringed with madness, but nice and sunny and fun. Here are a selection of my exploring/working drawings. And if this is your first time here, have a rummage about and look at some older posts! Or maybe even the very first post!

As always, click on a pic to make it bigger

A NEW POST

2010-02-15T22:43:00.005Z

Well here we are. This is more like it isn't it? I won't write much. Basically here is Coolio and the Moose to date. Small thumbnails so you can see it is progressing. Just not very quick right now. And also as a special treat there is Morph [or Mess] so far with one of my cats Sugar in the background wondering what I'm doing and expecting some kind of explanation.

Click either pic to make them bigger

A NEW POST

2010-02-15T21:29:00.002Z

Well its been a fair while since I tapped away some drivel about something that I'm showing you. There are many reasons for this, which is bad I know.

The first thing it says in the article 'how to get a good following for your blog' is write blog entries. A simple one I grant you, but no one likes to check a blog out every day and find there is nothing new to read, see, explore. Shame on me. There are other things about writing interesting things, putting up interesting points of view, and showing the world something amazing and vibrant and special. I seem to have failed slightly on most of these things but failed properly and against my will on the regular updates. I can't even show you a creative side line project I've done/started/completed either, because the last Christmas present from last year which was creative that I have to make is a 'make your own Morph' which as you can imagine is a splendid thing, but once half way through making my own Morph [or my own Mess] I realised I've tried to make Morphs several times through my life. When I was young and watched him religiously every week. I didn't do very well then either. And once when I was an animation student. This also didn't go very well, but then I made my own character out of the Mess. Anyway, my Morph is still a bit of a Mess so I didn't think showing it would be a good idea. Much more smoothing down and shifting of weight. Peter Lord does a short piece to camera telling us how to make Morph after he tells us he's been making Morph for about 80 years or something. ie. he's got it down pretty good now. Then the footage speeds up and we're supposed to be able to keep up! THEN it dissolves through into making the hands and you realise the Morph he has in his hands is one he made much earlier. About thirty minutes earlier but only 23 seconds have passed. Swines. I digress.

Actually I don't. I just wanted to break in here and scrawl something out. Make a noise, have a little dust. Build up to some posts. I guess I could shove what I have to date on Coolio and the Moose but its not very much. It retracing what I've done already but actually making shapes that make sense, and not general scribbles that are shorthands for detail and form and storytelling. If this is your first time to my blog then I am SO SORRY that this is the first thing you read. No doubt it will get deleted when I have something worthwhile on here. Actually damn it all to hell. Where my camera, where are my drawings, where is Morph. Lets make a damned post shall we! YEH! and this one will have a title!

CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY

2010-01-14T20:53:00.007Z

Yezzza! Finally I have done something constructive this New Year, well towards this blog anyway. Not that what I'm posting here has anything much to do with 'my' books. More to do with a a front cover I've created for someone else's book. As you will remember I got a design your own cover Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book for christmas last year and have only just finished the drawing! I hope to colour this up in photoshop as well as maybe have a go at watercolour and also good old fashioned pencil crayon too :O)

Hopefully I'll pull my finger out and get some Coolio and the Moose done soon. Illness permitting of course.

click the pic to make it bigger

YOU MUG

2009-12-01T23:35:00.004Z

Well here I am again with yet another late blog, AND it has nothing to do with any of my 3 books. Following on from the Choc Factory book cover that I'm midway through, the mug is the small project before that from Rhian. Scribble on it, bake it, scribble on it some more bake it, etc. Until it's done. And now it's done. The original pack shot is below, and below that is a 360 of me finished mug. Promise to have book related drawings springing up soon.

CHARLIE AND THE HALF DRAWN CHOCOLATE FACTORY

2009-10-28T14:06:00.004Z

Ahhhh, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. An all time favourite and probably one of the books that made me want to create, to write, to let my imagination run riot and tell people about it and hope they enjoy it. Blimey that sentence wasn't supposed to go on that long. Sorry. But what a great book! Roald Dahl has to be my all time favourite children's writer, and one of my favourite writers of all time. I think that means the same thing, but just to emphasise his books are so good they shouldn't be seen as just for children.

Anyway, I'm waffling. Last Christmas Rhian bought me several 'project' based presents. As if I hadn't got enough to do! One was a paint it yourself mug which I should put up here, as I seem to favour showing you what has stopped me doing my kids books. One was a make your own Morph [OH- MY-GOD] and as yet unfinished. And the other was a draw your own cover Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

I'm in the middle of that one at the mo, and thought it wise to post it up. It's not at all finished yet and I've decided to use it as a guide to doing my full colour finished illustrations for my own books. I might scan it in and colour it on the pooter and also attempt to go old school and colour it in myself with crayons. Well posh watercolour pencils actually. We shall see, so watch this space... anyway here is the front and the back...

click on them to make them bigger

REINDEER TO MOOSE IN SEVERAL EASY STAGES prt2

2009-10-28T14:00:00.003Z

see a pAs promised here are drawings of the boys with a bit more detail, from a few different angles. Not going to win any awards with these I have to say BUT they are useful to me. I like the big hooter on the one above, but I like the slightly more simple look on the face of the other guy. From here I'm going to draw them very roughly using the guide drawings I've done so far of the illustrations needed. Then hopefully I can make a decision. Otherwise I'll have two versions of the book, one with and without big hooter. Little bit specialist that one.

click on the pics to make them bigger!

REINDEER TO MOOSE IN A SEVERAL EASY STAGES

2009-10-28T13:51:00.004Z

Blimey. It's difficult getting these blummin pictures in the right order in this flippin' blogger thing. I know it's free, but that's not the point. As you know, a Reindeer has been designed, but Moose was absent. Shame really, since I loved the look of him, but you can't go having a Moose in disguise as a reindeer now can you?

Above we have the original designs for Edgar and also some added new versions. Below you will see a pic with loads of designs brought together to show you all the sketches I've done to try and get him right. I didn't want to change the style or the shape too much from what I had before. He still needs to look innocent, and youngish, not as young as Coolio herself, but a youthful Moose. Its surprising how large the antlers are of young Moose, so I've taken a bit of artistic license with the size compared to how big his Dad and Mum's antlers will be. I've also got to make sure the shape of these will bare a resemblance to mug trees, umbrellas etc. Or then the story really won't work. I think I'm on thin ice with the umbrella as it is!

Below you can also see two designs I was very happy with, hopefully next blog they will be worked up a little bit more.

BUMS

2009-10-20T13:38:00.005+01:00

Excited, giddy, happy and gleeful was I as I embarked on Coolio and the Moose and it was as I retackled the Moose Edgar that everything fell apart. The problem being he is a Moose, and the creature I had drawn as you can see on the top of my blog is very much a reeindeer. Or a deer of some description. He is a young Moose, so I have a bit of leeway with his look, but he should not and will not look the way he does now. Which is an absolute ARSE. Because I really love him like that. He has the right feel, the right age, the right helpless/cute look I had wanted right from the start. But alas is the wrong kind of animal. It could be 'Coolio and the Deer' but that just does not sound right. But which is more important, the name of the book and the detail of one of the characters or the look of it? I am looking at redesigning Edgar but I'm not happy at all with his big chin and larger antlers. Below are some reference pictures, so you can see what baby Moose look like, apart from the fact they don't get antlers till they get a bit older, the truth is stretched.

They have got a dark patch on their nose, which my guy has got, although he has an actual nose section, which Moose don't seem to have. Antlers go below the ears on Moose where as I have them the other way round for mine. They are an odd shape, and not really what you would call perfect cute, more cute because of its defects, which is difficult to capture in a character design. Mind you bullwinkle has his ears below his antlers. But he is far from cute, and kinda old looking. I need Edgar to be taller than Coolio, as if he is a few years older than her. Why? I don't know. Just something I've always had in my head, and early drawings made me realise thats what I wanted to make the characters work in this book. So back to the drawing board as they say, but unfortunately literally. YOWL HOWL AND POOPY SQUIRRELS.
I'll keep you posted.

GIANT'S PANTS FINAL

2009-10-09T22:17:00.002+01:00

I think I might have to write a kids book all about pants. I love drawing them. Is that weird? Only Y-fronts though. I'm sorry but boxers, no no no. The other ones, like speedos, NO. Nice big pair of Y-Fronts and I'm there. Ok I'm sounding weirder. Back to drawing, not that I left, but you know what I mean.

The giant has taken a while, a while to extract from my head since I couldn't really see him there, he was a bit fuzzy. Then quite a while to actually get round to shading in. But I've done it, hurrah! Not again without mistakes and slight niggles. Not far off. But notice how the pants are hanging in front of the back window of the house, and how the very next thing hanging on the line is caught on the tree which is at the front of the house. I have tried to shrink down the washing line at one end to make it look like it's going diagonally but its not quite there. Still, works for now. I also somehow forgot to shade in a hedge on the right there.

Oh well!

click on the pic to see it bigger!

GIANT's PANTS part III

2009-10-05T11:55:00.003+01:00

Just so you don't think I'm just scanning in old stuff and passing it off as 'progress' here is the giant's underpants picture as it stands so far. Bit of shading on the fella himself, but not a lot else. I'm not completely happy with that shading either though, but its not the end of the world, after all its supposed to be a working drawing and not the final artwork. Sure it'll be fine in the end!

Click on the image to make it bigger!

SIDNEY RELOADED - THE FAIRY

2009-10-05T09:53:00.009+01:00

Well now. Witch gathering lemons to make a nice potion to cure her poor dragon of a cold, check. Space to the right where pink things will reside and some how make sense that they are there, check. Marshmallows and candyfloss, uncheck. I did contemplate the witch being the witch out of hansel and gretel, so everything in the trees near her were sweets, or you could see her house in the background all pink and sweet. Didn't make sense to me. But then I had a thought, in the dragon picture the dragon has sneezed because it has a snotty cold, and obviously a bit of flame has come out as well, and set light to the witches broom who you can see flying off with a little smoke trail. So, that broom will still be alight, and what better thing to do with marshmallows than toast them on fire, and who better to do it than a pink fairy. Yeh, looking back that makes a whole lot more sense than seeing a house made of pink sweets. Hmmm... As Cher once said, IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME...

Look above and you will see some of the pictures gathered to try and help me draw the fairy because however hard I tried I could not get her right. You will see below that I made A LOT of attempts to get her right. Finally after weeks of pottering I realised that what I needed was a fairy who looked like she belonged in the same picture as the witch, so a similar style to the witch. So with the witch as a base I drew the fairy, and by jingo it worked. Several pencils and a whole spinny of trees later though.

The finished pic [although I think I need to clean it up in photoshop]: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DRtx-j2tj24/SbhQE6dEqsI/AAAAAAAAB-A/8XxRQH81yc0/s1600-h/witches-and-lemons.jpg

As always, click on the pics to see them bigger.

SIDNEY RELOADED - THE WITCH

2009-10-03T15:55:00.001+01:00

As you can see, I didn't take very long before I had my witch. I hadn't got a specific idea of what she would look like at the start, so I could just do whatever. And I liked her slightly dippy and unthreatening look. Some of the other sketches as you will see make her out to be a typical nasty witch, which didn't seem right to me. Of course she has to sit on the page with the Fairy, and at this stage I don't think I had actually thought there would be a Fairy, but more likely I was wondering how to fit candyfloss and marshmallows into the picture. The small links between most of these double page spreads was the thing that helped me think of something else pink to put in the picture and to actually have something for them to do in the picture too.

SIDNEY RELOADED - POODLES

2009-10-02T16:39:00.006+01:00

Ahhhh lovely little fluffy poodles. But if they're pink I'm sorry I don't want to know. Dreadful, NO NO NO. Not pink poodles. Here are the numerous quite repetitive drawings of poodles eating worms. Also popped in the picture which I was homaging in this too. Is homaging a word?

SIDNEY RELOADED - DEVIL

2009-10-02T14:28:00.004+01:00

Some pics I missed out of the first Sidney Reloaded post. Not sure you care about a list but thats the final 'colour things' list [apart from the fact pimples changed into devils. Or did it? I can't remember now. I CAN'T REMEMBER MY OWN STORY NOW DAMN IT! And breath.

2009-10-02T14:22:00.003+01:00

Poor old fella. I had fun thinking what the monster looked like. In the end I didn't go for anything too outlandish [well provided you don't think a large purple creature with a slightly zany fringe is outlandish] in the end, my thinking being I didn't want all the attention being on the monster itself. Which I kind of understand now, I think. Still love the cyclops with the tiny tooth in the centre top.

SIDNEY RELOADED - SHARK

2009-10-02T13:59:00.004+01:00

Not many for the shark I was pretty sure about him straight off. I love the bottom one's simplicity, but he needed a bit more to him than that or I would have had to go back to other drawings and simplify them down a bit. In the future I'll just use my very first simple line drawing. I even like the fact I drew his umbrella on as an afterthought so it actually looks like a little transparent umbrella, such a delicate/girly thing for a big hulk of a shark to be holding, making it even more engaging and funny.

SIDNEY RELOADED - DEVIL

2009-10-02T11:26:00.004+01:00

Looking back now I really like the French look the devil had originally. There was a reason I didn't draw him like that, I can't remember why. I think it was pointed out by Rhian that he looked like Mike Wazowski in Monsters Inc. which is very true, but then he will be bright red and have little horns. I mean if he's going to be the devil he needs to look like the devil right? None of this in a smart suit with greased back hair charming man stuff. This is a kids book, the devil is the devil. END OF. So probably just as well I didn't make him French.

SIDNEY RELOADED - CRABS & CONES

2009-10-02T10:58:00.010+01:00

Originally I had envisaged my little crabs [titter] being stopped from parking up at the cliff top for their jaunt to the seaside by traffic cones. But then I don't know why that just didn't work for me. Hence it changing direction to cones round a swimming pool [rock pool] and none of them being able to get in and hide under stones. Here are all or most of the sketches that had me arrive at that idea. Also possibly thinking about it maybe it was because I didn't want to work out how to draw a crab driving a car.

SIDNEY RELOADED - DRAGON

2009-10-01T18:21:00.011+01:00

Not too many for this little fella. I think I knew pretty quickly
what he was going to look like. Not sure about the crocodile
looking one top right though!

SIDNEY RELOADED

2009-10-01T18:02:00.008+01:00

Oooooh you lucky squirrels! Not only do you get an update, but soon you will have oddles of updates all back to back so quick you'll not know what to do with them. Read them I hope although I won't be doing much writing to accompony them. I remember back in the dark past I said to you, GOD IS GREAT, GOD IS... oh sorry got my manuscripts mixed up there. Back in the past, possibly back in PAST TIMES the shop, I told you I would show you a drawing which would have lots of prep involved and then I went and mislaid it. Anyway, I've found it! It's taken me since March of this year to do it [I don't mean I've been ferreting about in cupboards for the last 8 months] but amazingly those drawings and quite a few others turned up. Huzzaaah!

So as a quick appetizer to the ones that will follow here are some of the early paint splodges and scribbles for the stories main character, little Sidney. As ever, click on the pic to see a bigger version!

TOBY PICTURE AMEND

2009-09-08T12:03:00.004+01:00

Well you've got to love photoshop. Here I am waiting for a render and spell checking my blog [should really have done that a while back] and then looked again at the image below and thought, god what it is about the way Toby looks which makes you think, 'Oh the poor child, I wonder what his parents must look like if they made that'. Then I noticed, not only are his eyes slightly wonky, but he is supposed to be looking off to our left [his right] towards the noises Jeffrey is making on the stairs. But his nose is pointing in totally the opposite direction! Poor lad. Broken nose and he's only 6. Anyway, download the image from my blog, shove it in photoshop, bit of a tweak and Bob's your Auntie's Uncle Trevor and he looks loads better.

Well I think. You keep your opinions to yourself. Of course now his hair is too high up his forehead. Oh goodness.

BIT OF A BREAK

2009-09-06T11:22:00.003+01:00

Well, I know I haven't posted anything recently, but there is a good reason why I haven't. I ain't done nothing! Well I have, but daytime work is a bit stressful at the mo, and night time has night time work as well which is also stressful. So the giant will have to wait just a little longer to have his washing hung out [oooh but it might smell!] so he might need to wash it again and then hang it up. I did mention to him that he needs to get a tumble dryer but he said he had lent it to Edgar the Moose who was trying to get his antlers dry quickly before his ma and pa come home. An in joke that I don't think even I get. Anyway, enough rambling I'm only trying to put off even longer the work i have to do, its a sunday at 11.30 and i've already been at it an hour and a half! BOOOOOOOOOOO....

GIANT'S PANTS 2

2009-08-22T01:27:00.004+01:00

Over the past I don't know how long I've been having a quick think on paper about the giant and his pants. Take that statement as you like, but what it means is, I've been trying to think of how it would look several times over a longish period of time. Most of the sketches looking back are quite similar, because I see a vague bit of something in my mind's eye, but it won't quite gel right on paper. Here are most of the sketches shoved together so you can see. The image marked with a grey dot is the rough which finally made me go AHA! And the green dotted image is the start of the final illustration which i shall hopefully show building up over time. Notice the freaky sketch of a stumpy creature on the right of the middle top image? Well I decided that maybe the giant wouldn't be a normally proportioned man after all, but maybe more like the hunchback of notre dame, or a big shoulder brut. I decided against that about one second after making that appalling sketch. :OP

click on the image to make it bigger

GIANT's PANTS

2009-08-20T11:39:00.006+01:00

Gadzoooooooks! I've nearly been a month between updates. That's not the attitude for getting this whole project completed now is it? No, it's not. I've been a bit naughty and spent time on other things. Which I know is bad, but see it as a major case of procrastination. Major. These are the things which have dampened my 3books fire:

1. Struggling on the illustration of the giant's underpants. Many factors are a problem, how much giant to show, what angle to show it all from, and when I managed to get that right how the chuff the washing line angles through the picture. Difficult stuff. After all a picture of a giant hanging his smalls out to dry should be pretty funny and interesting to look at. And thus far I don't think my sketches are.

2. E4 have an E4 sting competition every year and I thought of several ideas quite a long time ago for the competition. I've been creating characters for that, and as yet haven't finished them let alone storyboard the sequence or animated it. So I won't meet that deadline and can return to giant's pants.

Click on the images to make these two old dears bigger.
Characters half way through design for E4 sting competition.

3. Illness. I've been a poorly. No stop that, no violins please.

Anyway, normal service will resume. Because the clock is ticking, and also because I really, REALLY want to get on with the next and final book, Coolio and the Moose. Sketches for the giant's underpants will start to pop up here over the next few days.

2009-07-23T00:33:00.003+01:00

Well here we go, at long last the MWTTWO's desk is all done. Several lunchtimes of sketching and shading. The wallpaper is made in photoshop using a pattern I drew from a 70s wallpaper. Just seems right he would have a dated jumbled room. Of course when I came to fit the pic in the mock book layouts so far it didn't fit properly. No surprise there, but then I scaled it up and it looked better. Only problem being there's no where to put the text now. Argh. And not only that but a lot of illustrations I've done so far have funny white blocks on them and look a bit weird levels wise, annoying. Some tweaking in the future before they get sent off for sure! Right I'm waffling, and its late. Goodnight.

to see the picture larger, give it a click!

2009-07-16T21:52:00.006+01:00

I've been merrily beavering away this week drawing each lunchtime at work. I make sure I have my full hour and also make sure its productive. Why is it that within an hour of getting to work I feel the only thing I want to do is drawing for my books. And when I get home at night it seems like the last thing I might want to do. Well almost, there is some painting to do. Even when I have a long undisturbed weekend I still managed to procrastinate myself into a corner and can't escape. Ho hum. Anyway, lunchtime drawing is actually great. I love it. Break from moving a mouse several inches north, south, east and west. And it gets my books closer to completion. Since the last few posts I've been tackling the subject of the title. We need to see the empty office of the man who... blah blah so I have done some rough sketches of what I wanted it to look like and started to draw it up. I could see it in my mind straight away, so there was no arguing with myself. Just straight to it, the only thing that needs decisions is items and clutter in the office.

I must remember that I wanted to draw a nice seventies style wallpaper in the background. Also, you see there's an empty shelf on the right hand side. What do you think should go on there? Any suggestions email me or message via facebook.

Anyway, sketches and drawing so far below, excuse being able to see through the rough onto the rough rough. Does that make sense?

click on the images to see larger versions

THE POOR MAN 5

2009-07-12T17:36:00.002+01:00

Blogger is annoying me. Each time I upload an image it represents it in this editing window as a bunch of code! Oh, ah, actually I just see why. DOH! Thats better now I can see whats going on and alter my text sizes and everything. So anyway, this is I guess I'm going to say the finished man who turns the world on in the morning illustration. I drew a larger dragon who just got in the way, and this one, well I don't really know where it should go, I never drew it specifically to go anywhere, but it will stay there think for now. I don't think its going to be a deal breaker for an agent or publisher, at least I hope not. So there she shall stay. I'm fairly happy with it, I don't think its as animated as I would like, the feeling of peril isn't too high for the guy in the car even though when you look he's just avoided driving into a dragon's egg after having to plough through very deep snow and then lean out of his car window to actually see where he's going because of exploding marshmallows on his windscreen and we also see he has a giant's pants to avoid as well. Tough going really, and you thought the M25 was bad in the mornings. I don't think the feeling of peril is strong even though in words it sounds pretty bad. Again, its not something that would necessarily be a deal breaker I hope, things can be changed, tweaked. And in any case, its not a pivotal part of the story at all. Right, giant's hanging out washing and empty desks to draw. And I think, crossed fingers thats pretty much white day sorted. I hope so!

SLEEPY HEAD

2009-07-12T17:32:00.003+01:00

Wow. Another post! I know. Wait two weeks and then suddenly.. yadda yadda, you know the rest. Anyway, this is one of the last drawings at the end of the book where toby is very happy with himself. He worked out why the world was white at 4am. Its missing his cat curled up next to him on the rug.

click on the image to see it bigger

THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT

2009-07-12T16:35:00.004+01:00

What the heck is wrong with blogger today? I know I haven't posted for about two weeks, but come on! Anyway, you didn't come here for a rant did you. No, you didn't. An upload for the first time in two weeks... I know, lazy! Well not lazy but other things have got in the way [as well as laziness]. This pic has been drawn for a while but I had some shading to do to bring it up to the other roughs. ie. not as rough as it was. Anyway, jeffrey the cat is creeping up the stairs and where as most kids might be scared of the creeks, toby knows its jeffrey. Not a lot more to say about this one, and there are plenty more to come!

click on the image to see it larger

HAVING A SNIFF

2009-06-15T23:49:00.004+01:00

Three posts in one day, ARE YOU MAD? Possibly. Aren't you? This is a drawing I had done quite a while ago, well two drawings, one of the room and one of toby in it. I really like this drawing because I had the idea of Toby hanging out of the window to sniff the air being across two pages suddenly one day. So the detailed existing full colour room is on one page with Toby's feet in it, and the other page is just white, with Toby's head in it sniffing. Simple but effective I think. Anyway, I had thought this was done, but found it in a pile of 'TO BE SHADED' drawings. So in the nice dazzling sunshine on Sunday I ventured outside and shaded it in. I couldn't see a damned thing faced with a near white page in 84 degrees of sunshine. But I soldiered on and got it done. Got a nice tan too, so now I'm slightly shaded in too.

I've just noticed I haven't filled the picture in over Toby's bed. I think I have a drawing for it [a train I think?] so that will have to get sorted sometime soon!

As ever click on the image to see it larger.

POOR MAN 4

2009-06-15T23:41:00.002+01:00

I don't know if I'm tempting fate but, when making the title for this particular post I created 5, 6 and 7 as well just to save time. Hmm... was that foolish? Only time will tell as the singer in this clip once said: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGc_tzGaL7M

As you will recall I had a few bits to add to the illustrator which is almost at the end of 'The Day the World Turned White'. A dragon swooping through the sky and the actual man who turns the world on every day. Unfortunately the dragon doesn't fit as it is into the illustration, and other things prevent me from finishing it off proper like. So I've posted the dragon and the man anyway. The man works, more or less, well as well as he needs to for a rough of the illustration, but the dragon as yet remains unsolved. Not far to go I don't think. I think I might only of needed to create part 5.

SACRIFICE

2009-06-15T23:29:00.002+01:00

Yes that does say what you think it says. Some of you [male] will weep openly. Some of you [female] will say 'What is it?'. Some of you [female] will tut openly. I know, am I showing dedication or what? I found myself giving myself treats of games of Call Of Duty well in advance of actually earning them. My productivity has risen by well, quite a bit. Not getting anything done? Constantly thinking of the best place to put a claymore and perfected cooking a grenade to within nano seconds, but have not progressed anywhere near as much as you should have with your personal projects and goals? Have no personal projects or goals? Maybe you should do the same. I will reinstall. But for now, RIP Call Of Duty Modern Warfare Multiplayer. You shall be missed.

POOR MAN 3 [almost there]

2009-06-09T13:45:00.008+01:00

Yes I know I've been a very lazy boy. Well kind of. Gradually pieceing together this tricky illustration. I managed to get the basic layout right quite a while back but then have been hung up on details. I've gradually created extra bits to go on the main bit you saw before. Lots of bits. Two top illustrations show the bits on their own. The ALMOST THERE illustration at the bottom shows the bits added and shading here and there to make bits stand out which otherwise would be much more obvious in colour.

Of course there are still two things missing! The actual man who turns the world on in the morning, and also the tail/body of the dragon who has dropped the egg. There will probably be some tweaks to shading here and there but not many as this is supposed to only be a rough! As ever click on the images to see them bigger!

POOR MAN 2

2009-05-25T16:14:00.007+01:00

So yes, busy busy busy. So many things to do, all mostly to do with the day job. But now, aha! Some progress, a trip to the pub yesterday was pretty fruitful. Well I say that, fruit coming in the form of pear cider mainly. Not a bad place to sit and potter, only problem is the fact it was a bank holiday weekend it turned out very noisey towards the end. I think I was there from just before 5 to gone midnight. Not drawing the whole time but a lot of it. Alas concentration wained here and there so good job I had my rubber with me. And as yet I haven't looked at what I had done. Mainly shading a half finished sketch of the final thing.

Things to add:

- Man that turns world on in car
- Dragons tail + claws
- Aeroplane
- Giant's pants and socks strewn about

some of these bits will be drawn seperately and then comped in later in photoshop some will be added to the drawing with a bit of rubbing out. Getting there, hopefully a final update for this one next week...

TILING AND WORK AND SLEEPING

2009-05-06T10:14:00.003+01:00

Yes well, now then, I have worked a much more detailed rough together to use for the final piece of artwork [which I think I'm going to work on at a smaller scale, ie. not two A3s stuck together [some of you might call that A2] but just A3 size, see how I get on] but alas overtime and tiling and grouting and sleeping and not drawing whatsoeversohelpmegod has got in the way. I know I'm naughty, there's no need to rub it in. Back shortly, honest!

THE POOR MAN

2009-04-27T14:13:00.007+01:00

Poor old fella, just trying to get into work and the entire contents of a child's imagination is being hurled and unleashed at you. Well that's what I'm trying to represent with this illustration anyway.

The strip of pictures shows my rough sketches working up into the startings of a finished drawing, then applying the brakes to get more roughs done. There's a lot to represent in this picture, and it's blummin difficult to fit it all in, especially in that over complicated detailed exciting way that it needs. As you can see the top rough was a splurge. Then I had a vision in my head which I thought was put there by a book cover for a Tom Sharpe book, but I must be wrong. I had a good look for it and it didn't show up, but there is one with a car whizzing on the front, so that might have been it. Anyone know of a cartoon of a car coming over a hill with a frazzled looking driver behind the wheel with his tongue hanging out, then give me a shout! Anyway, the second drawing [notice I've usefully numbered the frames but you can't read them unless you click on the image but that takes you to another page which means you can't read this text. Hmmm. What a dilemma? Personally I would open the image in another browser window and then you can see both, I can't find a way of getting blogger to do that, but if you know a way, let me know! Wow, homework.] is my rough of that vision, which I think came out of my brain without too much trauma. The second one is just tidying that up, I folded one half of the layout paper over the top of the original to make that one, you might be able to see bits of the other one through. Also notice on 3 theres a small thumbnail where I wondered if I had started going down the wrong route and whether actually like my original rough I saw the car flying through the sky vertically towards us. I may well return to that if this one doesn't work out! The fourth sketch is a straight trace of 3 with the 'stuff' added. Dragon's feet dangling down, lazers coming out of labs, marshmallows over head, giant socks int he road and a big load of snow covering the car. Phew. Happy with that sketch I started to draw it up neat, look see, number 5! Nah, I wasn't ready so that got abandoned and 6 came about. I did wonder about having the egg in the middle of the road and our snap shot illustration shows fractions of a second after the car has smashed through the egg. I kinda thought that actually puts the egg a bit too much in the centre of stage. So seeing the egg in the distance with a either a hole in it, or as I've drawn on the same pic [6] the egg smashed on the road but with skid marks by the edge of it where the car has skidded off road to avoid it. The marshmallow factory is annoyingly in exactly the same place as the marshmallow illustration which obviously is a NO NO, so this will probably swap places with the lab. Then however the marshmallows won't be coming over the car but across it, which I'm not happy with. How picky am I? Maybe I could flip the scene so the car is coming over the hill to the left, oh no, NO NO NO... I don't know, but you'll see the decisions in the next few days.

The image on its own at the bottom is the latest sketch, its traced from image 6 on the strip. I've expanded the area for the illustration to closer to the correct dimensions so I can fit everything in!

click on the image to see it bigger

TOBY AND A VERY LARGE EGG

2009-04-23T14:00:00.006+01:00

Toby and a very large egg. Enough said really. I've started to use a brush pen to make a very quick bold sketch of an illustration then overlay layout paper, redraw it with any tweaks or changes I have then retrace that and refine a final time with the finished drawing. Seems to work well because then I don't get into any details early on just if the shapes work. Then when I can see they do I flesh it out. Simple but effective! Just like me.

click on the image to view a bigger one

I'VE ONLY GONE & CAUGHT UP

2009-04-18T19:50:00.006+01:00

There are about 6 more illustrations to be created for 'White Day' which I've started to think about and make loose sketches towards, they are much more current where as much of what you have seen to date has been created over quite a bit of time. I have actually caught up, and this is where the fun/work starts. Creating the out standing drawings for 'White Day' and then moving on to 'Coolio and the Moose'. So things will probably slow down but thicken up as there is more stuff added as and when. So more sketches, more work in progress, just more. Hopefully! 'Coolio and the Moose' is actually quite heavily planned out which is nice and is going to be much more free to do. There are no repetitive locations, no planning of 'place'. The two characters are already designed. So it should be a breeze! Haha. Yes well, cough cough. With 6 roughs to do, tidying up and all the books, one book to totally draw and then possibly up to 9 finished illustrations to do I have quite a lot of work to cram in to however many days it is now till my deadline. Not to mention all the typography and final tarting about with the mock books. Yikes. Enough, I have to get on!

Maybe one game of Call of Duty before then...

A STAR IS BORN

2009-04-18T19:29:00.010+01:00

Well ok maybe that's a bit over the top and dramatic. Maybe it isn't. Below are 3 sets of images, collections of the initial first sketches and then the second round sketches and then the final tidied up and cleaned up finals to make their way into the mock up book. Look at the original 'Designing Toby' post to see him in his earliest stages: http://the3books.blogspot.com/2009/03/designing-toby.html

There were all kinds of problems along the way some major most tiny and all forgotten now. I endured a lengthy photo session in my living room where I dressed in stripey colgate PJs enacted all the situations and facial expressions Toby went through. Much to the amusement of Rhian I hasten to add. My pleas of it's all for art were falling on deaf ears as I clambered behind the TV [the only thing high enough to be used as a window ledge in Toby's bedroom] and stubbed my toes on scart leads and adaptors. Ah well. Those pictures you won't be seeing!

THE DROPPED DRAGON'S EGG

2009-04-18T01:00:00.017+01:00

I really am spoiling you aren't I? Look how much effort I'm putting into titles now. More than I am putting into actually doing my drawings. Uh-oh. Not only have I put some effort into the title design but also you get a movie. YES YOU READ RIGHT, A MOVIE! I know. Towards the end of the movie you'll notice I changed my mind about the dragon's neck. It all seemed a bit cliche having a long curled up neck. It had been annoying me for a little while and then I decided to get rid of it and then redraw it.

Hopefully you can see how the dragon illustration was constructed. I think I rendered out about five maquette angles and finally decided on this angle at the last minute.

As the top picture of these 3 grouped pics shows, there were LOTS of false starts and working drawings for this illustration. I still don't think I've truely nailed it but it's a lot closer than any of those drawings were. The second picture shows the sketch which had me thinking EUREKA! I've found it. Then the third shows another false start where the nuances of the eureka sketch were completely lost and the dragon looks old and predictable, where as the eureka one looks motherly, sad, gentle, much more what I was after. Anyway, then we come to all the pictures you've seen in the movie. Last and by no means least is the final pic. Unfortunately I mounted the illustration on some board as it was getting tatty and it wrinkled up badly which shows on the scan :O( You still get the general idea.

click on the image to see it larger

ONE OF THE HARDEST CHALLENGES

2009-04-18T00:54:00.004+01:00

One of the hardest challenges for keeping going and drawing after work, or at weekends is procrastination. I mean, blimey I have to be one of the kings of procrastination. Well I thought I was until reading 'How I write' in Time Out magazine [which is basically an interview with various writers asking them how they go about writing] in which I found nearly all of them do pretty much everything there is to do other than the actual writing and come to that either at the bitter end, or do it for an hour and then do loads more stuff and possibly maybe if they can be bothered do a little later. Trying to keep going is hard, and to be honest I've been doing this for sometime. That's kind of where this blog comes in, it's to help me keep going. It's just as well I have got this blog to keep me going since my cats seem to do everything they can to get me to not do my drawings to either A) play with them or B) feed them. They know which ones they are.

THE AMAZING FLYING HOUSE

2009-04-17T15:29:00.018+01:00

A flying house. That conjoures up so many great images in my brain it was difficult to lock it down to just the one. What would you do? No actually, I don't want to know because it might be better than mine. Anyway, this is how I approached it. Clouds, ground from above, planes. I had to know what they actually looked like so I can get the look right. I know something like google earth or maps shows you the earth from above, but it doesn't look quite like it does from out of a plane window. So I had to scoot about for pictures actually taken from a plane window, and make sure it was more in keeping with the surrounds of the house I had created. I think I also used a reference picture of my house/surrounds for some of the details seen through the clouds. Can you see me waving? Don't be silly, I'm not in the picture.

The angle again was worked out with my maquette and this time I downloaded a freebie model of a jumbo to put into the picture to work that bit out as well. A few alterations to the plane to make it more 'White Day' in style and I was off. One more thing is the outline style I had been rendering off my maquette at didnt do any favours for the plane since the details on that come from a texture. So I had to render two off one for the house and one for the plane.

You see a smaller version of the finished piece second from bottom. Now then, I got some feedback, and not necessarily the sort of feedback you want either especially since the plane is supposed to be in the sky and flying. The feedback was this: 'It doesn't look like it's in the sky and flying'. Bugger. So revision of this was, break the clouds by the edge of the house so you can see there is nothing beneath, add wings and a propeller to the house, as if some inspector gadget way it had been tranformed. The final version at the bottom still doesn't quite work it could be argued [other people might argue, I think it does!] but I think that will come out in the final artwork. When I come to do final finished colour artwork, that may well be one of the ones which gets done. I think the colour artwork will be an opportunity to right slight wrongs in a few illustrations. However I can feel myself 'wanting' to create full colour artwork for my favourite sketches. We shall see!

click on the image to see the large version

WHAT THE FORMATTING IS GOING ON?

2009-04-13T22:00:00.006+01:00

So what the formatting is going on? I don't know. I thought I knew how to control the stupidness of blogger but clearly I don't. So if this blog looks at times messy or just weird [ie. where pictures are in relation to text] well don't blame me. I make it all look lovely and then it just goes and plays silly buggers with me. Just so you know.

THE SCIENTIST'S SHELF

2009-04-13T21:04:00.021+01:00

At one point Toby's house just so happens to be tiny, you know cos a clumsy scientist shrinks it. Can happen so don't scoff. Anyway, in my head it seemed simple so I lined up my maquette to use and printed it off.

The resulting picture would probably look fine if it was drawn up and finished off proper, but to me it looked like some of the others before, it was too boring. So I went back to the maquette and got myself a lovely angle and printed it off.

The illustration you see bottom left of the group of four looks ok at first. Nice angle! I hear you cry, but then WEIRD ANGLES I hear you cry as you realise my perspective is shot to sherbert. I know, awful aren't I? Naughty. So the maquette found some shelves and brackets being added to it, plus a flask and a 'Little Shop of Horrors' plant to the bargain.

The final illustration hopefully does all the prep and false starts justice. As you can see there's a lot of junk on them there shelves. It's quite hard and time consuming coming up with shelf contents for a scientist. As you can see by a small selection of my reference pictures [taken in the science museum] it helps to have reference! Also notice the note at the back of the house, it has a formula on it? Well that's from this source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/4468884.stm

click on the image to see the large version

AAHHH! EXPLODING MARSHMALLOWS!

2009-04-08T20:11:00.013+01:00

Yes well, exploding marshmallows. What can I say? They speak for themselves really. This illustration was pretty straight forward in my head, a marshmallow factory explodes covering Toby's house in marshmallow. Simple huh? So I had a scoot about for the factory, I was thinking a combination of Willy Wonka's and the Rowntree Macintosh factory I grew up going past all the time up in York. Even though a couple of the
images to the left are actually a little bit naff they still triggered something in my head to use them as reference.

Again I used my maquette to get the angle right. Below that you see the first quick rough sketch, similar to the way I went about the second version of the snow scene. However I suffered again at the hands of a boring angle brought on by just not getting it right at the maquette stage. I even wrote on that first sketch boring angle. So god knows why I then went on to draw it up proper!

So I scrapped it and went back to the drawing board as they say. Well it was true. Another angle was found and I went for it. The subsequent pictures are the house and surroundings, then an overlay I created of all the marshmallow action, then this was scanned and taken into photoshop and I whitened the areas that were marshmallow. Put the two elements together and there you have it, a finished rough of the marshmallow factory explosion scene DONE.

click image to see a bigger one

BBRRR IT'S COLD, DID SOMEONE LEAVE THE WINDOW OPEN?

2009-03-26T13:12:00.014Z

So then, with the house model and room models done I started on the illustrations depicting various different things. In the first one the house has been covered in a huge snow fall. Big snow drifts, all the cliches of snowy scenes. I tried a few camera angles on the house and decided on the one at the top of the picture to the right. I then used this as a base for the illustration underneath. To the left here are some of the reference images I gathered together from all corners of the internet. Bless it. I thought I was pretty happy with the drawing but coming back to it two days later I realised it was very dull. This is a children's book, it needs to be magical and exciting and interesting and and, well you know, not what this illustration is.

So I went back to the maquette. One of the things I realised with this illustration is the fact you couldn't see Toby's window which I had always decided would be at the back of the property looking over the garden. So I chose a different angle, looking at the back and made it a bit more interesting. I also lowered the slide to make it look like it was buried in snow, top bit of the second picture. Then I decided to just go for it really quickly and loosely and sketch out the sort of thing I had in my head, big curling snow drifts, a snowman, a robin, lots of icicles the works. Basically what I would want to see if I was a kid I think. The final illustration is at the bottom of the 3 and the last picture in this posting. Click on it to see it bigger. Remember these are roughs, so the final artwork will be very close but will probably have extra details and slight changes here and there. The snow falling is put on afterwards with photoshop.

Within this illustration I decided on some of the surrounding landscape [which might change in the final illustrations]. So these decisions had to be carried through to all the other illustrations.I decided against modelling the rest of the surrounding area in the 3D because quite frankly I couldn't be arsed. If it proved difficult then I would.

click on the image to see the large version

MORE HOUSES

2009-03-25T21:52:00.011Z

Ah look what I found, some more house drawings [or some of the ones you've seen but better quality. Well ok when I say better quality, I mean roughly the same quality as the ones before but bigger. Actually if they were the same size they would probably be poorer quality.] Anyway. Top image here is some sketches for the plans of the house. I needed to know where things were going to be. I think this might be before I decided to make a 3D model of the house. So having a plan would be a good reference for each drawing.

As you might have seen before I had a reference picture of the Weasley's house from Harry Potter well I decided to get that picture after drawings this house and wondering what it reminded me of. I soon decided against such a topsy turvy house.

The red drawing is pretty much as close as I was going to get to the finished article. I knew of a problem as soon as I'd drawn it though, the house just looks too big! I decided to increase the size of the features. So door bigger, windows bigger, etc.

The drawing below that was one of two A1 size drawings I did for it letting me explore bits and pieces a bit futher all on one page. I drift into the bedroom on that page too and look at some ideas for contents of that room as well. Most of the things I drew stayed. The shape of the bed though changed, it looks too grown up. Too square. So I changed the proportions of it and gave it a nice wooden bed frame too. Something slightly old fashioned, simple and timeless. After a few explorations about possible wardrobe design and toy box contents I created the 3D model maquette.

The first image is a wire frame, for those of you not knowing of the joys of 3D this shows how the model is constructed. There is absolutely no point in it being here, it serves no purpose, but people always put their wireframes up, so why not me? The second render* is using the cell shader setting which renders each object out as lines. I print these renders off and then use them on a light box, or with layout paper to base my drawing on. The final picture is a swanky [well ish] render* of the bedroom. Again totally pointless but it shows the model off well and solidifies the room.

Whatever that means. Talking of whatever that means...

*Render. So what does render mean? Well it means taking all that maths and all those settings for textures and lighting and stuff and making the final image. That's a really bad description of render, so I shall look it up and post the description here:

Rendering (computer graphics), the process of producing an image from a higher-level description of its components

oooh thats a good one. Also check out this link http://en.wikiped/wiki/Rendering_(computer_graphics)

DESIGNING TOBY

2009-03-25T01:01:00.016Z

I could see Toby the instant I wrote about him. A simple little lad [but not like that] with scruffy hair and stripey pyjamas. Not a very challenging character or original granted, but an engaging and straight forward one I hoped. Apart from a few simple variations I tried out in the very short design process he pretty much stayed the same as in my head. I found difficulty getting his age right. Too much leg and he looks too old, head too small and the same problem. On the grouped designs to the left my favourite was always the guy seemingly in clouds on the right of the bottom one. No I don't know why he was in clouds either.

Toby got a bit of a trendy fringe in the second design page here. Soon forgotten thankfully. I tried him with glasses too briefly but dropped them since he wasn't wearing them in my head. Maybe he has contacts. Who knows.

In the third drawing although he seemed very similar to the other designs I had done he looks too old. The main reason being the body is too long. Everything is too much in proportion. Yes I know our heads aren't that big, that would be crazy. But looking at the drawings below you can see what I mean. This is also partly to do with his facial experssion too and his hair cut.

In the final drawing as I said before the guy on the right as I said before is my firm favourite and one I went forward with in the rest of the layout designs. Notice the creepy looking lad at the bottom left with the goggly eyes. Blurgh, what was that about? Actually the guy next to him with a scrawl through him too isn't exactly the normalist looking guy either. Don't blame them I think it's more my fault than theirs.

FACED WITH A 'WHITE' PAGE

2009-03-23T23:32:00.017Z

So my rocky travels bring me to 'White Day'. I don't mean I've been to where they shot Rocky to some how get me in the mood for illustrating, or that I've been to THE Rockies. I'm sure you knew that but I wouldn't want you reading on thinking that or we could end up in a right twizzle.

White Day needed only a few things to get it going, a house, room, boy [Toby], and his cat, Jeffrey.

For some reason I started on the house first and not the main character. The house is a character though really, kind of. Ok maybe it isn't but it might have explained why I ignored Toby for the house! The house was sketchy in my head. I knew I wanted a nice country house, tall, homely, some where you would of enjoyed growing up. Something right out of Famous Five. The illustrations with the house in them just wouldn't have worked with a modern house, or a terrace, or a Barrat home. To the left top are some of the inspiration pictures I gathered together. Not always just the shape either but sometimes the mood of them, or a detail. Yes that is the Weasley's house from Harry Potter, maybe a bit too topsy turvy for me, but in a very nice setting. Obviously something I was going to need to address as well.

To the left are some house designs. I might need to swap these pics out so you can see the detail a bit better. After researching I was pretty sure of the type of house I wanted. Now then, stop, don't be nasty, but I realised it was going to do my nut in if I had to draw this house from various different angles and work out the perspective and also just thinking of interesting angles to have it in.

So I had the idea of making a maquette but in a 3D package. This way I could work out my compositions [and as you will see from later posts, not very well at the start] and camera angles if you like well in advance of drawing. Now at first I thought this was cheating. But then why should it be? Some artists might draw subjects from various different angles to get what they need, some will use models, maquettes to of course. It seemed the perfect solution. So as you can see to the left here I built the house and the garden [some simplified trees for basic shape and foliage position]. The renders to the left are the final outputs I needed for tracing and then working on in the illustrations. The one to the right is just a nicer render to show off the model a bit. Now this was complete allI needed was Toby's room, Toby and his cat...

LAST OF SIDNEY

2009-03-23T22:41:00.006Z

I don't really know why I put this big orange square of paint strokes on this post. I can't think why it's here? I seem to remember that its not even original, it's one small patch which was repeated in photoshop, and not very well either! But the original, well I don't know where that went, and it doesn't really matter. The point I think is I shoved brush to paper to see what it would look like [now come on I don't mean I have never painted on paper, or I don't know what paint looks like but more, I want to see what the texture would be like with undiluted goache or acrylic. See if it would look the way I hoped and remembered. Anyway, this was the result and I knew then that I really want Sidney to be painted. And pretty boldy too, in the main.

What you see below is the layout as it stands to date. Obviously it's small because I don't want to give too much away, I have probably done that already anyway. Oooh, have I put a copyright on this blog? Oh yes I have. Phew. Anyway, you might notice big blocks of colour, gradients from one to another. This is something I need to come back to. Also my layout or mock book is going to be in black and white. I don't know why I told you that, just thought you might like to know. Well ok be like that. Well don't storm off in a huff, you started it! Oh fine, FINE!

click on the image to see the large version

SIDNEY

2009-03-23T21:58:00.006Z

AAAAAAhhhhhh! Sidney where have your eyes gone? Oh yes, I was trying out Sid shapes in paint.

I always saw Sidney as a paint splodge/stroke. I mean why not right? A paint splodge with eyes. Now there are other things that he needs to have about him, arms at one point, and he also needs to express emotions too. If he is jumping for joy then he can be a little splattering mark, which looks happy. If he's sad he can be a dribbling sunken splodge in a corner. I know on many occasions I've been a dribbling sunken splodge in the corner. Or was that drunken?

Anyhoo, he's a lovely little fella who's just a little confused with life. When it came to actually finding Sidney the character and then bringing that character out in paint splodges, well that wasn't so straight forward. Below are sketches for the character and a small cast of extras that appear with him. Hopefully you can tell the emotions that Sid is feeling in each sketch. Mostly let's face it ranging from happy to sad with maybe two stop off points between.

click on the image to see the large version

WHO'S A SPOTTY DEVIL THEN?

2009-03-23T21:05:00.012Z

Well this here Devil is as it happens. Not really sure why he should be so spotty since he is chomping his way through a whole picnic basket of chillies. I know representations of the Devil are usually some lithe little man or a charming sophisticated besuited fella and not usually a red brussel sprout with a moustache, but why go with cliche? I could hardly draw a nasty ghastly evil terror for a children's book now could I? Well actually of course I could. But then I don't believe in God or the Devil so what the heck. Anyway if the devil is supposed to be charming, why wouldn't he be slightly cute and be wearing flip-flops? Exactly. I mean you never hear of God being charming do you? Notice also the snail who appeared earlier on. He's not used to chillies as you can see. I think this straight forward fire out of mouth pose was inspired by Richard Condie's 'The Big Snit' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbwMm5LyQgk. There's a bit in that where his cat chews through the TV cable and gets electrocuted. Funny stuff, also check his film 'Getting Started' which looks at procrastination. Something we can all relate to even though we generally don't realise or admit to doing it.

I love the snail so much I dedicated a big fat picture of him. I have no idea how I'm going to incorporate him in the red half of the painting when I come to it. I guess maybe the fire from his mouth and the fact he's burning inside will give him a red glow in two different ways. Notice the soft texture of the rug and its lovely hemming. Aaahhh, I know my rugs.

On the Orange side I really couldn't decide what two things to have that are good. Then I thought, well, why not have every single thing you can think of that's orange. So I had butterflies and flowers and pumpkins [a homage to a failed piece of 'non-typography' I created at college 'Like typography before it was invented' said my tutor helpfully. Carrots and oranges as well of course and pride of place my cat Woody who alas when I drew this had been run over by a car and killed. Not actually while I drew it, but a few months before. So a nice little nod to that gorgeous little fella.

click on the image to see the large version

ANOTHER BREAK, YOU BEAST!

2009-03-12T00:07:00.001Z

Yes another break from the blogging stream. I'm off to amsterdam for a long weekend. I might find those fairy drawings there. Well I might think I have found them.

WITCHES HAVE YELLOW TEETH AND FAIRIES ARE PINK

2009-03-11T23:57:00.006Z

Oh utterly damn blast and buggery chuff. I promised [did I promise, would I have been so bold?] to show you an illustration which had a lot of prep work and also, you know, show the prep work. But alas, and I'm not fibbing, I can't find the darn stuff AT ALL. If I manage to find it I shall upload it and update this posting. If not you shall have to take my word for it.

Anyway, the problem was basically everything but the witch, her broom and the lemons. In other words, the fairy, the rest of the tree and the marshmallows. Well at first I didn't know what to have as a good pink thing, then I thought of marshmallows. The fairy I have to say was AWFUL. I wanted her like a little plump cuddly thing, with a gap between her teeth. You know like the fairy in Wilo the Wisp. But try as I might it just didn't work. I liked the witch so much it seemed impossible to get the fairy to go right. IMPOSSIBLE I SAY. It must have taken me a month if not longer to get it right. I don't mean non stop. I mean dribs and drabs and sulks. Then I had a brain wave, the style of the fairy was working against the style of the witch, so why not draw it like they are sisters, or the same style as each other at least. So tracing the witch but into a cute version of the witch [and tracing isn't cheating when the thing you're tracing you actually drew]. Anyway, that solved the problem. But I wish I could find all the many versions of the fairy before the finished one.

The marshmallow dispenser strapped to a tree makes all the difference I think. Also notice how the fairy is toasting her marshmallows. Maybe think back to the dragon? Also the witch should have a list in her hand which is title 'Spell to eleviate a cold' or some such nonsense. Of course the ingredients will be lemons and honey!

Right, annoyed at not finding those drawings I'm going to finish here. No, don't complain.

click on the image to see the large version

POODLES SLURPING WORMS

2009-03-10T20:46:00.005Z

Now, faced with pink and purple to illustrate, or actually sorry to first write about, well you might be able to think of lots of things that are pink that you don't like. Or purple that you do. I had a bit of a brain freeze and one thing wouldn't go out of my head, and that's poodles. Now I may have seen the odd [literally] pink poodle in my time, but they're not exactly all over the place are they, not even in Paris. So why that image should stick with me I don't know. I thought poodles and worms sounded quite good in one sentence if nothing else, and then when I thought of a homage to the Lady and the Tramp spaghetti eating scene but with worms, well, I was ready to begin scribbling. Now I wish I had hundreds of prep work to show [there might be a few margin scribbles] but really all I done was sit down and draw. That's it. I thought grapes might be a little boring just sat in a bowl so decided to have a nice vine instead. Then that seemed a bit boring too so I decided to make some of them have eyes and character. Well I mean, you would've wouldn't you? Anyway, the illustration I started after this one HAS got loads of prep work, or more like design work when I was half way through, I won't spoil the surprise, but I think I might have used at least a trees worth of paper on that one.

Don't miss the worm breadsticks though will ya!

click on the image to see the large version

WE'RE ON A BREAK

2009-03-08T14:14:00.004Z

I've been on a bit of a break from the blog for a few days while we attempt to sort our back garden out. It's raining now, so we're having a break from doing our back garden. Any more breaks and I'll be totally broke.

Updates will resume next week!

CRABS & CONES

2009-03-02T22:24:00.019Z

Poor old crabs. Thought they'd all meet up and go for a swim down the local pool. But what do you know, damned cones everywhere! The pool is shut and the crabs just don't seem to know what to do. What ever you do, don't suggest they use the sea instead.

As you can see here on the left my lovelies, the top drawing is the way I originally drew the picture, and then the middle grey one is desaturated via photoshop then the bottom one is the colour corrected final. You can also see that the pictures have a join. Unfortunately my scanner is only A4! So I've had to scan the pics in several chunks. I realised that my pictures weren't the right aspect ratio for the size I wanted the final books to be [ie. to fit text in?!], so I had to backtrack and stick bits on both sides of the pictures and then redraw and add bits. The bottom finished illustration is actual about a third longer than this one, but not a lot goes on in that third so I've saved a bit of space. Give both picks a click if you want to see them in slightly more detail.

click on the image to see the large version

DON'T UNICYCLE NEAR STRAWBERRIES

2009-03-02T11:42:00.012Z

What a handsome chap eh? Poor purple monster, fell off his unicycle. Problem is if you're going to fall off your unicycle, don't do it in front of a load of easily humoured wild strawberries or they'll just sit there laughing their heads off and not give you a hand up and an elastoplast.

This is for purple and red. What?! I hear you cry, well each illustration is in two halves, one based on a colour. The monster is purple, everyone knows monsters are purple, and he's bruised, purple again.

Now those strawberries, well, I wasn't keen. So below you can see the new strawberries, traced off the originals and corrected. Notice also the fact these top two illustrations are blue? Well I found some leads for automatic pencils that were blue. I had the idea I would loosely sketch them and then go over in standard pencil after. But I liked the blue so much I went on with it. The finished article has been scanned in and desaturated obviously. Yes, it is obvious! The strawberries were cut out, then good all glue sticked into place. Once scanned the more obvious hard edge join was airbrushed out. Not very well I've just noticed on the final version at the bottom.

One odd thing about this composition that annoys me, but not enough to change it, is the hairline of the monster. Well not just the hairline, but the shape of it. It is the same shape as the grass behind it, and almost at exactly the same level! In the final picture the difference will be quite obvious, due to colour, BUT its just one of those annoying things that starts to whittle away at you until you feel the need to alter it. It hasn't quite whittled me away yet, hence it remains the same. But HOW ANNOYING?!

click on the image to see the large version

One thing you won't notice from this particular drawing, but you will notice once I've finished them is how the sky/sun/weather changes the colour of the sky in each picture accordingly with the colours represented in each drawing. Cunning eh? Bit of luck more than anything, I mean though you don't want a picture more or less being Orange apart from a bright blue sky now do you? Well I don't. You keep your choices to yourself. This is my blog.

SHARKS HATE RAIN

2009-02-23T01:01:00.004Z

This poor fella looks a bit depressed doesn't he? Well everyone knows one thing that sharks hate is rain. Imagine not only being grounded cos the tide has gone out but also then it starts to rain. I actually feel depressed every time I see this guy, I don't think he could look any more sad. This is my second full detailed rough. I wish I wasn't being so detailed. You'll notice one thing from the last illustration. And also of course a snail enjoying a picnic and cocktail! He has got a surf board with him too, but I seem to have to get rid of a couple of lines there to make it stand out! Actually the more I look at that surf board shape the less I understand it. How about you guys? I know I can hear ya, what surf board? and then... a snail? and then... oh I thought he was really happy to be in the rain!

I give up.

click on the image to see the large version

SNOTTY DRAGONS AND CUSTARD

2009-02-22T17:33:00.001Z

I decided to illustrate Sidney is Orange first. I knew that I wanted to created a bright, colourful book since it's all about colour. I want bold and painty. But all of those finished paintings will need to come from drawings, and the more detail I can get on them the easier the final paintings will be to do. However I didn't realise I was going to get so carried away and put so much detail in as I did. I couldn't stop! So I decided to work through the double page spreads which all have a structure the same as this. Where by one side is one colour, and the other is another.

I saw this drawing in my head and put pencil to paper and here it is. There were a few bits I had to scrub out, mainly round where the Dragon is sitting.

click on the image to see the large version

You might notice that there are quite a few elements in the drawing which don't make sense as yet, like custard and the sun, snot dribbling out of the Dragon's nose, flames, smoke trails and a small smudgy shape in the distance. Well if you see/read the book + see some later pictures you'll get the idea. None of it is crucial to the story though it's just nice detail that hopefully some people will see and get an extra angle on the book from. What angle that is I don't know. Am I rambling for the sake of something to say? Yes, yes you are. Oh, sorry about that.

EXTRACTS FROM THE 3 BOOKS

2009-02-19T14:26:00.003Z

Here you are stop your moaning. Below are extracts from each
of the three books to give you a slight flavour of what they're like.

_______________________________________________

The Day the World Turned White [an extract]

Toby wasn’t scared of anything.

Not GHOULS, Not GOBLINS, Not even things that go
BUMP IN THE NIGHT [because that was usually his cat Jeffrey
knocking things over]. Toby wasn’t scared of anything because
he knew that every bump in the night, or creak on the stairs
could be explained. It was never anything scary, but usually
something very non-scary, like Jeffrey.

So Toby wasn’t scared when he woke up suddenly at four
o’clock in the morning, a time he’d never been awake at before.
'I wonder what the world looks like at 4 o’clock in the morning?'
thought Toby. He decided to take a peek out of the curtains.

Toby’s eyes widened in shock at what he saw!

Was it a GHOUL or a GOBLIN?!

No, there was nothing there at all.

No garden. No sky. No sun or moon. No greenhouse.
No gnomes. No slide or swings.

Nothing.

_______________________________________________

Sidney is Orange [an extract]

Sidney is orange. Not AN orange you understand, but the colour
orange. He's been orange all his life. But he didn't want to be
orange any more.Not since he'd decided to become blue.

'No one likes orange any more', said Sidney to himself. 'Sharp clawed
crabs are orange, and traffic cones. No one likes traffic cones, they
get in the way. I want to be blue, like the sea. People like swimming
in the sea, and paddling. So I want to be blue, because everyone
likes blue.'

So Sidney went away for a day, and when he came back
he was blue. He was very pleased. He trotted around all day
smiling about being blue, and everyone smiled back. But the next
day Sidney wasn't smiling any more because he was sad.

'No one likes blue', he said. 'Blue is the colour of rain and sharks.
Who wants to be the colour of a shark? I think I should be green.
Grass is green and people like to play on grass. So I want to be
green, everyone likes green.'

First ever bit of work I created for Sidney is orange is this mock up double page spread.The final one will differ slightly from this, but the style is more or less intact all these years later!

_______________________________________________

Coolio and the Moose [an extract]

Coolio is a little girl who is as normal as you or I, apart from
two little things. She likes to eat custard and peas, and her best
friend is a Moose. He's not any old Moose either, he's
Edgar the Moose.

Coolio thinks Edgar is great even though he's not keen on peas.
Or custard. And especially them both at the same time.
Coolio and Edgar have so much fun together they never want the
day to end. They go to the park, run, skip, laugh, play with
their kites, and lay looking at clouds and imaging them to
be many funny, silly and ridiculous things.

One day Coolio and Edgar were painting pictures at Coolio's house.
They were having enormous fun with all the colours of paint.

But then suddenly Edgar tripped over his own hoof and his
left antler dipped in the red paint! Then he tripped again and stuck his right
antler in the blue paint!

'Oh no!' He cried. 'I better wash this paint off before Mummy and
Daddy see it!' So he scrubbed them, rinsed them, and rung them out as
hard as he could before popping them in the tumble dryer.

Then when the dryer went PING he opened the door and got them out.
'Oh no! They've shrunk', he cried.

'What am I going to do?' shrieked Edgar.
'I don't know', said Coolio, 'will your parents be cross?'
'Probably! But I don't want to find out', whimpered Edgar nervously.
'Then we better find you something to replace them with before they see',
said Coolio and grabbed Edgar's hoof and marched him off into the garden...

Detail of layout plans for Coolio and the Moose.
Amazing how difficult it is working out how to split
the text and how many pages its going to take.
Why did I ever think it was going to be easy?

THE THIRD BOOK'S BIRTH

2009-02-19T01:20:00.003Z

This season is all about orange madam
It all started with the colour orange for some reason. I've just made the connection that I selected orange as my 'colour' on the blog. So maybe I like orange. Well I can reveal I do! Quick write it down, remember it for the £1000 question on 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire'. Burnt orange and olive green to be precise if you need that sort of detail for present buying. So armed with a colour my third book was born. I think it was the first line which gave me the storyline to this book. Again with a simple writing approach and simple style, it has again a repetitive rhythm to it which I think I should drop for any further books I write! The first line is: ‘Sidney is orange. Not AN orange you understand, but the colour orange. He's been orange all his life. But he didn't want to be orange any more. Not now he'd decided to become blue.’ So that was that, the first line pretty much gave me my structure for Sidney’s small journey. It’s all about colour and changing yourself and not being happy with the way you are. The ending was obvious from the start but how it actually was going to work took a few word pushings to work out. All very simple really.

It was very easy to imagine Sidney throughout writing the story. I imagined him from the start as a little scruffy squidge of paint, a brush stroke with eyes. Working out how to express emotion through a paint splodge will be difficult! So, now then, are you ready or have you done it yourself? Book one: ‘The Day the World Turned White’, book two: ‘Coolio and the Moose’, book three ‘Sidney is Orange’. Next blog I’ll give you a snippet of the start of the stories, and also my thoughts on the style of the illustrations and how I intend to work my way through them…

THE SECOND BOOK'S BIRTH

2009-02-19T00:48:00.000Z

I have not got an elk fetish
Well now. I can't really think where this book came from. Well I do. I've always had a fetish for elks. I mean who hasn't? I won't tell you the full story of where that fetish comes from, but all you need to know is I drew a character called Gordon the Elk throughout art school. Ever since then I have drawn elks. Haven't you? Anyway, I think maybe the title came first, but this time the character was going to be a moose. I mean otherwise it would seem like I'd got a weird elk fetish or something and I wouldn't want people to think that. I think, and I am happy to be told I'm wrong, but I think the title came from the fact I said coolio instead of cool quite regularly about work, home, play and holidays. I think I then one time said 'coolio and the moose' at a friend and then said 'that would make a good kid's book title'. And the rest as they say is history.

What came first the title or the book?
Coming up with a title first and then writing the book seems a bit silly doesn't it? Maybe it was a straight reaction to how long it took to get a title for the first book. But I think I'll stick with it. A silly/mad/interesting title is actually pretty hard to come up with when you know exactly what the story is. But if there is no story, then there are no boundaries. Walter's special egg and the magician's kipper. See? The bottomless cow and the immaculate pat. Hmm... maybe not so good. But hopefully you see what I mean.

With this book I decided to write fast as you will remember, which lends itself to simplicity and economy with words. I cut corners. When Coolio and the moose go to the park I didn't explain the walk there, or much of what they done when they arrived, or the park, or the weather, or all of those other things you explain in a novel, not a picture book. I liked writing like that. It was fun. So now, have you got it? Book one: 'The Day the World Turned White'. Book two: 'Coolio and the Moose'.

THE FIRST BOOK'S BIRTH

2009-02-19T00:14:00.001Z

What's it called again?
The first picture book I wrote remained title less for quite some time. It wasn't till about a week before I was due to send it off to the writing competition that it got itself a title. I couldn't think of one at all but luckily Rhian came to the rescue and garnished me with a lovely title. I really like the title because there are lots of words and its detailed. That sounds a bit odd, but it sounds slightly older, like a book from 60 years ago or something. Anyway, its title is 'The Day the World Turned White'. A simple story of a boy who knows there are no such things as monsters creeping up the stairs and bogey men hiding in his wardrobe and when he wakes up at 4am one morning, something he has never done before (yes I know parents, if only that were true!), he's determined to stay calm and think of a logical explanation for why there is nothing outside his window but white.

Structure
It's pretty simple in its structure and repetitive in rhythm. I always remember books like that being good for that transition period between being read to, reading with, and then reading alone. So it's a slightly younger audience that the book is aimed at as such, but what does it matter what age group reads it? As an avid reader still of picture books, I'm hardly about to start pigeon holing my potential audience. I noticed I'm not the only one to think like that thankfully. Half of the authors/illustrators in 'The Magic Pencil' think the same thing http://www.amazon.co.uk/Magic-Pencil-Childrens-Illustration-Today/dp/0712347704/ref=pd_sim_b_4

Hacker
The text on this book has actually changed quite a bit now I've come to illustrate it. It's amazing how small an amount of words you need if you've got pictures. So I became quite a harsh critic for my over wordy story (when I originally did my very first draft of this book it came in at 1700 words, when actually I was after 700 or less!) and hacked the poor thing to pieces. It thanked me for it in the end.

THE BIG DETAILED INTRODUCTION

2009-02-16T21:51:00.004Z

For those of you who might wonder what drives a man to whittle away his seconds, minutes, days, weeks, months and years writing a children's picture book, and then why he writes another two, and then what possesses him to set about illustrating them all when really he isn't an illustrator or a writer and he hasn't got any children, well, then you better read on...

It's all Mike's fault (part 1)
Back in the day, and I forget when it was, [I suppose I could find out, but I'm not going to bother] my mate Mike who has always been into writing [he's written an (as yet unpublished) novel and comes up with books to write all the time] told me one day of a competition run by Little Tiger Press http://www.littletigerpress.com/ It was a competition to write a children's picture book. The prize was to have your book published and then I guess be one of their writers, and become famous and buy houses and things, and then there would be film deals and everything, ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING. Now, I thought a bit about this, having never really ever thought about writing a children's book before and found little idea shaped nuggets would form between my ears and if they were very lucky they would get scribbled down onto paper and sometimes even REMEMBERED.

The first book
An idea started to form which was based on a comment I made while having lunch with friends. Or was it? I don't know it's all a bit hazy now, but it was basically about a boy who woke at 4am and looked out of the window to discover the world wasn't there. Now I've just said that out loud, as it were, I wonder if I went the right way with that initial premise, that little remembered nugget from between my ears. But that's one of the important things I have learnt through at least the writing process that decisions are difficult, because they could go one of several hundred ways, at least. It's also one of the bits I struggle with the most. With one decision comes more, and more, and then what? This is probably why the initial writing process for that one story took me several months, fine tuning, annoying friends and girlfriend to read through and try and force them to be honest when all you want to hear is 'IT'S BRILLIANT!' and then editing it over and over and over and... AND... AND... AND... IT WAS ONLY 700 WORDS! So once I'd finished it I posted it off. Knees knocking and god knows what thoughts were running through my head of this and that and what ifs. Unbeknown to me I had caught the bug. The bug of telling a story. The drawing would come later, that was also Mike's fault and Rhian's too. But I like to blame Mike.

Let me tell you a story
I think I've had the bug for telling stories for years and years. I remember drawing comic strips as a child, and enjoyed writing stories when I had to at school. I went to college and studied animation which as you know is a great story telling medium and I loved telling stories, however small. I started a novel when I came to my current job. I was in a bed sit for 3 months, a god forsaken horrible grimy hair covered place with a small table and a single bed. Joy. But with me I had an ancient laptop [which I still have] and I started to write a book. Well I didn't realise it was a book when I started I thought it was a very silly letter. But hey, four nights later and I had 5 some what sporadic and rambling chapters. It remains unfinished. But from then on, ALL of my projects were story telling. Series of children's books, short films, long animated films, film scripts, and children's picture books. My only problem was completing ANYTHING. 'The problem is,' said Rhian, my girlfriend, 'you never finish any of these projects, you need to finish one before you go on to the next'. She was right, is right. This is what this blog is about, one man's struggle to finish one [ok three] of the hundreds of projects he wants to create, to have, to possess. It's a struggle though I can tell you.

The other two
Now, yes, you're right to point that out, this blog is called 'The Three Books' and for a very good reason. Because I have 3 children's picture books on the go. How silly. Well doesn't one just seem like I have all my eggs in one basket? Two isn't quite right, and three is a nice balance. So three it is. To be honest it could easily have been twenty by now. I'm not showing off, I'm not saying they'd all be any good, not at all. But I have had at least twenty ideas for children's picture books. And they're just the ones which came to me whether I liked it or not.

So where did the other two come from? Well once that other one was sent off, and probably because it took so long to form, and also because I now had the bug, I sat and wrote a story. Quickly. I think it took about an hour. I edited it once and that was it, done. About a week or two later I wrote another one. Not so quick to do to be honest, but more or less written in a day. The latter two books remain people's favourites too. How annoying eh?

But what about the competition?
I never did win that competition before you ask. Not even slightly.

So why are you illustrating them?
So why am I illustrating them? Well I have drawn for my whole life. I am a motion graphic designer, but also a traditionally taught animator, so I can draw. Not as well as you might imagine. In fact my drawing reached new heights not too long back, maybe 9 years ago in life drawing classes. I had never got on well with life drawing until I went to life drawing sessions off my own back. Something clicked in the freedom and the desire to draw as well as the mates I went there with. Now these stories were ready to go off to publishers, they were edited down, I was happy with them, I was ready. A final read through from Rhian and Mike my unofficial editors, all was ok as far as they were concerned [mike never did enter anything into that competition, don't even think he wrote a word] but... they said 'Are you going to illustrate them then?' WHAT!? AM I WHAT? And that was that. 3 years later and I'm still doing that very thing. Now I'm not a fast drawer for sure, but I'm not that slow. But I work full time, and many other things have stopped total dedication to these 'Three Books'. Anyway, that's where you come in... the stories are written... but the pages aren't drawn.

The final aim
My intentions are to draw up the 3 books in rough form, and send through either printed rough books, or a PDF of them. Then also work up 2-3 colour spreads as finished bits of artwork. Phew, doesn't sound too much I know, but it is!

I won't be putting the full stories on here, or the final rough books either, but I will show the process and snippets. Teasers you might say. Well I hope they're teasing anyway...

Thanks for listening you lovely person
Are you still there? I do hope so. Hopefully this hasn't made your nose bleed or for you to miss the birth of your first baby or the conception or the initial conversation about whether you should try or not. That's not really general enough is it? It sounds like I'm talking to a man, but you could easily be a woman, or both. You might not want kids, you might be too old to have any more, or want any more. You might be too young (although looking at the news today what is too young?). You might be hundreds of different things and I really do hope you are. Keep coming back. I do hope it's even slightly interesting or entertaining. And hopefully at some point in the future you can go into a bookshop whether it be real or virtual and buy not one book because thats not quite enough, not two because that just doesn't seem right, but three. Three books, because that's just nice and balanced isn't it? Plus I'll get more cash.