children’s books

Book Sneak Peek ~ Draw, Redraw, Paint, Redraw

| kirsti

Draw, Redraw, paint, redraw

A lot of reworking goes on at various stages of the illustration process. If I’m working in oil, it happens a lot during the painting process. If it bugs me, it gets scribbled over until it bugs me a little less. It’s inevitable that some things will never be quite right – but there’s a printing schedule to adhere to so stuff has to be pried out of my hands and shipped out the door at some point.

The colours in this photo are a bit grey. It’s a much cheerier palette in person. Let’s hope that comes through in the final scans.

This is another detail from a page in the current book-in-progress.

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Spring Has Sprung, the Books Are Hatching

| kirsti

The Children’s Writers and Illustrators of BC (CWILL BC) is having a spring book launch event for 2006/2007 titles.

SBH banner

Join Alison Acheson, Dan Bar-el, Dianna Bonder, Vivien Bowers, Della Burford, Kristin Butcher, Linda DeMeulemeester, Maggie de Vries, kc dyer, Lee Edward Födi, Dennis Foon, Diane Haynes, James Heneghan, Melanie Jackson, Heather Kellerhals-Stewart, Cora Lee, Shar Levine, Ainslie Manson, Adrienne Mason, James McCann, Victoria Miles, Max Newhouse, Cynthia Nugent, Jacqueline Pearce, Louise Phillips, Ellen Schwartz, Sima Elizabeth Shefrin, Shannon Stewart, Tiffany Stone, Joan Betty Stuchner, Diane Tullson, Kari-Lynn Winters & Pam Withers when they launch their new books this June.

More information will be posted soon on the CWILL BC blog.

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Book Sneak Peek ~ Underwater

| kirsti

In the fall of 2006 I finished the illustrations for my 4th picture book. It’s not out yet so I’ll keep the specifics quiet until then. But in the meantime, I’ll post some sneak peek details of the process and the bits and bobs that went into developing the illustrations.

The underwater reference photo is part of a series I took with a cheap disposable underwater camera. Although shot specifically as reference for the book, I like the look of them so much that I have further plans for the photographs. The trickle of watery paint is part of my palette for the underwater scene. I brightened the colours a bit since this book is more about clear light and less about murk

Water, whether it makes up a ditch, a pond, a lake, an ocean or even a puddle, hides wonderful collections of life. I’ve always been fascinated by bodies of water and as a kid spent endless hours searching out crayfish, frogs and sticklebacks in the drainage ditches that surrounded our farm.

When I had a good look at this series of photographs I noticed a few contained sticklebacks, almost invisible in the cloudy water.

Submerged (2)

Paint (6)

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