Day: April 22, 2016

Ive had a change of thought and decided to avoid a cartoonish look for my book , alternatively going for a more traditional look, incorporating characters showing more realism in addition I feel this correlate well with my simple layout for the book. I have been analysing the work of author/ illustrator Beatrix Potter’s work to gain some inspiration. I like the classic look her illustrations portray also the diverse shades of colours used to create the vibrant textures, Ive also decided to experiment with watercolour for my illustrations and various brush techniques as I think it will emphasis the books traditional look. Unlike Potter’s illustrations I want to keep it practical and simple by doing this I will create a simple background for the illustrations.

Whilst researching I was intrigued by Helen Borten and Marta Alte’s work and the stylistic approaches they implemented into their work. In Helen Borten’s work I like the textures used in her drawings the mixture of the woodcut effect, crayon, paint along with the vibrant range of colours, appealed to me as her work is very diverse and visually pleasing. Im considering using aspects such as the crayon effect in my own work.

I like Marta Alte’s work specifically her book “My Grandpa”, Im looking to create a simplistic format for my book and in my opinion this is a great example, I like the positioning of text in relation to the drawing, which also contributes to the fluency whilst reading. I hope to show this style in terms of page layout for my own story, finally I like the watercolour effect implemented onto the characters,  and that objects other than the characters have been drawn in a different style such as the sofa and news paper etc. It gives the book more variety of style/theme.

From being set the task of creating a picture book for children, you just can’t not look into one of the pioneers of the craft ,Dr Seuss . He is undoubtably one of the most popular children’s book authors/illustrators ever , so i’ve researched some of his most iconic books to benefit me and further expand my ideas. His illustrations give off a comical feel and a quirky vibe from the inventive characters he created to appeal to the consumer. His work uses aspects of surrealism and wacky cartoons to create the unique look, making his work stand out from other children’s book illustrations.

The dialogue used consisting of rhymes and so forth, accompanied by the illustrations correlate perfectly emphasising the humorous elements. He also gave the reader in this case children a simple yet fluent experience whilst looking at the illustrations. Like the example below from “Cat In The Hat” I would like to use a page layout similar to this as it’s effective and simple,  the layout of images/ text uses up the blank space well giving it a simple look.

What I am most concerned about with this project is the illustrations specifically what style, to start tackling the issue I did some research into children’s books to identify the illustration techniques and style used to understand what is artistically expected of me once I’ve draw them out myself. Since the start I’ve wanted to do cartoon illustrations opting for a more simple clean outlook so I’ve looked into simple iconic children’s cartoon characters from mostly books with some exceptions to give me an insight into the techniques used to draw inspiration from. I like the bold strokes and smoothness of the designs and the simplicity but yet they are still intriguing, I like the texture strokes used on the “Cat in the hat” and “The Lorax” which create a fur effect, a technique I will definitely consider using as I will most likely be using animals in my story. I came to the decision of using animals as from researching it was evident that they are a popular choice for characters in children’s’ books.