Monster Island Back Cover Art

My progress on finishing up my Monster Safari book was temporarily put on hold due to the birth of our first grandchild this past weekend. Now I'm back on track in the race against time to finish up the book. I have school appearances coming up and I must have my book available for my upcoming school dates.

There are 12 monsters featured in the book. Now there's 13 with this guy, who is as yet unnamed. I needed art for the back cover, and this dude just missed the 12 monster cut, so I figured that rather than start a new drawing from scratch, I might as well dip into my stack of monster rejects and make some fortunate creature the star of the back cover. You can't tell by the expression on his face, but he's thrilled.

Monster Safari Book Cover

This is the final cover art for my Monster Safari children's book. There's no type-setting on the cover. All the lettering is hand-done. The illustration is painted in Photoshop with a Wacom Cintiq. I'll make a few more tweaks before I let go of it, but it's 99% done.

The character looks a little too yellow from when I painted it. It's probably because it's in CMYK mode, which would throw the color on the screen version off a little.

Next comes the back cover, which will be more hand-lettering, though I may change my mind and type-set it. We'll see. Then there will be about two wrap up pages at the end of the book, then I'm done. I leave for a business trip to Pennsylvania in the morning. I'll plan on finishing the book at the airport, on the plane and in my motel room while I'm gone. So when I get back I can bring it all to a close.

Then I'll get the paper book published, and right after that the ebook, followed by a YouTube tutorial drawing for each of the pages. Then on to the next book. What fun. I'm sure glad I don't have to have a job.

Monster Island Cover Art

All of the lettering on the cover of my new Monster Safari book is now finished. Today I will be working toward finishing the cover illustration. I will add in more background behind the creature and perhaps make some changes on the creature as well.

I have some issues with the little creature in the Pooka's grasp. When you're dealing with a young  audience as I do, you have to be extra careful about any negative implications. Will the Pooka soon be including the helpless little creature on his lunch menu? Or are they best of friends? I will have to resolve that issue. Mothers are always very protective of what they expose their children to. A big monster eating a little monster might move the book from the "G" rated category into PG territory. It's frustrating to me, but that's the audience. Has Barney the Dinosaur ever gobbled up a smaller dinosaur on camera? I seriously doubt it. That's my audience.

The entire book, from the cover to the end is hand-lettered, with the exception of the ISBN page. I hand-lettered the very first book that I wrote and illustrated. It was called The Great Thistledown Flood. I was thrilled to learn that it became a Gold Medallion Honor Book, and I attended the Gold Medallion Awards in Denver, Colorado. That was a memorable night. Because of the painstaking hand-lettering, the book also introduced me to carpal tunnel syndrome.

The next post will reveal what I came up with for the cover art. It will either be the finished sketch, or the final art. Stay tuned.

Monster Safari Intro Page

As I press on toward the finish line, here's the introductory page to my Monster Safari kids' book.

This little creature is a fitting image for the intro page because my initial sketch of this little guy was what turned into my Monster Safari book. He was a character that I penciled out several years ago as part of the initial sketches for an online game. I used him for the initial monster character for this book, then added 11 more. Here's the initial sketch that I did for the online game: http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=1517037313888825393#editor/target=post;postID=6194046565805754604 

The entire book up to this point, including all 12 monsters, is all here on my blog.

Next I'll be working on the front and back cover art, and I'll post it in a few days, as soon as I'm finished with it. 

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles?

Hornballs at the Water Hole

This page that I just completed for my Monster Safari book will help to give the reader the impression that the setting for the book is deep tropical jungle. I had fun drawing and painting the scene, but it made me wish that it wasn't just a fictitious story. I love tropical locales and I wish I had another life to be an explorer, as I appear to be in this scene.

Yet there is some truth to what you see above. The safari outfit that I'm wearing in the illustration is real...it's hanging in my closet. It's the costume that I wear when I do my school appearances: http://www.bronsmith.com/schoolprograms.htm. In a couple of weeks I'll be flying back to Palmyra, Pennsylvania. I'll do four school shows in four days, and I'll be selling my new Monster Safari book while I'm there. That's why I'm in such a hurry to finish the book.

This is the Hornball how-to-draw page that will be in the book: http://bronsmithart.blogspot.com/2012/07/hornball-how-to-draw-page.html

I will feature 12 Little Beasties by way of the how-to-draw pages in the book. About three more pages to go, and the book will be done. Then on to the next book. Will it be called Dragon Safari?

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles?

Monster Island Page - Herd of Hornballs at the Water Hole

This is the line art for one of the introductory pages for my kids' book Monster Safari. I only have two or three more pages to go, plus the cover art, and the book will be done. I have not much more than a couple more weeks to go before it has to be done.

The way that I put these illustrations together sort of defies convention. When I was in art school I never embraced the idea of drawing tons of thumbnails before I start work on an illustration.  There was no thumbnail with this piece. All I did was pencil in the "stage", which consisted of the shape of the water hole and the hill behind it. With my stage blocked in, I just started making it up as I went along until the picture area was filled up. Sort of unconventional, not something that I would teach in one of my classes. But somehow it seems to it seems to work for me.

It waffled back and forth, then decided to hand-letter the whole book, since it's a sketch book format anyway. I've hand-lettered so long that I would just as soon go ahead and hand letter something, as opposed to going into InDesign and typeset the text.

Also, I don't pencil the whole illustration in before I start inking. I'll pencil an area, and if I think it's safe, I'll go ahead and ink it in. So I sort of pencil and ink my way around until it's done.

Of course, there's no contrast in the art at this stage. But tomorrow when I start filling in the color it will start coming to life and take on a much better contrast definition. My challenge will be to take care in creating the lights and darks, and carefully craft the dappled light effects that work so well in moody jungle scenes.

The open area behind the expedition members will be free-washed in without line. It will look much better off in the distance when it's not defined with a line. The farthest thing in the distance with a line definition will be the big tree on the left, because it's part of the mid-ground.

Check back soon for the final color art. I should be done in two or three days. I have to be done with the color soon, or the book won't be done on time.

Monster Island Spread, Final Art

This is the final art for the Monster Island Expedition Map, which will be an orientation map for readers of my upcoming book, Monster Safari. I put 29 hours into this illustration.

The expedition begins at the helicopter, a CH-47 Chinook, in the bottom center of the spread. You then follow the dotted line through the reference points that number up to 20. You end up back at the helicopter landing and pick-up point on a small motu. This page will show the readers where the monsters were first spotted, along with some of the key reference points on the island. Following the orientation map will be the monster profile pages, which include a how-to-draw page for each monster. The relatively empty portion in the center of the map is the gutter of the book. 

Next comes the cover. It will be posted soon. I have to have this book finished in two to three weeks. I"m not sure how I'll do it, but four schools in Pennsylvania are expecting it. I will be flying to Pennsylvania on the 28th of February. 

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles?

Monster Island, Ink Line

Here's the ink line for the Monster Island Expedition Map page of my Monster Safari kids book. I threw some color in to help define the water from the land. The dotted line indicating the route that was taken over and around the island is now defined in ink. There are also a few issues with the positioning of the monsters on the map that need to be corrected in Photoshop before I start adding color. The next image that you see will be the finished color. 

This book must be finished ASAP. I have a week's worth of school assemblies in Palmyra, Pennsylvania in the end of February. They are all expecting to purchase the Monster Safari book, so I'm definitely under the gun to get this project wrapped fast. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished results very soon.                                                                                                

Monster Island Pencil Layout, no. 2

The pencil layout for the Monster Island expedition map spread is about halfway complete now. I decided to add a quick dash of color to separate the water from the land, so the sketch will be easier for you to figure out. 

DESCRIPTION OF THE EXPEDITION

You'll note a pencil line running around the island inside the lagoon as well as over the land area, showing directional arrows. This will be the track that the expedition follows. You'll note the helicopter in the lower center. That's the drop-off point, where the expedition begins. The first portion of the expedition as it tracks into Hooloo Cove is indicated by the dotted line. The next time you see this sketch, the course of the expedition will all be drawn in dotted line. (Enlarge above image for a closer look.) 

In the last sketch (scroll down one image) you'll see that the helicopter was a small size airship, similar to a LOH (light observation helicopter). I decided that in order to carry all the kayaks and other supplies that we would need a much larger airship. So I swapped the for-seater LOH ("loach") out for a Chinook. They're jumbo-size choppers, designed to carry larger numbers of people as well as supplies (It cost me a fortune to lease the Chinook, but it was worth the expense).

The Chinook lands on the small motu and unloads passengers and supplies. We immediately observe several skulls and other bone fragments in the coral sand. The skulls do not resemble any animal life that would exist on a tropical island. I make note of that in my journal. We assume this must be a feeding site for a sea creature of some kind. 

Then, with some trepidation, we step into our kayaks and the expedition is underway. We paddle single-file in a clockwise position. The expedition will be accomplished by circumnavigating the island along a course that stays inside the fringe reef, to avoid the risk of swamping the kayaks in high seas. The waters inside fringe reefs are generally quite calm.

We enter the first cove that we encounter and one of our Maori team members names it Hooloo Cove after his island of birth. There we beach the kayaks and begin our overland exploration of the island. 

I named the "Needle" peak in the upper left portion of the island after The Needle on the island of Rarotonga in the South Pacific Ocean. The last time I was on Rarotonga I had planned to climb The Needle, but ran out of time. I hope to climb it on my next visit.

We'll pick up where we left off with further development of the sketch in the next post in a few days. Check back soon to see how the expedition is progressing. 

Monster Island Initial Layout

I have now begun the pencil layout for the Monster Island map page. It will be a double-page spread. I thought I would first show the page layout in its early stages, before I begin adding details and refinements. So now I know the shape of the island, but I only have a general  idea of what will follow. This is because I seldom do thumbnails. I just start drawing and wait to find out where the drawing leads me, following a rough mental picture in my mind. In art school we were taught to do thumbnails...I never got into that very much.

Next I will work on the title banner and start laying in the route that the expedition takes. I'm concerned about space. Is there enough space to include the locations of all the beasties on the map? I'll know soon when I start laying out the expedition route.

As soon as the book is completed, it will be available for sale, also as an Ebook. If you choose to buy a copy, let me know if you would like me to autograph it. I'll be glad to accomodate.

Have you seen my other blog? Check it out. It's called The Trowbridge Chronicles.

Bird's-Eye View of Monster Island

This is the final art for the Monster Island bird's-eye spread. It will be the opening spread in my Monster Safari kids' book. I inked the pencil layout (below) then colored it in Photoshop with my Wacom Cintiq. Most of the graphite under-drawing is still there, mostly covered with color. I did remove the graphite in the light areas, like the beach.

At present the text remains my hand-lettering. But I will probably substitute the hand-lettering with typeset text. 

The next thing that you'll see on this blog will be the pencil layout for the next spread, which will be a straight-down view of the island. It will look more like a treasure map, in that it will show where we located the monsters, the location of the peaks, swamps, etc. There will be a dotted line which will trace the route of our expedition to the island. 

Check out my other blog: Trowbridge Chronicles.

Monster Island - Bird's Eye View, inked

Here's the next step in completing the final art of the Monster Island bird's-eye view spread for my new kids' book, Monster Safari. I inked the line of the halftone drawing (see below) using a Micron Pigma number 005 pen. I used a number 2 for the hand-lettering. I left the half-tone in so that it would serve as a guide when I'm painting in the color values and shadows.

The next and final step, the color, will be done in Photoshop, using my Wacom Cintiq. I will be posting the final color art soon.

Check out my other blog, the Trowbridge Chronicles.

Merry Christmas to All!

Here's the pencil layout and final art for this year's Christmas card. Best wishes for a Merry Christmas to all and a Happy New Year.

Monster Island - Birds-eye View

This will be the first spread in my Monster Safari kids' book. This illustration will introduce readers to Monster Island from an aerial point of view. This is a graphite value study of the upcoming full-color spread. The next page in the book may contain a straight-down view, an illustrated map of the island, which will pinpoint exactly where our team encountered the various monsters on the island. Click on the image to enlarge it.

I hand-lettered the above text, but I might decide to typeset it. All of the monster pages (scroll down) are hand-lettered, but I might find that it would be more appropriate to typeset the introductory pages.

The next view that you will see of the above illustration will be the final full-color version. 

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? It's a world away from Monster Island.

Two-Headed Zilch - How-to-Draw Page

               

The last beastie in our bestiary sketch book is perhaps the strangest, and certainly the rarest. We only saw one specimen of the Two-Headed Zilch during our time on the island. It was probably an anomaly, a one-of-a-kind creature. 

Watching the Zilch walk through the jungle was a hysterically funny sight. We had to stifle our guffaws so as not to scare him away. When one side of the Zilch is walking forward, the other side is backing up. What was most hilarious was watching them squabbled over who would walk forward. Whoever lost the argument was saddled with the inferior task of backing up as they lumbered through the jungle in search of food. I was sketching furiously while I laughed silently. 

They would begin with a back-and-forth struggle...forward, backward, forward, backward, and so on...until one would win the tug-of-war. He was then the leader, for the moment, until they would stop to nibble on a jungle morsel, then it would start all over again. 

You can see that there's a small space on each side of the creature where a talk balloon could be placed. But I'm in a bit of a quandary about what the creature will be saying. I'm open for suggestions for a very short bit of dialogue that would go in the talk balloon...one bit of dialogue from each side of the creature. If I'm able to use your suggested dialogue, I'll send you a signed copy of the book when it comes out.  

Now that all of the creatures are drawn, I will begin the final phase of the book, creating the full-color set-up illustrations and text, using the many reference sketches and photos that I took while I was on the island. The next image you see may be a bird's-eye view painting of the island and surrounding tropical sea. I have only a handful of pages to go before the book is complete. If you want to see all of the monsters in the book, simply scroll down.

In the foreground you can see the hint of a game trail which leads to a thick, dark and mysterious region of jungle, with a sharp peak in the distance. We called this peak the "Needle" for its sharp point (which we scaled later that day). It was in this dark jungle undergrowth on Monster Island that we spotted the Zilch.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? Check it out.

Snoot - How-to-Draw Page

The monster menagerie march continues, with the curious looking Snoot. Hey, don't blame me for the silly name, folks. My assistant named him the very moment we first spotted him slogging through the swamp on Monster Island. He was standing on a half-submerged log below a hanging branch with a segmented serpent draped over it, just as you see here. I grabbed my sketchbook and sketched him on the spot.

Each spread in the upcoming Monster Safari book will feature a full-page sketch of the monster (just as you see here) on the left side of the spread. The how-to-draw page will be on the opposite page. Though we discovered many more monsters during the course of our safari on the island than you will see in the book, I selected my favorite dirty dozen beasties for the book.

Here's a shot of me in the jungle on the island, taken by my assistant. This photo was taken just moments before we spotted the Snoot. You can see that the jungle is very dense and spooky, with lots of tangled vines and roots, and animal trails that lead to nowhere. I felt like I had just climbed into a Tarzan movie.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? Check it out.

Limbot - How-to-Draw Page

Ten monsters down...and two to go.  I'm on the home stretch with my monster how-to-draw pages.  After this I will write and illustrate the full-color introductory pages of the book.  There will be a bird's-eye view of Monster Island and some other descriptive art.

I'm in a rush to finish the book because the sooner I finish it, the more I will sell during this school year. I know the school year will be over before we know it. I'm happy about the topic I chose because I know that monsters never go out of style with elementary age kids. This will sell for years to come. They can't get enough of monsters, dragons and space creatures. Perhaps my next how-to-draw book will be a dragon book.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? Check it out.

Oregon Duck Going Long for a Pizza

Thought I would break the monster monotony with a Oregon Ducks pizza commerical. This was the only painting that I ever did for my Trowbridge Chronicles blog that was not a "Mrs. Trowbridge" painting. I cheated a couple years ago and posted this illustration that promoted the Ducks for a pizza company. Now I have this blog to post my own drawings, sketches and paintings. The next post will take us back to my Monster Safari book. Stay tuned.

Horned Toad - How-to-Draw Page

If you're just tuning in, I'm in the middle of creating a how-to-draw kids' book, called Monster Safari. I'm displaying each spread on this blog as I create it. It's good to be on the downside with about three more monster pages to go, plus a couple of full-color set-up spreads. Scroll down to see all the previous pages. 

It's not moving along as fast as I'd like it to since I can only work on it late nights (as I am now), early mornings and weekends. But I'm enjoying the process. I've created many kids books over the years, yet it's always a kick to release a new one.

The book will be available as an e-book as well as traditional. I also plan to bring these Little Beasties to YouTube in the form on how-to-draw tutorials for kids, after I'm finished with the book.

Check out my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles. It's totally different from this one.

Beakapoo - How-to-Draw Page

It takes patience to create a kids' book on the side. I wish I could work on it full-time and move through it quickly. But this is my late-night, early morning project. I'm pecking away at it as I can squeeze it in between my regular projects. But it's been fun to watch it steadily grow from week to week. It should be out for at least some of the school assembly programs that I have coming up this year.

I have written and/or illustrated many books over the years. But this will be my first ebook, hopefully the first of many. 

For this monster I wondered what a big beak with legs would look like. Now I know.

Have you seen my other blog, The Trowbridge Chronicles? Check it out.