Website Redesign: the Sketchbooks

I had another meeting with the designer of my website today. I've had lots of bits and bobs to re-write, and new photos to select.

I want to make my sketchbook page more exciting. I have been playing around today in Photoshop, creating a montage that will form the background to each sketchbook category.

What do you think? If you select to view my Costa Rica sketchbook for instance, this image will come up first, with an introductory drawing from Costa Rica dropped into one side of the sketchbook template, and a bit of information about the trip on the opposite page. You click the sketchbook to see the thumbnails of all the drawings I did on that trip.

I'm off to pack for the Hay Festival now. I'll let you know how it goes. Wish me luck!

Bank Holiday Weekend: Drawing in the Garden

Well, thank goodness for a bit of decent weather. Bank Holidays are usually a guarantee of rain, but this time we managed enough sun to warrant suncream!

On Saturday John had a stag do from midday until the wee small hours. Somehow, I found myself doing all the chores round the house - who got the best deal there? I slapped myself into shape by mid afternoon, and took some time to sit in the back garden and do the sketch above. I keep forgetting to use my proper moleskin watercolour book though.

On Sunday we mostly hung about, lazed and pottered. It was so wonderfully hot. As you can see below, John was still working hard...

I'd forgotten about the holiday bit, so had intended to do at least a bit of work anyway, but it was far, far too lovely. So we went for a picnic in the park with friends, then drove to the garden centre, where I bought lots of plants, which I thoroughly enjoyed potting up for the rest of the afternoon. I finished just before it started to rain.

Birmingham 'Young Readers' Festival

On Tuesday I had another fun day, storytelling in Birmingham. Young Readers is a lovely festival that lasts 2 whole weeks, and I was really pleased to be invited to take part.

As you can see, I went back to pencil again for the train journey. There must have been some sort of fertiliser conference on: he was one of several working on fertiliser documents (Nosy Parker Chapman).

At Quinton Library I met the cutest Reception class. They arrived early, and then had to wait ages for their transport back to school, so ended up sitting for well over 1.5 hours, but they were so good. I practised reading Stinky! and we drew smelly things, then I gave them an old favourite: Big Bad Wolf is Good.

At lunchtime, the organisers laid on a really nice buffet in Central Library for all the authors and illustrators to have lunch together, so I got to meet the lovely Steve Smallman: great bloke, fab cartoonist and author of one of my faves: The Lamb Who Came to Dinner (also on Bookaboo - read by Meatloaf, no less!).

The afternoon was in Kents Moat Library with Blakenhale Infants - a bit of a squeeze, as it's only small and the school bought 90 children, but we had a stonking time. I love it when the kids are really up for it. Sometimes you get such a lovely vibe and it simply glows: all the old jokes work exactly right, new fun ideas just appear in the air and the children seem to be completely on your wavelength. Wonderful.


Big thanks go to the teachers, who had done lots of prep work with them. At the end they gave me some great paintings and pieces of writing they'd done in school. Here is a taster (thanks Holly!). There are more in the Picture Gallery.


I drew this man on the train back to Sheffield, but he spotted me half way through and the sketchbook was passed all round. It's always a bit embarrassing carrying on after that, especially when the victim is sitting so close. I stuck with it though and finished him off.

I little while later, when they'd lost interest, I managed to sneak a drawing of his friend (with his wonderfully beardy double chin) although I had to pretend to be drawing the luggage rack above his head whenever he glanced across!

Author Visits to Schools: Out and About Again

On Monday, I visited Romiley Primary School in Stockport. I did a PowerPoint talk to KS2 and then lots of illustration workshops with Y5 and Y6. I had a lovely day, although a 6.30 taxi on a Monday morning was a bit of a shock to the system!

I experimented with doing my train sketching in pen for a change:

As you can read above, I was a bit held up the 7 mile long Totley Tunnel. It was a stop-everywhere train too, so I amused myself by trying to draw one thing out of the window, each time we stopped at a station:

I was really impressed with Romiley Primary: it was a hectic 5-session day, but I never once heard anybody tell anyone off. The teachers and kids seemed to have a great rapport, and the atmosphere was one of happy enthusiasm, peppered with a lovely gentle banter. It was nice too for 3 of the teachers to be fellas for a change (think rocking horse poo).

During an initial talk to everyone, I stressed the importance of starting a sketchbook if you want to be an illustrator when you grow up and, as I moved around school during the day, it was lovely to be accosted in the corridors by children keen to show me little sketch drawings they had done in notebooks, based on my illustrations.

It was also great to discover that both teachers sitting beside me in the staff room at lunch were quite keen artists on the sly, and one even kept holiday sketchbooks - brilliant stuff.

Luckily I am over the worst of my cold now, I'm just praying nobody at Romiley gave me a fresh dose: time will tell...

This last page of sketches were done on the way home: I'm always less productive at the end of the day, and mainly draw to stop myself from falling asleep and missing my stop!

Thanks to everyone at Romiley Primary School for a great day. Keep up the drawing!

Flap Book Artwork is Weird

I've just spent 2 days glued to the computer (at least the weather's been so awful, it's not felt too bad). It's all to do with A Lark in the Ark...

When Peter Bently and I perform it at Hay Festival (May 29th) and Edinburgh Festival (August), we are going to project the illustrations as we read. Apart from looking really good, this will be really useful: it's nice to go into the audience and choose children to open the flaps, but it's tricky for anyone else to see what's underneath. This way, each time a flap is lifted, everyone gets to see it.

But the trouble with flap books, is that none of the artwork makes any sense outside of the book, so I couldn't just load my existing illustrations into PowerPoint, ready for projection. For example, there is a page that looks like the one above. You lift a flaps on the duvet to reveal baboons in pink pantaloons hiding in the bed:

...along with llamas in pyjamas:

Except, what I actually drew was this:

...and this:

So, I had to re-visit every illustration in Photoshop, joining all the bits together, turning them into images that match what you see when you are reading the real book.

Unfortunately, I quickly discovered another issue: when you open a flap in a book, and it goes across someone's face, well, that's fine, but for a projected image I thought it would look weird:

So, perfectionist (or obsessive?) that I am, I did more fiddling around, moving background characters out of the way:

While I was at it, I moved some of the eyes, and even pasted in this wee wombat to fill a pregnant space created!

It's all done now (phew) and looks really fun. Egmont are going to print us T-shirts for the event, and we are going to use my 'doctored' version of the llamas in pyjamas on the back! I think Hay is now fully booked. I'll post details of the Edinburgh event in a few weeks.

A New Picture Book to Illustrate!

Isn't it funny how everything always happens at once? Anderson Press have just asked if I would like to illustrate a new text. Hurrah!

It should be good fun as there's lots of drama in the story. It's quite dark and scary in places, which appeals to me, but there's also plenty of potential for humour and wonderful characterisation.

The author is Julia Jarman, who I've illustrated for several times, on projects with Orchard and Hodder, most recently for Class Three All At Sea. I've never worked with Anderson Press before, but they obviously like what Julia and I have done in the past, and that's why they will have thought of me - thanks Julia!

Julia and I make a good team, as we think alike. We are both really into promotional work too, which means we're always bumping into one another at festivals (believe it or not, there are some authors you never get to meet). Sometimes we even perform together, and will be presenting Class Three All At Sea together at Edinburgh this summer (more details later).

This new book is an ASAP project: Anderson Press want me to get it all finished in time for the Frankfurt Book Fair in October (see Dragon-Proof!), which means I'll be getting going on the roughs almost straight away. So, for the time being, everything else is on the back burner.

The Unluckiest Person in the World!!!

Remember that last weekend I caught a cold? I didn't seem to get the head cold, but boy did I cough, and when I breathed in, it sounded like blowing bubbles through a straw in a glass of lemonade.

I thought I'd given it to John when he got ill mid week. Then, when he took to his bed, I thought: man cold.

But guess what? He had a different cold altogether. Instead of me infecting him, he gave his to me, so I'm ill all over again!! This time I've got the whole thing: sore throat, sneezing all over the computer monitor (too graphic?).

One bit of news though to cheer me up: I just heard that A Lark in the Ark is going to be a Cbeebies bedtime story. It'll be ages yet til it's on, but it's lovely to be chosen.

The votes for the Red House Awards are all in now, so somebody somewhere knows whether we won (exciting, but sort of strange). They keep it a closely guarded secret though, until the big ceremony next month, when they do the old envelope opening trick...

I'm so upset - I have an important wedding abroad, so won't be able to attend. Peter will be there to cry on my behalf though, should we get lucky.

The drawing at the top is from An ABC of Nursery Rhymes by the way: Ring-a-Ring-a-Roses of course. It also seemed a fortuitous answer to this week's Illustration Friday: which happens to be Contagious.

Above is my original picture book illustration.

Visual Brainstorming

For my new project, I need to generate lots and lots of different characters, all of them young animals, so I've been sketching cute little creatures as they come to me, almost doodling around the theme really.

I confess, I find this hard to do in a void. I know some people just open the floodgates it all flows out (lucky devils), but I usually need inspiration to kick-start me and to stop myself going round in circles.

I generally browse publisher's catalogues to get things going. These are bristling with wonderful images, and they always get me excited and begin to spark ideas, like: 'Oo, of course - baby pandas!' or 'Mmm, a dressing up box might work well for me too...' or 'Aha! So that's why mine doesn't look like a monkey!'

The trick is not to copy other people's drawings or ideas, but use them as a jumping off point. VERY important that! I sometimes make a note of any images that inspire me, so I can go back later and double check that none of the source material remains.

I don't know if any of these sketches I've done will make it into the final book, but I certainly feel far more loosened up as a result!

Back to Some Real Work!

Thanks for all your well wishes folks. I am feeling a bit better today, although still subject to occasional fits of coughing, that shake the studio and rattle my brain!

Today I have to set my sketchbook aside and get on with some proper picture book illustration again. I had some very positive feedback from that acquisitions meeting I told you about a few weeks ago, and it seems my project idea was very well received.

The publisher is still not quite ready to commit 100%, but has offered me a development fee to work up more character drawings (hurrah!). They say I've hit the right note with the characterisations but, because it is aimed at littlies, they are keen for all the animals to be baby animals.

Not sure how much more I'll be able to show you while it's in development, but in the meantime, I am posting more of the pen & ink drawings I did from the window in the Picture Gallery.

An Easier Window...

I'm still sketching from the studio, but treated myself to an easier time - this is the view from the regular window at the side of the house: no acrobatics necessary.

I had to do it over two days. My new idea (while waiting to get my hands on some better waterproof ink) was to try laying in some colour first, adding the ink on top, once it was dry. I tried to be intuitive and do it without pencil guidelines, but all the roofy perspective was more tricky than I anticipated and, by the time I'd finished the watercolour bit, the light was nearly gone.

I finished it off the next day at roughly the same time in the evening.

It worked OK, but far too much faffing about. Anyway, I now have another ink to try: Higgins Black Magic Indian Ink. Ridiculously expensive: £5.35 for a tiny 1fl oz bottle, but recommended by Seamus Heffernan in my Illustrated Life book as a non-clogger - we'll see!

Hanging out the Window!

Given my current infected condition, I thought I'd better stick to drawing indoors for a while. You may remember that my studio stretches across the attic of our house. Because I'm up high, I get quite interesting views of the surrounding roofs.

Mind you, I had to stand on a stool to get this view leaning out of the velux window at the back:

It was a terrifically windy day and I was a bit concerned my book might get whipped out of my hand and get lost out on the roof! Note the obliging rook, who perched on the apex at just the right moment.

Because of my current problems with waterproof ink, I tinted the drawing afterwards in Photoshop. For those who like to compare, this is the original:

Sniffle Sniffle

Today I have a cold (pause for sympathy). I felt it coming on last night, but went jiving anyway, which was possibly a mistake...

I also didn't help matters by sitting outside drawing in the afternoon. I was lulled by the sunshine into thinking it was warm, but then the sun went in and the wind came on and it was FREEZING! I was half way through the drawing above though, so had to carry on (dedication eh?).

Same thing happened at the weekend, drawing this. I have a pretty shallow learning curve:

This was when the waterproof ink started playing up again. After a brief flush of success, it went flaky again, drying up all the time, so I got a tad tetchy:

I'll have to try a different make, but in the meantime, because I was using non-waterproof, things got a little messy with the garden shelving, so I tidied up a little in Photoshop afterwards.

This is the before and after:

Red House Voting & Hay Festival Tickets

Do you remember me posting back in February that A Lark in the Ark is up for this year's Red House Children's Book Award? (so exciting!)

As a result, I've been invited take part in the Hay Literary Festival for the first time, and am doing a joint event with Peter Bently, Lark's lovely author, on May 29th.

We have never done an event together before. We will probably only get about 30 mins beforehand to rehearse, so there will inevitably be a degree of playing it by ear, but we have all sorts of ideas and it should be good fun and will involve plenty of silliness, as befits Peter's very silly story!

Click here if you would like to book tickets to see Peter and I strut our stuff in Hay.

Also, voting for for the Red House Award closes on May 11th - just a few days!!!!! Children can cast their votes by clicking here (please vote for us, please vote for us, please vote for us...)

Well, you wouldn't want to disappoint all these cute animals now, would you?

The Author at Work

I have just been commissioned to do a small illustration for my friend Damian Harvey. He and I worked together on An Itch to Scratch a few years ago, and have remained in touch ever since. He wanted an image versatile enough to use on his letterhead, on promo sheets and on the website. He suggested perhaps an illustration of 'the author at work'.

I thought I'd try out my new experimental watercolour technique on it, and came up with this:

I've tried to suggest the various ideas that have burst out of his imagination, by making visual reference to some of the books he has written. Damian says he is really pleased with it (phew!).

And for today's quiz question... can you spot which of Damian's books I'm suggesting in the illustration?

Milly Goes to the Pet Shop

I decided to play with the watercolour & graphite illustration technique a little more, as I felt it had possibilities, but last time it ended up more cartoon than 'picture book'. I created this little character, who I think I'll call Milly. She is taking her new friend home from the pet shop:

I much prefer this to the hierarchy illustration. The paint work is more understated and delicate, and I am already rather fond of little Milly.

Waterproof Ink at Last!

The non-waterproof ink cartridge finally ran out just after I started this drawing, so I ran indoors and got out the waterproof ink and special plunger thingy.


I gave it a good rinse out, but was impatient to get back to the drawing before the sun disappeared, so I didn't wait for it to dry, which is probably why I had a bit of trouble with the rest of the drawing: the line kept drying up on me. Dammit dammit dammit!


I painted it over the weekend, at the same time of day. You can see where the corner of the laundry basket bled a bit, but I quite like the softer, 'rough & ready' look it gives.

I emptied the pen out and refilled it before doing this next one. Much better. Phew. By the way, these are those Stabilotone water-soluble pencils I used for the 'theatre' illustration:

Sorry, I didn't think to scan it before I started the painting, so you only have the colour version.

The amusing thing was, I realised just as I was ready to start the colour, that all my brushes were in the picture! Fortunately I remembered my waterbrush: if you've never used one, they are plastic, with a water chamber you fill and can squeeze to get water to the bristles. Perfect for painting out and about.

Illustration Friday - Hierarchy

Here is my Illustration Friday attempt for this week's theme of hierarchy:


I thought I'd try a slightly lighter touch than last week, so tried out a new approach with watercolour, quite roughly applied, and then a line added with a graphite stick, like before (make marks a wee bit richer and wider than a standard pencil).

As a style, it's rather more 'cartoony' than is appropriate for my usual illustration work, although once it was done, I realised that it is a lot like the work I've done in the past for children's chapter books.

Quickies (ooh Missus!)

I'm still finishing off the cartridge of non-waterproof ink in my pen (what a tight-wad: I want to use it up!) so any colouring is a lot more easily done digitally for the moment.

These are just quickies done during the week, coloured simply, in the spirit of non-preciousness I talked about earlier. I like the concept of a sketchbook being as much a visual record of snatches of the day, as a series of little works of art: refreshingly liberating.

Like the washing line sketch, these are coloured in Photoshop, rather than Painter: cruder mark-making, but quicker and so more casual in spirit. I've not got quite so carried away this time!

Above is my computer desk, featuring the obligatory mug of tea and 'to do' list. I've not bothered to include the 'before' drawings this time, as I think you can imagine.

Socks and Undies!

I am really pleased with this one, so I was all exciting and wanted to show it to you! It was a sunny afternoon yesterday, so I put some undies on the line, then thought it made quite a good subject. I am still trying to get comfortable with the ink, so sketching all sorts.

It was tricky to make out in black and white: too much going on, as you can see from my original drawing above, so I did some colouring in Photoshop. I intended it to be fairly simple tinting, like yesterday's self portrait, but that didn't work very well with the stone work, and I ended up turning it into a proper painting.

By the way, the big knickers are John's not mine!!