I took a course at Cedar Hill Recreation Centre, with April Caverhill, an illustrator from here in Victoria, BC. I had written about 15 stories over a 10 year period, between 1995 and 2005, and so was interested in illustrating them for publication. We only had 5 classes, and I missed the first one because I had the 'flu. We created a cover for our book, an image of our main character and an additional image of another character or important element of the story. This first pic is the semi-final image of the cover of my first story, which has 4 following stories with the same main character.
Here are some pics of the pages of sketches, coming up with this semi-final image. The first pic is of the thumbnails of the position, perspective, and colours of the image. The second pic is of the first thumbnails of the initial idea, with the second row of thumbnails of another character. The third pic is of the 2 finals in pen, 5" x 7", before the semi-final coloured drawing.
This semi-final image is 8" x 6", pen and coloured pencil. This character is from the story of "The Little White Dog" and she has just stepped out of the tree trunk, from which she grew until age 18. She holds another "seed" of herself, which she plants when she is ready to die at an old age, and regrows in the tree to step out young again after 18 years of incubating in the tree.
This is the image of Little Heart, the main character of the story. She came to earth in a falling star, and was found by a childless husband and wife, who became her parents. She is magical, and loves to play and help others. Here are some sketches leading up to this image, below. This semi-final sketch above, is 8" x 10" and rendered in pen and pencil crayon.
Here are some initial sketches, of which I haven't developed larger semi-final images, of her beginnings, and of the stream in which she plays while her mother collects herbs.
More images to come, as I continue along this journey of illustration!!!! I really love how I initially have a vague, out-of -focus image of what I see in my head, as in the above first drawing of the creek. Then I continue to draw it again, from a different perspective, and more detail evolves. Then I decided to draw it, looking down on the creek from a bird's eye view, and the shadows and sunny sides developed further. In the lower left is an image of where the creek bubbles over into a deeper pool where fish are, and the final sketch is of Little Heart playing on the beach of the creek. These thumbnails are about 2" x 3", pencil, then pen with coloured pencils.
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