Autumn rattles on…
Latest Jam
-
Evolution of a Guinea Pig
I’ve recently had the joy of working on a book cover about a talk show hosting guinea pig called Gerry. I’ll post the finished artwork, details about the book and author, along with a link to amazon once it’s finished. In the meantime, here’s some sketches and character progressions…
Thumbnail of cover and more detailed character sketches. 
Action! A scene from the book and pretty close to the final cover design. 
The croc chases Gerry! I’m thinking this is the best point in the book to illustrate. 
Gerry interviews a temperamental time travelling crocodile. 
Early hedgehog sketch. Again, this will need clothes. 
More animated, but too skinny! Gerry eats a lot of cake in the book! 
Gerry presents a chat show. He needs to be bipedal and wear a suit. 
I’m starting off with a rough sketch of a real guinea pig (from memory) -
The Birthday Bird
I’ve long been a fan of the Easter Beagle. I like the idea of a completely made up tradition that nobody follows. So here is the birthday bird…
A whimsical short story without a moral.
-
A windy day on tree hill
Gosh. Isn’t windy? I mean it’s really very turbulent outside today. I walked up Weets Hill this morning and the power of the wind took my breath away, in a literal way… and gave me a Wallace and Gromit type smile. It’s inspired me to colour in this sketch, as a sort of here comes autumn kind of thing. I should point out that this artwork is not of Weets Hill, it’s of a far gentler slope from my imagination.
Here’s the original sketch and some stages in the development of the piece. Note – the shadow on the right moves right at the last moment as I finally decide that it’s coming in at the wrong angle. I preferred it before, but it was wrong. Might still tweak that a bit more. In the original sketch there’s a creepy dead tree in the foreground, but that wasn’t what I wanted this to be about. I want the figures to be looking at the leaves and the sky, without being crowded or spooked by an old stump.
