Illustrating a Picture Book: Starting the Pastel Artwork

I haven't yet got the final go-ahead on those last few redraws, because my art director has been on holiday, but most of the illustrations for Swap! are ready to go. So last week I finally gave in and started tracing-up on the light box. It's such a tedious task, tracing each illustration onto my pink pastel paper, and I have to do it in the dark too, despite the sunshine outside (groan), as the pastel paper is too thick to see through otherwise. 

It was great to get stuck into colour though. I started with the first spread of the book, not because I like to work through in the correct order, but because I had clear ideas about the colours things needed to be (pretty much pink, pink, pink), so it was a safe place to begin. 

It was also a comfortable way to find the main characters, as they are very large on the page. I  was imagining Lucy blond, but concerned that might not jump out of the page as much as brunette, especially as I am rather fond of soft, pastel coloured backgrounds (which we will drop in later, digitally).

I wasn't sure what colour to do Sparky. Black would be tricky for showing details, white a little boring, brown a bit dingy and dull... I wanted him to stand out from the backgrounds too, so I chose white with tan bits, to make it more interesting and colourful.

You can watch me create a piece of my pastel artwork in my new short film, made in the studio.