The Blooz Is Coming!

Hi Chaps,

Well, I've got another book available to preorder.
This one is called 'Stuck With The Blooz', due out in October, published by the lovely people at Harcourt Children's Books in New York.

The story is about a child who is feeling blue, and is visited by a manifestation of a blue mood, called the Blooz., a big soggy lump of a thing.
But the story is about the child dealing with and coming to terms with the Blooz, and so the blue mood.
It's a very nice story indeed, written by Caron Levis, who you can find out more about here. But it was great fun to illustrate, and I'm really pleased with it.
I had the idea that the illustrations could start out quite washed out, with muted colours, and then gradually get more colourful as the child's mood lifts.

Everything was done via email for this, so I've not met or even actually spoken to the editors or author, but nevertheless it worked very well.
Even though the only communicated was via emails and with a 5 hour or so time difference too, I found it to be a good way to exchange feedback and ideas and get some really good creative stuff going.

So, here are a few spreads from the book, as a bit of a sneak peak.

As this was done with US publishers, it's available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble over there, and they are also publishing it over here in the UK too, so it's available on Amazon and The Book Depository here too.
Here are the links.
US
Amazon, Barnes and Noble
UK
Amazon, Book Depository

More Pirate Sketches

Arrrrr, I left these scurvy pictures off my last Pirate Post, so here are a couple more.The ship and the captain.
I really enjoyed doing all the decorative woodwork at the back of the ship, and was pleased with how the angle came out.
And with the captain, I was trying to get a real rough seadog sort of  character, but make him young child friendly too.

Pirates, Arrrr

Hi Chaps,

Well, I've just recently been working on a Pirate book, which has been great fun.
And, an interesting spin on it, is that it's also a game story book.
It's got a spinner on the front, so you don't need dice, and three board games inside which I had to design and draw as part of the book, too.
A bit of a challenge, but fun, and also quick. Eleven spreads, and covers and title page etc, and  from sketches to artwork delivery in just one month, which is the quickest I've done a whole book.
It's been a bit of a push, but I don't feel it's been rushed.
It's been great fun designing a galleon and a pirate captain, and a bunch of pirates for the crew, and a pirate map and everything.
So, as I've suddenly got a bunch of new work, I thought I'd post a couple of my preliminary sketches.

And, a quick note -
In my research, I found someone who'd put 'Oooh Arrrr' for pirates.
However, this is actually farmers ( See 'Brand New Combine Harvester' by The Wurzels)
Pirates just go 'Arrrr'.