Hey everyone!
Other than a few copy tweaks and other random type-o's, the Captain Hammer book is officially done!! I'll be sending out the finalized artwork either Wed or Thurs. to the printer and in a week or so we'll have a book!! Amy and I will be flying to San Diego for the Apraxia Org. Conference and the crew at CASANA are really making a big deal about the book and putting a lot of support behind it and my art. Should be a good time and a great 11 year Anniversary trip for us as well. Once I find out more info, I'll post some link on where to get the book. Be Patient!!
What I wanted to do on this post was quickly show you the process for a single page of artwork, but also talk you through how we got there.
First and foremost was the characters. Captain Hammer is actually based off of the real life Super Hero, David Hammer, a fantastic Speech Pathologist who helped start CASANA and has been working with kids for a long time. He always dresses up at the Apraxia Walks as Captain Hammer, so I had a little to go on with the costume.
Our biggest goal with Cap was getting the fun and kind personality of David through a Silly Superhero Cartoon Illustration. We wanted to keep the color scheme he had going above and the mask, but also keep his smile, mustache, and hair. Not an easy task as I was basically doing a caricature of someone who I get to meet in a month!
I started out with the costume:
Just a basic idea for his outfit, not for style. Then I did a pose for style and color based off the little thumbnail at the bottom of the previous sketch page.
Sue, my author, and friend of David, thought he didn't look silly and/or kind enough. Biggest comment here was, "A children's book, not a comic book." I really took that to heart and kept going. But, she liked the color scheme and the costume.
This is generally where we landed for Captain Hammer's face. His hair, mustache, smile, mask...the whole package. He became even more cartoony in the book, but this was a great start.
For Super Sean, it wasn't too much of a stretch because I wasn't doing a caricature of the real Sean, who is also my author's son (!). Just going for a cute kid with lots of personality who looks between 6 and 10 yrs old. More on Sean later.
Then we moved onto the initial Thumbnail Sketches. I had the script and that was about it, so I jumped in and started doing very small rough layouts for each page. These are just to show the general layout of the page before moving onto tight pencils.
Again, once I received sign off, I moved onto the next stage....Tight Pencils.
As you can see, this was a penciled in version of the finished artwork. All the details and laying down a basic guideline for the color which went right over the top of the pencils. Not sure if that was the best way to do it, but it worked for me. Always a learning curve on new projects and finding what suits my style. Anyhoo...Color!!!
This was the interesting phase and also the most time consuming. I decided early on that I wanted to color the art using Dr. Marten's Inks rather than Watercolor, Acrylic, or digital coloring. The problem was....I had never really used them before so I didn't know how they would move and lay down the color. I found ways that worked along the process and they work very similar to watercolors, but dry much, much faster which helped with my timing. The other issue I had that you won't see here is that my reds were all very pinky and I switched up all the reds half way through then had to go back and color adjust all the reds in Photoshop. I actually spent many late nights and hours reworking the color in Photoshop because the inks are very bright and saturated and I wanted a more watercolor look. I'm doing watercolor next time for sure.
Anyway, once I had sign off then it was adding in all the copy for the entire book. Copy Edits Suck!! As an artist and designer I never deal with soooo much copy and so many edits. It's all worth it in the end, but the lettering stage almost pushed me to my limit.
Again, Thanks for following me and my blog and I'll let you know where you can get the book if interested. This is a labor of love not only as the artist, but also as the father of child who had Speech Apraxia. I only hope that this book can become an educational tool and help other families just like mine.
Alex
Other than a few copy tweaks and other random type-o's, the Captain Hammer book is officially done!! I'll be sending out the finalized artwork either Wed or Thurs. to the printer and in a week or so we'll have a book!! Amy and I will be flying to San Diego for the Apraxia Org. Conference and the crew at CASANA are really making a big deal about the book and putting a lot of support behind it and my art. Should be a good time and a great 11 year Anniversary trip for us as well. Once I find out more info, I'll post some link on where to get the book. Be Patient!!
What I wanted to do on this post was quickly show you the process for a single page of artwork, but also talk you through how we got there.
I started out with the costume:
Just a basic idea for his outfit, not for style. Then I did a pose for style and color based off the little thumbnail at the bottom of the previous sketch page.
Sue, my author, and friend of David, thought he didn't look silly and/or kind enough. Biggest comment here was, "A children's book, not a comic book." I really took that to heart and kept going. But, she liked the color scheme and the costume.
For Super Sean, it wasn't too much of a stretch because I wasn't doing a caricature of the real Sean, who is also my author's son (!). Just going for a cute kid with lots of personality who looks between 6 and 10 yrs old. More on Sean later.
Then we moved onto the initial Thumbnail Sketches. I had the script and that was about it, so I jumped in and started doing very small rough layouts for each page. These are just to show the general layout of the page before moving onto tight pencils.
This was the interesting phase and also the most time consuming. I decided early on that I wanted to color the art using Dr. Marten's Inks rather than Watercolor, Acrylic, or digital coloring. The problem was....I had never really used them before so I didn't know how they would move and lay down the color. I found ways that worked along the process and they work very similar to watercolors, but dry much, much faster which helped with my timing. The other issue I had that you won't see here is that my reds were all very pinky and I switched up all the reds half way through then had to go back and color adjust all the reds in Photoshop. I actually spent many late nights and hours reworking the color in Photoshop because the inks are very bright and saturated and I wanted a more watercolor look. I'm doing watercolor next time for sure.
Anyway, once I had sign off then it was adding in all the copy for the entire book. Copy Edits Suck!! As an artist and designer I never deal with soooo much copy and so many edits. It's all worth it in the end, but the lettering stage almost pushed me to my limit.
Again, Thanks for following me and my blog and I'll let you know where you can get the book if interested. This is a labor of love not only as the artist, but also as the father of child who had Speech Apraxia. I only hope that this book can become an educational tool and help other families just like mine.
Alex
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