Ike and Esme

Tuesday, October 23, 2007








Hey! Pssst! Wanna peek inside the mysterious finished book package below? It's final art for the book 100 Days and 99 Nights for Little Brown. These drawings were done on 90 lb hot press with pencil. Click to enlarge!

I promised to show the final for the sketch of this piece in the post "School Days" to show a bit of how the drawing went from sketch to finish. I always try my very hardest to keep the original feel and energy when drawing anything final, which is challenging when tracing. I find I need to happy with faces and then I feel "friends" with the characters enough to go into the other elements. My art school drawing professors would be rolling their eyes to hear that approach, but hey! I need the spirit there first! When I packed them up to ship, I even missed these kids, but I am excited to see them in their new home: a finished chapter book.

So here are Ike and Esme on their sad walk home, missing Dad in Iraq. The chapter headers will be Esme's stuffed animals, alphabetized A (for aardvark) through Z (to zebra).

3 comments:

Jackie Parker said...

The stuffed animals would make a FANTASTIC wallpaper border in a baby's room. I don't know why I think that, but it totally would.

It's very cool to see the two versions! Thanks!

Annie Patterson said...

They are all so lovely! I love how you drew the hair on the kids. You maintained the liveliness of the sketch just perfectly. :)

Unknown said...

AARDVARK!