Drawing Birdy

So I'm back at my drawing board this week. After a two month hiatus between thumbnailing my new Otto book and beginning the pencil roughs, I'm once again splashing about in the balmy waters of pencildom, happy as a duck.

As I was sketching out an early sequence in the book (shown below) I began thinking about this character Birdy and where she came from. Like authors, story illustrators find their affection growing for certain characters as they work them through, and for me Birdy is one of those. Motherly and kind, she brings our heroes in out of a nasty downpour and brews them up a nice cup of tea. They end up staying the night in her cozy little caboose in an abandoned railyard, and when they prepare to leave the next day, she is talked into joining them on their travels.

But where did this character Birdy come from? It was only when I was sketching her up for the third or fourth panel that it suddenly occurred to me she was a little old Scottish lady I ran into in England's Lake District. Thirty years ago.

The story goes like this. My partner of the time and I had just stepped off our bus in a small Cumbrian village, and were standing staring about, probably looking somewhat lost, when a little voice near my left elbow asked us where we were staying. I discovered the voice's source, a little old wizened gnome in rubber boots and Macintosh, with a load of firewood in her arms, and told her we had no idea. To which she answered, "Well, come along then," and turned and started hoofing it across a field. We grabbed our heavy packs and scrambled to keep up with her as she nimbly hopped over a downed fence, with no idea where she was taking us. Eventually we ended up at her B&B. 

It was along time ago, as I say, but my memory of her is still fresh as the day it happened — her mater-of-fact taking us under wing, the old saggy four poster bed heaped with comforters and replete with hot water bottle. And especially the mountain of food she piled up for us for breakfast. And I remember her telling us her story, how she was "brought South" by an English lad when she was a young girl, lured across the border by young love, by a husband who had had the audacity to up and die and leave her alone away from family.

And it was today that I realized that that is who Birdy is, that I'd drawn a tribute to a long-forgotten memory. But in this story, because it's mine to do with as I please, this time she goes home.

Otto and Crackers meet Birdy on a wet night. My unconcious tribute to
a little old Scottish lady I met thirty years ago.

"How to Draw Otto" Videos

Lately I've been messing around with creating a "How to Draw Otto" video. I ended up with two, a short, speeded up version:



And a longer, guided tutorial version:



Let me know if you like them. I will be posting them (hopefully along with others in the future) on their own "How to Draw" page, accessible through the Pages bar above.
Enjoy!

Very excited …

I just received news today that advance copies of Big City Otto are now in at my publishers. For the uninitiated, these copies are those sent ahead of the slow boat from China (or wherever the books are being printed - but probably China) to be sent to reviewers, bloggers and persons of influence. If I'm lucky I might even get one myself!
As the book gets closer to its release date the publicity and promotional machine begins to go into high gear. In addition to the sampler that I mentioned in my last post, I also have a stack of promotional post cards in my hot little hands to distribute to the four winds.
And if you really can't wait for the book, here is a link to a 16 page preview that Kids Can has posted on their web site. (Just click on the image below.)

Enjoy!

Click on image to go to preview.

Bits and Pieces

Here are a few bits and pieces I'm working on these days as I wait around for my editor to get back to me with comments on the second book in the Elephants Never Forget series (Hometown Otto).

Here's a self-portrait I was asked to do, to be included in a promotional sampler
of Kids Can's fall graphic novels. It will also have a few spreads from Big City Otto,
so keep your eyes peeled for it!

Above: Some first round character sketches for Birdy, a retired dancing bear
that helps get Otto and Crackers pointed in the right direction. There are a lot more
characters in the second book, and I want to start to get a feel for them before
 I get into the actual thumbnailing of the story.
Below: Sketches for Harriett Tubby, a pig that our heroes meet who is running an underground
railroad escape route for mistreated farm animals. She is based on the remarkable Harriett Tubman,
who was famously pictured with gun in hand as she led escaped slaves north to freedom. A the moment
I have opted for a broom, but that may change. Any suggestions?

Wrapping It Up

This week I was finishing the last bits and pieces of the graphic novel – title page, end papers and cover. It all went down to the publisher’s yesterday and this morning I woke up unemployed!

As we all know, you must, MUST not judge a book by the cover. But yet, as an illustrator, I know how important it is to get the book cover as right as possible. This will be the reader’s first encounter, and along with a brief  flip through and perusal of the jacket copy, will be the deciding factor as to whether your book gets read.

Whenever I do a book, I always prefer, if possible, to do the book cover last. By then I’ve had time to think about the book, what it’s about, what its essence is, and hopefully, have some ideas that can be distilled down to something that is eye-catching and, more importantly, captures the story.

When we were kids I think we were all frustrated by covers that were clearly done by someone who hadn’t read the story – small details that we knew were just dead wrong. But it doesn’t mean that the illustrator can’t stray from the text a bit because, as a cover, you’re not simply reflecting a part of the story, but rather something that is emblematic of the entire story. Also, there needs to be a tie in with the title, so that the title and cover image make sense as a whole. So what ends up on the cover might be a particular scene that captures the essence or it might be a constructed scene that doesn’t actually appear in the book itself.

Finally, the cover is something that most publishers are pretty hands on with. They may let you run fast and foot loose in the interior of the book, but when it comes to covers they will want their say. This can lead to multiple versions or, if you’re lucky or inspired, you may nail it on the first go.

Below are the three versions of the Big City Otto cover that I went through, along with the final art. I’m happy with where the cover ended up, and feel that it is a fairly good representation of what you will find between the covers.

Here is my first quick sketch for the cover, executed a few months ago. I wanted to communicate  a "lost in America" feel, hence Otto with suitcases, looking like a newly arrived immigrant 40's style straight off the boat. And as the Alligari Boys feature prominently in the story, I wanted to include them in a menacing role. I elected to go with an all black background with a single pool of light, trying to give the whole thing a film noire retro look.

My editor Tara Walker came back to me with the comments that although she liked it, she felt that it didn't really say "Big City".  She suggested some buildings in the background. In the meantime I had begun to think that the first one wasn't animated enough and that it might be fun to show the scene immediately after Otto had unwittingly helped the Alligari Boys knock over a convenience store. I've taken the title copy to a more finished state, distorting the Baddaboom typeface that I had used in the interior for sound effects and loud shouting. I've also dropped Esperanca's name off the cover (by mutual consent!) as her involvement in other book work had taken her away from a major role in this project (she still gets a writing credit on the title page). I liked the hand-lettered effect for my name, which I had first used in the title bar of this blog, so I went with that, and added a city skyline in the background  to communicate "Big City".

Here's the third go around. Again, Tara was encouraging (as editors have to be!) but said that she felt that the second attempt didn't really focus in very effectively on Otto and that she preferred my first take but with more city. I could see her point, and took another look at this to see how I could incorporate that. It occurred to me that if I flattened out the perspective a bit and went to solid black for the mid-ground, I could make the somewhat tricky transition from a three quarter bird's eye view in the foreground to looking up at the city skyline in the background. I also thought it would be fun to actually have Big Al emerging from the sewer hole to reinforce the "alligators in the sewers" theme that runs through the second half of the book. (You will notice that Big Al's cigar has disappeared in the second and third versions. Smoking on the cover, even by a bad guy who's height has clearly been compromised by this activity, was an absolute no-go.)

And here is the final go. Tara circulated the third pencil around Kids Can Press and it received enthusiastic approval, with the only concern being that too much of the title was obscured by Otto - an easy fix.
I'm really happy with the retro feel of this, the contrast of the red type against the black background. Synchronicity even played a part as I had accidentally added a coarser dither to the colour in Photoshop, but realised that I liked the effect, which mimicked the coarser colour screens of earlier printing processes.
In the end I think the cover has accomplished exactly what a cover needs to do. It right away says "Big City" in both name and image, reflects one of the major dynamics of the story (the interaction between Otto and the Alligari Boys), and shows Otto as a bit at sea and innocent in a foreign environment. This was one of those covers that doesn't show an actual scene in the story, but captures its essence. And it was truly a collaborative work between my editor Tara and myself, who's sage comments helped lead me to exactly where I think this book cover should be.