I’ve centered the “Penelope” title in the oval better as suggested… I think that helped. I’m liking this tighter crop too, but it’s only because I’m zoomed in in Photoshop…

REVISED COVER POSTED:

Let me know your thoughts/concerns on this new one… I’ve lightened the environment, added detail and shading to the background elements and taken away the pink ribbon for “and her First Day…”

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HERE IS THE FINAL COVER DESIGN! http://robthedesigner.com/wordpress/final-penelope-pilot-cover-art

Book designers, if my pages are 8 1/2″ x 11″ and I have about 40 pages, assuming it’s not a hardback, how much room should I allow for the spine’s width?

Any feedback on this cover design is appreciated – would it grab you on a shelf and prompt you to pick it up, if you were looking for a gift for your daughter for example? Are the colors too dark or too bright? I’ve turned off the text to not give stuff away since it’s not finally approved yet, and I still need to add detail and shading – but please give me your honest feedback about the cover.

We might say we don’t judge a book by it’s cover, but in the publishing industry, that’s just not true these days…

Just a sneak peek at my leading lady…

I also love the characters he draws – they’re whimsical, funny, yet still look like real kids – hard to explain… it reminds me of the old PC game, Willy Beamish. The characters look similar – cartoon, yet realistic as well. My drawings tend to be the same, so I probably gravitate to his work in that aspect as well.

Having kids in elementary school myself (well, one now) I have seen first hand how cluttered a teacher’s classroom can get – which is the premise of the book. My favorite illustration in the book shows the classroom being cleaned out for a rummage sale, and you can see the sedimentary layers of earth beneath, which contain a dinosaur skeleton, pipes, bots, a time capsule and, my favorite, Davy Jones’ locker. HA!

Guy, if you read this, great job. I loved every square inch of this book. I’ll be looking for more of your work in the future.

This book is definately an inspiration to me while I create Penelope Pilot – and I just noticed it’s overdue. Sorry kids, I’ll bring this back to the library very soon. My teacher always said I share well with others. ;)

Another great book I grabbed from the library recently that does this well is “Larry Gets Lost in Seattle”, a cute story about a dog who gets separated from his boy on a trip to Seattle. The story then uses sidenotes to teach about landmarks around our town, such as the Pike Place Market, Safeco Field, and (how cool is this) the Fremont Troll and “Waiting for the Interurban” statues. Plus, the illustrations are extremely cool in a retro, fun and kid-friendly style. Everything about this book makes me wish I didn’t have to return it to the library.

So check out “Larry Gets Lost in Seattle” by John Skewes, as well as keep an eye out for Penelope Pilot by Lynda Meeks and yours truly!

Original drawing in my sketchbook...

The next step is really refining and darkening my line work, in preparation for scanning into the computer. I lay a sheet of tracing paper over my sketch, and using a Staples OptiFlow pen (or other nice and smooth ink pen) I redraw the sketch with dark lines and any relevant shading I want to show in my linework after its colored.

Scanned sheet of tracing paper

My next step is scanning the tracing paper into the computer. I usually scan in grayscale to get the subtleties of the scan to show, rather than scanning as 1-bit line art. Also, I try to always scan 300 dpi, because you never know when you’ll need a hi-res version of your illustration.

Working off my scanned image, I’ll adjust the brightness, contrast and levels of the scan in Photoshop, and erase any smudges that might have gotten on the original drawing. I’ll select the layer once I’m happy with the cleanliness of the image, and float it to a new layer and then changing the blending mode to Multiply (after selecting the white with the Magic Wand tool then deleting it). This allows my coloring layers beneath the lineart to show through, but it doesn’t mess up the top line layer.

I’ll start by creating a few layers for color, laying down the background color as well as a few swatches to use as a painter’s palette (for the eyedropper tool):

Coloring the drawing with a handy pallete layer in Photoshop

Once all the coloring is finished (the longest step), I’ll create a new layer for shadows. Using my marquee tool is the quickest and easiest for me, as I block in large areas of shadow, referring to my original sketch in my sketchbook. Once all the shadows are filled with black in the shadow layer, I’ll apply a Gaussian Blur to give a soft effect, if necessary.  It looks a bit dark, but this is what I’m seeing a this point:

Shadow layer painted on and Gaussian blur applied

Having the shadows on a separate layer helps a great deal, because I can adjust the intensity easily with that layer’s opacity slider. I decided on 15% opacity for these shadows:

Shadow layer complete with opacity turned to 15%

The next step in this illustration was the lighting effect. This was different from the shadows, because I have a TV casting a cool glow across the subject. I create this effect by blocking in the area that will be OUTSIDE of the lit-up area using the marquee tool, and filling it with a dark blue color to add intensity. Once that layer is filled, I’m going to apply a gaussian blur to this effect as well for a more subtle dramatic effect. Take a look at the layer in the layer palette:

Creating the shadows from the TV

Note I’ve turned the opacity down a bit. Again, it always helps to have it on a separate layer…

Shadow layer (from TV)

Once those final touches are done, the illustration is ready! Here’s a smaller, web-friendly version (the original is 300 dpi)… Voila!!

Final illustration!

Ideally, I’d like to move away from the Web design and really concentrate on just being a freelance illustrator, but since the Web is where the money seems to be, and jobs are hard to come by in today’s crazy market, I guess I need to stop being picky and step up.

I have an interview for a Web Designer job today with a major Christian publisher, which would be cool – if I’m going to be a web designer, having an “in” with a publisher of Children’s books is a good deal, I’m thinking.

Anyways, here is some of my latest Web work:

Media Partners home page

CatchTheFishVideo.com

CustomerServiceHero.com

First of all, Mike Mulligan And His Steam Shovel. I loved the simple art and the great story here of self-sacrifice… if I remember correctly, the Steam Shovel worked himself out of a job and ended up being permanently enclosed in the ground floor of a museum after helping build it… Plus, it was illustrated by the author herself, which I think is just cool!

I also loved Syd Hoff – his simple colored line art was easy to stare at for hours. It would have been even better if my kid brother didn’t add his own illustrations to”Danny and the Dinosaur” when he was a baby!

Another great one by Syd Hoff – along the same lines, a kid and their giant animal buddy. =)

Next, “The Sneetches” by Dr. Seuss. I never noticed the profound lesson against prejudice in this story as a kid, but I loved it. And the animated version was very fun too… Poor poor sneetches without stars upon thars… Dr. Seuss was AWESOME.

I still remember coming back from our library when I was in first grade, with armloads of Richard Scarry books every week. I loved the level of detail in his work, and I also still remember my teacher telling my parents in a conference “Robbie’s drawings are so detailed – I always look for tiny little things he’s added”… definately Scarry’s influence as a first-grade illustrator. =)

I LOVED Harold and the Purple Crayon. I always wanted a crayon or pencil that would create in “real life” the things I drew. I probably got in trouble for drawing on the walls a time or two because of this book as well.

This Disney book was second hand when my brother and I got it, but I went through it time and time again. I made that Captain Hook coin bank several times as a kid, and now that I look at this, I bet I could still teach my kids to make one. Too fun!

I *LOVED* this book. Much like Richard Scarry, I’d stare at these illustrations FOR HOURS. I was shocked when starting this blog, because I entered “The Giant Jam Sandwich” as one of my favorite books, and later on I noticed that it linked me to others who were fans of this book as well! AWESOME. Last year my wife and I took a trip to Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon. We were there for hours! In fact, kids teased me because I was sitting “indian-style” in the kids section almost the whole time. I got some funny looks from the employees too!

And last but not least, my all time favorite children’s book EVER:
The art in this book inspires me to this day – I love the murals and mood and just… EVERYTHING about “Where the Wild Things Are”!

So now that I’ve shared, what are some of your favorites?