Transcripts
1. Introduction - Is this class for you?: Welcome. I'm Rebecca should Peter Jones. I have an illustrator and designer based in Manchester. The aim of this class is to show you my process and help you to get ideas for your own children's books, picture books spread. So it's less about the videos and more about your ideas and your work. If you're looking for a quick fix, then this class is not for you. However, if you believe in hard work and growing and learning in this class can be an incredibly valuable stepping stone in creating your own children's book. For this class, you can use any medium. However, there are some skills required for this class. It's more of an intermediate class, but don't worry if you don't have the skills yet. I'll link a resource document in the class description so you can check them out. The skills required for this class, our composition, character development, and basic storytelling. Are you excited me too? So how does this all work? After showing you my tools, my planning process, NSP drawing of how I create a double-page spread. I'll give you a prompt to create your own story. With this story, you can create your own double-page spread. So what is a double-page spread? A double-page spread is purely book opened up and both sides carried an image. There's very different options of how to create this, and I'll share with you later how to do this. So all that is left to do is let's get started. And I'm really excited to share these prompts WebView. So stick with me. And if you liked this class, please stare at it will really help other students to find a class and also helps me to help other people. Yes. So let's get started.
2. My process Part 1: tools, planning and sketches: I'm Monica should begin Jones and illustrator and designer based in Manchester. And today I will show you as speed painting or speak drawing of children's book spread. I'm working on at the moment. But before I start, I just wanted to show you how this all came about, the short planning process and which tools are used. So here you can see my t. This is the paper I'm using, discuss out. Watercolor paper smooth, a four or 300 grams per square meter. And I like this paper. I like the texture and the color. Affordable. Next, I would like to listen to podcasts. This is the creative pep talk, which I really like and highly recommend. If you want to keep going and do not lose hope in your creative career. And this is really good for illustrators and also other creatives. These are my trusted headphones. Bows, quiet comfort. And I really love these headphones. They can completely cancel out any noise. This is active noise canceling. And then of course, my tools of trade. These are my pencils, just a mix of Dev and artists drawing and polychrome us. Farber custom. Yes. So that's that. So this is the sketch that we will trace with a light box and this is the prostate will show you. And I think it's really good to see like how different people do their stuff. So I hope you enjoy this. Just before I start, I want to show you how this sketch even came to be. And I think this is really helpful if you want to learn how to prepare, how to plan children's books spread. So all of this started with an online course I'm taking. This was part of an assignment to create two characters and double-page spoke based on it. And I just enjoyed it so much today to say it, to continue and make a story out of it. So these are these two characters, and I call them accumulators and Philippa. And this is the little sketch that this double-page spread is based on. So let me just zoom in and show you. So this is just something that came to my mind. So it's molecule woodland scene, but I want to make it a little bit surreal because I can make this as a mouse with wings and all mice in this magical world have winks and my story. So I wanted to make it a little bit. Yeah, not completely natural. And have him live in a house with little vegetable patch and a huge dandelion. And this whole shape actually came about because of an acorn. So don't want to go too deep into this, but just to see like this is how my thinking process works. And yes, so this idea was great and I thought this would be really nice for beginning, seemed like an outdoor scene. So what I did next is I did a small sketch. But you can see here. So you can see this is the house from before, but much more gestural. And I added Archimedes and figured by their playing with an econ, throwing it around over to Washington. And I thought this is a very nice, seemed to begin the story. So this was really quick and you can see my sketches are very loose. I don't spend much time on this. Then. What came next was much more detailed sketch d such as nodes. And you can see the difference already between these two. This being much looser and quiet. Yeah, the proportions of the page and not very detailed here. What I do when I plan out a spread, because I think the original book size, what will it be? And then I usually divide it by four or by two depending on how big I want to work. So this is already the original ratio. Just smaller, size down because I find it very hard to work. Big. Everything kind of gets out of proportion. So I will show you just a quick tip on how to, even if you draw a small, how it can work larger for your final book and spread. So like I said, these are the right proportions are halved it because this is going to be a double-page spread. And you can see this is already quite detailed and this is my bass, my foundation for my final sketch. So what I do is I sketch everything out and divide proportions how I wanted. Maybe see what context could go. It's looser, but it's way more detailed already in everything is already in the right place where I wanted to be. So what I do next, I scan this in and depending on how light I want it to be, if I maybe didn't draw everything a 100% precisely and I want to draw over it. Then I would print it with the draft setting, which makes it a much lighter. Or I increase the brightness. So sketch comes out a little bit lighter than a printed in decides I want, which is a for which this is my printer and scanner can take a4. And this is also the size of my paper. And of course this is only work for a portfolio at the moment. But if I will do this for real project and the client, then of course, I would always work to size a 100% or larger of the final outcome. And this is just a really easy way to have a small sketch and didn't work larger. Okay? So here you can see this is o, this is just much larger, is a little bit blurry, but this is no problem because this is just for us to try different color schemes and maybe correct some lines. But it's a really helpful tool if you're not comfortable throwing larger and everything is still fine in proportion, that's great. So but I do a print, a few of those. And then I do some color testing. And often one testing is enough and then I can proceed. But with this one, here, I use my pencils and a salad to catch over it and just follow the lines. Sometimes correct a few things. And then I realized, ok, so here I mixed ie, Inverted colors, but accidents, Actually the head would be kind of nice magenta and the body is yellow. So I made it a note for myself that when I actually trace it, then I noticed this actually has to be other way round. And with dispatch, although I really loved, is blue and the contrast between this lighter blue and darker blue, I felt this whole scene was a bit too blue. I don't know. Somehow it just was too strong and hold the attention, gets drawn to decide too much. So what are decided? After speaking to someone else was to take another peek piece of paper that I printed out. So it's the same. And it just corrected the colors here. How I thought maybe it works better. Like this. You don't have to do the whole thing again. We can just see OK, this actually makes the whole scene lighter. It looks more open and not as closed as if this, for example. So I think it is I want to show you just can really help. If you work traditionally, of course, if you work digitally, then this is not necessary. But if you work traditionally lead and saves you a lot of time because I didn't want to do everything again where I felt this was fine. I only wanted to correct one piece. So this is really great to test things. And I just I just folded the things awaited I don't need and this doesn't really distract from the main image. So one more time. So you see here, it's quite strong and I like it, but it just doesn't really work. Takes time and practice. I think it's better. Yes, so this is really helpful for me. A great, good. So let's start tracing. I think the tracing nowadays spoke so much. I think I will put it into the next video in part two. And then you can see the whole speed drawing tracing process after final image of this and how I do that. Okay, I'll see you in the next video.
3. My process Part 2: more tools, light box, and speed drawing: So here I will just show you quickly some tools I forgot to mention. This is my state law. Mass plastic would really like to use for correcting things. And just a normal sharpener. And I like to use Washi tape. You can also use artist tape and this is just to stick the sketch and the final paper together so they don't move. While I am tracing. And my light box at the moment is an old window I reclaimed and desk lamp. Of course, if you have light box or a light path, I would recommend using that instead. So what I do, let's jump right in. As I have this sketch that I showed you in the previous video. And what I will do is I will place it on the glass and place my paper on top of it. I use this what you take to stick it down. This tape is really good if you don't want things to move. However, it doesn't come off as nicely. So I guess artists would be better. And again, I'm using my wonderful. And so without further ado, let's get started. Threshold. All right. Oh, shoot. All right. Ok. What is that? Threshold? Ok. Threshold. The natural way to approach that. It's natural. Hello.
4. Prompts for your picture book idea: So now it's your turn. Let's create your story for your double-page spread. How we will do this? Well, I will, I created a little game for you. And how it works. I will give you different prompts. And for each problem you have to think of a number between 13. And I'll say pick a number. And then after a few seconds I will tell you which number means what. And this is how you can slowly create ideas for your story. And I tell you it really works. It really helped me and I created a whole story that it was full of life and characters. There are really great just with simple tools like this. So let's get started. First, let's choose your main character. So think of a number between 13. Ok? So number one is a person, number two is an animal, and number three is a thing. Awesome. Now to a secondary character, think of a number between 13. Number one is the person, number two, and number three is an animal. Great. Next, let's find our setting. Again. Think of a number between 13. Ok. Number one is indoors. Number two is outdoors. And number three is a different reality. So that could be anything you like, that could be underwater, outer space and eating. You can think of just be creative with disk. When it was all happen. Let's pick a time period. Again, a number between 13. Ok. Number what is the present? And number two is the past and number three is the future. And you can take this as far as you like. The future could be Alexa for psi phi to pass, could be mythical. Just take it as you like it. And the last one is the mood or the setting of the scene that you will shorten your double-page spread. So again, a number between 13. Number one is emotional or sad. Number two is joyful or something funny. And number three is action or drama. And I will just share one last tip of you before you should start. Let the characters interact with their environment or with each other. That's all I want you to do. And you can adapt it or change it up however you like to say is just to help you to get started. What I want you to do now is go to the project description and follow all the steps. And often they don't take much time. So really just in the work break and a lunch break in your commute, take a few minutes to fulfill these little prompts and an evening post your progress. And this is how we will make progress. We will make progress slowly. Sometimes it takes several days for me to develop this. And sometimes it can take a week or more, and that's absolutely fine and good ideas need time. So what I want you to do is to take action right now, grab a pencil and a piece of paper. And after you've thought a little bit about all these little prompts that you picked. Think of one sentence that could sum up your story and make one little loose sketch of what it is, what it could be, even if it's just one element of the story, the one character, it doesn't matter. Just post something and get it started. Creative project now and do it. And I'm really excited to see what you do. And let's start this journey together.
5. How to find examples for double page spreads: So this is just a quick tip. If you need inspiration for how you double-page spread could look like or what is out there. Whatever commands you to do is go to the library or go to a bookshop, or look at the bookshelf. Because I think if you like turns books, you already have some at home. And I'll just show you like DES or tool that I really like. And you can choose whatever. They are both very different. I'm not going to show you the content because of copyright issues. But what I recommend you look into books, turns books and see how they make double-page spreads. And you will find as a wealth of layouts, different ways of approaching this. But it's really great to see what other people do and what's out there. And do not copy, but get inspired for your own spirit. That's all. Please do not copy out of people's characters or work. It is illegal and it only hurts you more than anyone else. And also it helps industry so you don't want to do that, but please show your unique characters. That's all. And I'm really excited to see you stories and an airplane or says hello from Manchester. Okay, I'll see you soon. And I really wrote for you.
6. NEW: BONUS Examples - technical terms: Hello, I decided to add a few more examples for designing a page and designing your pictures, and also to give you a few technical terms. So I'm not a, you know, printing professional, but I will just explain it to you from an illustration and design point of view. And I hope this is helpful for you to design your page is better for future print production as well. So the first thing I want to talk about here, these two red lines they show you is here in the middle is something that is called the gutter. And that's where they just tend to be either folded or glued. And this is where two pages on several pages come together. The thing here to consider is when you design your images, is that depending on the way the book is bound or folded, and depending on which position in the book. So which page number, for example, I might have to issue that here. A little bit of image is lost. So it's important to not place the most important things like a character's face or something that you really don't want to have distorted in the middle of this. So he, I've just have some edges that online if they're gone, so to speak, when images folders, and also here does enough space on the other side of the page. So even if there is a bit of image loss, it's no problem. It's very rare that you wouldn't have any image last year in the gutter. So overall, it's best to not place any important parts in the middle of this area. Good. And next we'll talk about something else that is very nice as a design element that also important for print production is something called bleed. And this is just one example, but bleed is basically something that you have to consider when a book is produced in the future. So for example, when a book is printed, you have to basically treats a bigger image than the actual book 4B. So when the blade cuts the actual paper, there's a little bit of room for error. So let's say my actual page will be where the red line is. So this red frame, but I still have extended and have extra image beyond this. So in case the blade cuts, you know, a little bit further up here, a little bit further down, there is enough space and they will not just be a white edge or anything. I hope you understand what I mean. So basically in here and this would not be a problem because this is all white but with my full bleed images, which I will explain in a second. When the image extends on all sides, then you won't need to basically account for this bleed. And image will have to be a little bit bigger. So let's say again, I will not place anything really important here because that's anywhere in this area. The blade will be able to cut. And that's not something we want. Sorry. I'm not a printed technician or anything. I'm just trying to explain this to you as much as I can. But again, basically extended further and have things that are not important in this area. And instead of having something like an eye or a face, simple as that. And then there's different ways you can bleed an image. And this is more of a design thing than a print production thing. So you can have an image bleed on all sides. For example, this is a page that bleeds on all sides at a top, left, right, bottom. And what this does, it expands your image. So basically it looks larger than it is. It looks like you are looking into something and makes it look bigger than it actually is. So this is the bleed and I'll explain this with more examples in the next video. So don't worry, if this was a bit confusing, you will see many examples now of different pages I've designed myself. And then you will be easily able to pick up a book yourself and analyze it with a few simple terms and disport, increased your image library and your knowledge. And then you can design a smarter, better pages.
7. NEW: BONUS Examples - page layouts: Now we will talk about a few more specific ways of how you can lay out your page. So this is another image of Archimedes, the story that I've shown you already, that I've developed from a very simple idea of a few words, a mouse with wings and a bird with shoes. And that was the initial prompts. So you can see it can be really simple and you can develop a really great story. So what I want to show you now is a few different ways of designing images and what that can do. So on the left side, my main character is starting to collect different little doll houses and our possessions. It doesn't really matter. But what I wanted to show is that it starts to get out of hand. And I thought, well, how can they showed us in the best way? And I decided that spot illustrations, which are illustrations without a background, like here, here and here. These are three spots. Might be a good way because there can easily show you the passing of time or how actions develop. For example. And in this case, I wanted to show very quick succession, how his bag gets fuller and fuller and fuller. And here you can see Al-Qaeda back is, you know, this backpack is not ready for. You can walk around easily. Then he starts to struggle. A little bit of spark gets for his straining has phase. And then from here on you can barely move. His bag is so full. And I think for this, despots obey effective has no background to distract from the action. As very clear, is to see what's happening. And on the next page, basically on the facing page, we have a full bead is fleets on all sides of the actual page, up to the gutter and two sides of the page. He's sitting at the center of the page and you can see his problem has really got out of hand. Overflowing doll houses is just coming out of the sink. Out from under the sink. Yeah. And he asked side I have indicated deliberate atomized that are flying because obviously they have wings, they can fly, but he's weighed down by his. Yeah. This has a deeper meaning. What I want to say is that we are sometimes way down by things that we hold onto. Like, you know, can be emotions, can be memories, can be possessions. And sometimes we need to let them go. And that's the main point of the story. And that's what I wanted to show that here he realizes this is too much. And we have seen this. We have conveyed so much action in a very short amount of time. So through my individual spots and then through the final image. So on one page alone, on one spread alone, we have shown a lot of action in a lot of meaning. And that's was easy to do by including some spots. So we can show more on one page. And by including a full bleed which shows you basically the room is bigger than it looks, but we are just looking onto a very small aspect of it. Okay, well then I show you a few more examples that we can have a look at. This pace. You already know we have a different situation here. But again, similar considerations have to be taken into account. We have the main characters here on one side of the double-page spread. They are safe from the gutter and also save from both the ends of the page. So they're totally fine. They won't be cut off in print processing or anything like this. And then we have, the data would be somewhere here. And also nothing of utter importance is in here. We could, even if we wanted to let go of this tree, but I quite like it. So this might be an art director, my Italian okay, that this tree goal because it will end up in the gutter and would look strange. But for now we leave it because it adds an interesting element. And here we have image, the image bleed at left and also the bottom of the page on the left as well. And what this does is it tells the viewer that this path, although we haven't drawn all of it, most likely extends further down, same as the field. It will extend further to the left. So it gives you a bit more skill, a sense of scale. So we know, OK. This is actually bigger than it looks, but we don't, as a designer are illustrated. We don't need to show everything and that's quite handy, isn't it? Bleed can show you that as a place that's much bigger than you can actually see without having to draw it all. And that creates interest and lets the viewer also add a little bit of 2D world of their own, with their own imagination. And I think that's so important in picture books as well. Next, this is another page of the same story. And in this case, I have chosen not to have any bleed in the whole page. So does this affordable page. And what I could have done if I wanted to, for example, retrospectively, I could have extended the line of mice beyond the page. You know, could have made them smaller and smaller, smaller. And if they would have gone beyond the patron, a page, so to speak, would have bled at the top. This could have shown that this does end. You notice line of mice is really, really long. But in this case, I didn't think to do that and I didn't want any mice to be cut off, so to speak. And I think it was already indicating there enough mice in the picture. But this is something you could do. Another thing we have done here, so the bleed again would be about here. So maybe this is a bit dangerous. These mites are kinda close together and it will be ashamed to lose them and they would maybe be too close and if the picture gets folded. So something could have been, or could be done later on, is basically to pull either these two mice to decide or put this mouse a bit further to the left. But again, you are continuously learning and when you have an artifact that they will tell you this and usually these things get already caught in the sketches. Stage. Good. And just to add what happens here in the stories on Archimedes then decides to let go of his possessions and decides to share it. And again, the most important characters are safe from the gut to and from the edges of the page. And something that I just want to add here, which is not part of this course, but it's just a good consideration, is look at how film is made, especially composition to film. This is how I learned initially. There's different camera angles and that is very true for picture books as well. It's almost like a still in the film or like a storyboard. And here we have the bird's eye view. So although Am I perspective game isn't the best, I have to admit, I still think it works. And by Philippa, my hummingbird, with shoes, being closer to the viewer, it indicates that we are flying over this scene. And that just creates a bit of visual interests. Competitors, other scenes which are more of a frontal view straight on onto the image. Ok. Next, I will give you a few more examples of a completely different story to see how you can work with that. It's not all just about mice, but hope this was helpful. And let's go to the next one.
8. NEW: BONUS Examples - mini quiz: So we'll do a little quiz now. You can answer in your head if you want. And I will give you the answer in a few seconds. So on which side does this image bleed? So just image blues on the left and the bottom. And what does this tell us? Well, what effect does this have? So in this case, it shows us that these characters are significantly bigger than what we can see. But we can still have a very nice close up of the character. So we can focus in on the expressions which are very important in this. But at the same time we know that as more to them than just New York did not cut off or anything. So there's more background and we can see which can create more visual interest. We can focus on the characters here. And it shows small-scale and a wider world than we can see. So it creates more interest. And little bonus question, something I haven't touched upon. But I want to just add, what do you think? What else happens here? 50 characters. I want to give a hint. It has to do with the eyes. So the interesting thing, something I haven't touched upon, but something it's very interesting to consider is when characters look the guide to viewer as well. So here we have the bear and the hedgehog looking outside of the page. And because the page here doesn't have any bleed in his lot of whitespace. It basically creates some visual interests and makes you curious what is, what are they looking at? And at the same time, we create some tension here between the rabbit and the woodpecker because they'd look at it and asked himself the same question, what is going on there? So through this image, I could create a lot of visual attention and a question interviewers might, what are they looking at? So that's also a very interesting way of how you can work with bleed or where you don't have any bleed, where there's just white space off the page because it opens up the story. So where you place you bleed also has an effect. So now a few more examples of a completely different story. They quick also a few sketches. So you can see how it all works. And hope all these examples will be incredibly helpful to build your visual library and to look at images in a completely new way.
9. NEW: BONUS Examples - more page layouts: So now we've talked about a few more examples. Before I continue, I just want to ask you, please review to class and give me feedback. Tell me what you want to see more of the reason why I've created this extra bonus material. Because in your feedback, I've heard that you want to have more examples. And I totally understand this. And at the moment maybe we can't go to a library very easily. Although I encourage, again, I encourage you to go to a library or a bookshelf or look through your own books to see more examples. But for now, I will give you examples of my own stories. This is how MOD met and it's about how Lucy mod montgomery published her book and of Green Gables, which many of you hopefully know and if not hollering, recommend you to read it. It's one of my favorite books. I love it. It's so it just creates visual imagery in my head. And I just wanted to dedicate this book to her. I just think she's an amazing author and I love all her unsavory books. Well then let's get started. So this is another double-page. This is actually the first page of the murder story starts. It's about how MOD, how any condemn her in the story is being read to by her grandfather. So this is how she gets in touch with stories. And I guess many of us have hopefully experienced a parents or carers reading to us. So here's a bit of space for text. This is also something I forgot to mention before. Most books, not all of them, but most books have taken them. Most picture books. And there are a few examples of books that have no text in them. And which is incredible, but they have to just work a little bit harder. And here I have had some texts. Please excuse any spelling mistakes. This is all just part of an idea at the moment. And English is not my first language in Casey, crude. But yeah, let's text aside. It's always good to leave some space for texts. And then a double page, we have the gutter is all safe. And the most important characters are on this side. And here I've just created a little bit of visual interest by adding this little cat playing with the kittens. And that's all I want to say about image. It bleeds on, on the right and on the bottom and on the left. Just showing you again a scale, a sense of scale. On the next spread. We have a very similar situation as in the Archimedes book. I again chose to show different examples of how she hold mode finds story in nature and in different other places through Spot illustrations. So I can show many different things, all in one page and in the other page of this spread. Would be a would bleed again towards the bottom and the sides and the top will be either full color, I guess, or it will be white because that's just how I tend to work. And considering we have, the previous page was a full double spread. It's quite nice to break it up into different visual chunks, so to speak. So if you design a whole book and you create your flood plan, that's how I've learned how it's called something you use in magazine, editorial design. So you can see you have your whole Magazine laid out in pages or next to each other and thumbnail size. And then you can see, okay, here we have too many full spreads, like full images. And maybe we need a few spots. So it's just to create more visual interests and turning the page and to prevent visual boredom. So that's what I've decided to do. But if you work for your portfolio, you don't need to consider this 100% because you can have individual pieces didn't necessarily need to be connected. However, even in a portfolio, you can almost think of it as a flood plan. An auto actor will see all these images. And let's say you have only force beds and you can just get a bit boring, you know? So having something like this can be quite interesting. So to have a few spots and maybe, you know, a full bleed page on here. So that can be quite interesting. And you don't need to have texts. I just added this just to see where it would put text. So and next will go to another page. So this is again a following page of this and T I chose again two spots, but they are individual. So here we have mod sending out her first poem. And then it got sent back by the publisher. And if you've been on this publishing journey of it longer than you might have experienced that feeling. I guess the first rejection can hurt quite a lot, but overtime you, you kind of just get used to it. So if you are under schema at the moment, just keep going. And I feel like a captured her disappointment quite well. So there's a lot of body language and I felt only face wouldn't have really fully captured this feeling of disappointment. Of course, I could have exaggerated as know her on the floor or something, but I don't know. I just I just felt like this kind of posture would show that better. So I chose to show her full body. And it's also quite nice Toto expectation in her, you know, her standing upright and joyful and Dennis posture of defeat. So sometimes you have to think, okay, what angle, what viewpoint, what way of showing this image makes the story work harder? And chores, Mom, visual interests. And this is something that, you know, you try on thumbnail size very, very often the amount of times I have worked on these cuff belief, some spreads. Have been reworked ten times, 15 times, some of them only three times, but don't worry if you don't get it right. That just takes time and emulated my stoke a changed. So yeah, and that's perfectly fine. And you just want to, you know, over time you can be more and more. And if you like this sort of thing, if you want to see you for flood plan off a picture book and want me to talk about it. Please view to class and give me feedback or write into discussions because that's really helpful for me to know. If I should invest more into, you know, showing you this and also if it's interesting for you. Ok, let's continue. So on the next page, we have again, a place for a text. And like I mentioned, is always good to consider. And here we have mod, progressing through a time from being this rejected child to an adult who has a more positive outlook onto writing and who just keeps going on these letters here that you can see. They are all let us of rejections to show how many rejections you received. And if you, right now, if you've been trying to get published in children's books, you might have experienced getting letters of rejection or emails of rejection or just silence, silent rejection. And initially this can be quite crushing, but over time, we just learned how to keep going and to write moment that will appear when our idea is bad moment, right? Time where the person, and thus, that's something I wanted to show it through this double spread. And there were different ways of how I thought I could shoulders. But this is the way I ended up after several iterations of this image. The only thing that I think might be challenging is the gutter. Retrospectively, there are quite a lot of diagonal lines which can be difficult, especially when there is, like, It's not in the middle, basically in the middle of the book where there's where it opens flat, but there will be a fold over, so to speak. And Yeah, so this might be something I would have to change or adapt. And on this final page, again, full double-page with bleed on several sides. I've chosen to show little n, which is representing the character, the idea to book itself. So it kind of given her almost like an external life, not just being a book, but being like, almost like an character that is alive. If you know what I mean. It's like a little Zumba Lena character of an like her spirit, her book spirit, cheering, mod on to get published. And this is the letter of acceptance that she finally received. This is even the logo I have researched from the actual publisher who accepted her, which is nice if you can add something like this, which shows you have done your research. And also for people who are really big fans, they really appreciate these kinda things. So I don't know if you can see this. This was basically a quite a big jump between the pages of Sony previously. And this is towards the end of the book. And it's always good to have some variation. I think I do tend to go to double-page spreads. A naught as false, false birds quite easily. So that's why a flood plan is so helpful because then you can see, oh, I have too many of those. And maybe I need to mix it up a little bit with more spot illustrations or maybe the layout can change a little bit. And this is, yeah, would I highly recommend you doing? And if you find this interesting and you'd like to learn more about distant, please just write in the discussions, give me feedback in your reviews. And I will, I would love to show you more how this book was developed and what to consider when making your portfolio. So I hope this was helpful and yeah, thank you very much for watching.
10. Final thoughts and words of encouragement: you are needed: I'm really excited for what you will do. Write a review. It really helps other students to find a class and it also really helps me to continue doing what I do and to help other creative people. I really believe in you. You can do this and the world needs great stories and great characters. And we need more viewed in this world. And I think you can really contribute to this because you are unique and you have your unique take and no one else can share the stories that you can share. So I will just give you a short Bonus Material afterwards, but you can already get started if you want and leave it. And this is just if you need inspiration. So have a wonderful day. I'll see you soon. Bye.
11. NEW: Q&A 001 - process: Hello and welcome. This is a bonus section where I thought
I'll answer some of your questions that you
posted in your reviews. And if you have any more questions, if
something comes up, please just post them in the
discussions or mentioned them in your class review
when you re to the class. And I'll do my best step-by-step to get back to them in
these little short videos. I'm a mom of two now
with a little baby. And I can only do
this with voiceover. And I hope that's helpful. If there's an individual
sample or something needed. I'll try my best to do that, but that's just the best way
for me to do this right now. So the first one in this video, I want to get back to what my process or to talk a
bit more about my process. Sorry. To talk a bit more
about my process. I feel like I showed you already the
process and it wasn't very clear what exactly after process you
want to see more. Maybe you can clarify it, but basically what
I showed you in the video in the very first
one is still my process. I start from a
very, from an idea. And then I started to create
a few rough sketches. I had just visually brainstorm. That's how I think. I understand now that not
everyone thinks this way. So I can show you my way. Another way maybe
would be when people have written a story already. And then start from
the written words and then make the
pictures for this. But often for me is I have two pictures first and then
I write a story later. That's funny. Write a whole book. I'm fine portfolio piece. That's not necessarily
so like I mentioned, you can start with a prompt game that I mentioned in the class. That's really fun. Then you
just pick the main character, the site character and
setting, and the time. That should ideally help
you to come up with an idea really quickly,
or maybe several. Just write them all
down and see which one appeals to you
right now more. You can also do if you want. You can just take a very famous
tale, fable, fairy tale. And these are very popular too, because these keep getting
reprinted in different ways. And it doesn't even matter
that there's like a 100 over many Red Riding Hood
stories are famous stories. There's always demand
for more because they get reprinted and then they wanted to use a
different illustrator. It's very helpful to have, actually have pieces
in your portfolio that might be stories that you
haven't even written yourself. In the sense of like,
how do you call them? Copyright-free stories
are basically whether the writers have already
passed away for, like I said, the amount of
time that depends on it. A country I think
sometimes it's 770 years. Famous. Tails, basically,
like Red Riding Hood. Yeah, that would be good
to have in your portfolio and basically just in case you cannot come
up with an idea. I just went on a tangent. But basically I started
with this idea, just said really
quite vague idea. And then I just
started sketching and just see what happens. And usually I do this
on a piece of paper. That's very helpful. I don't know. I just I
now work more digitally, but I feel like a
piece of paper. It's just not so
much commitment. I can do that really quickly. And then, like you saw
what I did in the video, I pick one to develop further. And that's very similar to many. Design projects. Will cover projects
in a group with other mothers who work in
design and illustration. And another mad I mentioned she justice exactly the same way for her book cover
illustrations. And she's doing that professionally
for many, many years. For big publishing houses. It is just, you start with rough sketches that don't
even look like anything. They look like you
just stood out on a napkin in a restaurant. That's how much detail, sometimes scores and not much. Then you take this idea which
is a visual cue for you, and then you take
it and develop it, you draw it again
but more detailed. And that's when I started to think how what kind of format, what kind of size would I
want this to be in order? The ratio, for example, it's just going to be a
book that is in square. A square book like
a rectangle book, I said portrait or landscape. Then you start
thinking about this. How would this then
be on a double-page? So you have to know like as
if you would fold it open. Basically if you have a square
book and you fold it open, That's the double-page
spread size. I will just take a few books
and see what size you like because for your portfolio it doesn't really matter so much. But it's just a good
starting point. And that's literally
what I did for my books. I just went to a book
that I liked and I've measured or I went online to
check the size of the page. How long how I did double pages. And then you just add the bleed. That's my process
for this stage. And then what else do? Then I take this
more refined sketch. Then I brought in the video. Back then I was
still working with color pencils much more. And that's what I
started blowing it up digitally and then printing
it out and tracing it. Whereas nowadays it's different. I use my iPad. Since I've become a mother. I basically started using
my iPad for everything. The reason mostly just because
it's too much time that takes me to clean up my pencils and to get
them back in and out. And from my little
more not to ground. I just don't have a
dedicated working space in our current living
environment and it just makes more sense for us. Basically, I use now a different method,
but it's very similar. So I basically just
take a picture of my sketches and then I make
a big, large enough Canvas. So how I want my
final to look like? I usually do that for the
actual real book size as well, including the bleed. Because you never know, maybe you will actually
want to know devoted. Use this for a larger project. It's always easier to work
large and when you worked at Italy and then size it down, I use that exact size on
the canvas or larger, the right ratio in Procreate. And then I take a picture
with my iPad and then open it in a trace it so
it's almost the same. The only thing
that I'm skipping, don't have to print out this draft printed
I did in my video before because it's just not necessarily I can
skip that process. So that's again, it's
just much faster for me. Trace the sketch, and then I keep working and finalize it in my Procreate app with my
pencils, digital pencils. So I'm trying to develop a style that is looking very similar to what
I've done before, but skipping currently
their pencils, I might go back to pencils. I love my pencils,
but it's just not the state of life
I'm in right now. And I think that's also something you have
to consider when you're developing your process. Just because other people have many hours to spend
on disordered, letting their watercolors
dry and add another layer. This might be working for you. This might not be
working for you. And I think it's good
to be honest with yourself and use a process
that works for you. And that just comes with time. I had just had to be realistic and this is not working for me. It can do this color
pencils correctly. That's pretty much it. If I didn't, I'll just repeat. Basically main idea come up that can come in
many different ways. You can use prompts online. You can use my prompt game
that I highly recommend. It. It works in there will
probably come back to this. But it's just fun. You
know, it doesn't really matter which way you use
to come up with an idea. As long as it's original, or use a tail that can be
used that is copyright free. I don't know if I
use the right term, but you know what I mean? Like folk tales that are
common Hardy colors. There's a specific
word actually. It just doesn't come
to mind right now. Public domain. Yeah, I think that's the word that is in the public domain. You can use this to then. Then you set your
rough sketches. That's going to be
different ideas and different approaches or
different page designs, different layouts,
different characters. Of course, if you haven't had a character development already, then you would do that too. You can develop your character. This is not something I'm
teaching in this class. There are different
classes on Skillshare. That's something I
would recommend. So you basically just put
a few different ideas out very quickly, very rough. You can basically so rough
that you can understand it. But you don't spend ages on it. Sometimes it takes
a few seconds. It depends obviously
on your on your amino. How many ideas come up quickly? Sometimes lots of ideas come up, maybe sometimes
you only have two. Then you just take
one that you like further and you make
it more detailed. Then you can transfer it on
whatever medium, you know, you've worked
traditionally than you have to kind of make
it work larger. Maybe due to process I
suggested to a printer. Or you can just take a
picture and then enlarge it and work digitally and then
you skip that process. So I hope that
made it a bit more clear how my process works. I noticed it was a bit I
hope I don't talk too fast, but again, I'm working
with what I have right now and that's sending my bedroom warm up
babies sleeping. So I hope you can appreciate the information that
it is theirs in it. It I know it's a bit
of a repetition, but I hope it made
it a bit more clear. That's basically what I do despite having even
switched medium. I think this is
medium independent. Thank you very much and I'll
see you in the next one.
Romica Jones, draws - Illustration / Meditation
