This is a "preparatory" image for a book I'm illustrating and starting to work on. It's a pretty large black & white painting with color added in Photoshop. The book is nuts and will look pretty different from most of the other stuff I'm working on. It's supposed to be done late this year and will be published sometime in 2009. More to come.
Archive for May, 2008
Thursday, May 22nd, 2008
This is sort of a tease. It's a just-approved sketch for a job in which the final inked original art is 30 inches wide by 40 inches tall (76cm by 102cm — really — take a tape measure and see how big that is). When it's done it's going to take up to 18 passes on my scanner to get it into Photoshop. It's by far the biggest, most complicated illustration I've ever done. That's all I can say about it right now. When it's done I'll post more. (And yes, I know this is a 500-pixel low-res image. That's the tease.)
Tags: sketch
Posted in illustrations, process | 7 Comments »
Thursday, May 22nd, 2008
Thanks to all y'all whom came out and braved the crowd and my tedium at the Philadelphia Book Festival this last weekend. It was grand. I followed a really good guitar-player and then I was followed by Gordon from Sesame Street, so what did I do? I talked about Photoshop! Woo!
Below are photos of me in front of the awesome banner they made with my tree on it, Adam Rex and me with Gordon (cool!), our friend Owen dancing while I waxed about a certain piece of software, a banner using stuff I made, among others.
Tags: library, Philadelphia Book Festival
Posted in childrens books, events, seen | No Comments »
Monday, May 12th, 2008
This Saturday and Sunday is the Philadelphia Book Festival at the Main Library. I'll apparently be an "event" at the festival itself on Saturday and I hope you can make it over to see whatever it is I'm doing. I'll be on the "Target Children's Stage" at 3:00pm.
Rumor has it that there will be a Q & A session. So come up with the question that you've always wanted to know the answer to. (My favorite color is "rainbow" so don't ask that one.) And then I'll be signing books. They've ordered lots and lots of early copies of the new Roscoe Riley books that will be in stores later this month, as well as all the other stuff.
In addition, sometime on Sunday, not sure when, I'll be signing Shredderman books with Wendelin Van Draanen. This is our very first signing together and I'm pretty excited. We will be at the Children's Book World booth, so check in there and find out what time it's to take place. Then, if you happen to see me, let me know too.
This is all good news, yes. But the other shoe has to drop, right? Well yes indeed. At the same exact moment that I'll be acting all famous and whatever on Saturday, the slightly more talented and much better looking Adam Rex will be doing the same in the Children's Story Hour Room, also at 3pm. So you must decide between us, and we're both taking names…
Here's the link for the festival.
And the link for my little event on Saturday.
We're praying for decent weather, so please come in any case.
Tags: appearance, book, festival, library, Philadelphia Book Festival, posters, signing
Posted in design, events, headlines, illustrations | No Comments »
Thursday, May 8th, 2008
These three books, written by Katherine Applegate and published by HarperCollins, are coming out on May 27. They are the first three of a series of six and possibly more chapter books, for which I am illustrating the covers and interior illustrations. Roscoe is a nice kid who keeps getting into trouble. The stories are really cute and perfect for kids just learning to read. I spoke to someone at Children's Book World in Haverford yesterday who told me that they expect these to sell like gangbusters.
You don't have to wait for May 27, however. If you come to the Philadelphia Book Festival on Saturday May 17, you can get your copy then. I'll be there signing and talking at 3pm.
