Cats

I've been drawing cats in preparation for designing a cat character for my picture book. I feel the need to get myself to the point of more easily drawing the cat from any angle in any pose. This kitty needs to appear in every spread in the book.

Just a little sketch

A little sketch I did based on a photo on the cover of a children's clothing catalog. I was delighted by the pose.

The Final SBP Pages

Here are the last three scans. I'll put the sketchbook in the mail tomorrow.

I'm not all that excited by how they've come out. But I am thrilled with what the Sketchbook Project exercise has done for my creative flow. Just what I needed to get into the frame of mind for what's up next -- creating a picture book dummy.

Almost finished!

Okay, so I'm now leaving most of the verso pages completely blank. It's not laziness. Honest. I really don't like the way these thin pages look with every surface inked and showing through the back. I wish the SBP used books with thicker paper.

On the next page, I forgot to write the verb. Doh! I didn't notice until after I inked ink, so I wrote IS in black over the red word  NOT. Did you notice how I snuck the theme in there?

Only two more spreads to go. Maybe I can even get this puppy in the mail early.

Another spread for the SBP

I managed to finish another spread today. The boy has found the bird. And I have plotted out the last pages of the story. Stay tuned!

More SBP pages

Here are the next six spreads. All the blank spaces are there because the pages are thin and the black ink images read through the back of the page. It's less obvious in the scanned images than it is in the actual book.

These END OF INTERMISSION pages enabled me to keep drawing while I was dreaming up how to draw the next part of the story. I had a lot of fun inventing chairs.

The above page is plain lightly inked to create a buffer between the heavily drawn chair page and the graphic novel-esque spread that follows.

This is my first stab at drawing a sequence of frames. I really like this type of storytelling. If I do another SBP (and I think I will), I'll being doing more like that. Unfortunately, I don't have time left to divide the remaining pages in this book into frames. So I'm back to single images. Verso pages are blank to avoid read-through.

Not sure why I feel compelled to draw a character who doesn't like to draw. What would Freud say? I love drawing. But part of me is thinking of other things I love to do (novel writing) that I'm not doing when I draw. Drawing becomes a stumbling block to completing the writing. Writing can also being a stumbling block to progressing on the drawing.

That's an interpretation that would fit with the image that follows. While Boy is complaining, Mom is fantasizing herself into the arms of a dashing man.

15 pages (7 spreads) left to fill. More posts to come!