While Norman was in the Shetlands researching, I was at home in Perth, doing some research for the pictures.
I made a few initial sketches of Viking things- costumes, houses, the bows of ships, rune stones, helmets… Norman has a huge collection of books on Vikings, so I wasn’t short of material. These sketches gave me lots of ideas for how the pictures and characters might look. (I haven’t shown all the sketches here, because don’t want to give away too much of the story).
The Margaret River Cow Parade is finishing up- we got this cover illustration in just in time.
The cows are being auctioned on July 10. Get down to the South West and see them while you still can.
In the back right, I’ve included a cow painted by myself and other members of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, WA chapter. Check out this post for more info.
To make things different, edition 723 had two versions of the cover- an extra large wrap-around, set in daylight, and the usual cover, set at nighttime.
I’m behind quite a bit in these covers- here’s one about a Bridal Expo that happened recently.
The new Robin Hood film is out, featuring a Gladiator-like Russell Crowe.
This Quokka Robin Hood is more like the Douglas Fairbanks or Errol Flynn version…
I hope this doesn’t mean my Quokka covers have jumped the shark…
Here’s a second cover supporting the Days of Change campaign, sponsored by Quokka Press.
Here’s a rundown of how I colour the Quokka cover each week. I’ll use the Easter cover as an example.
I use Photoshop CS3 and a Wacom Intuos 3 graphics tablet to do the colouring.
I do quite a few things to get to the colouring stage:
1. I draw a sketch at final print size, and get it approved by Quokka Press
2. I set the sketch onto my lightbox, and lay over some watercolour paper (190 gsm smooth)
3. I ink the lines in using ordinary black ink and a Hunt 120 nib
4. I scan the finished linework (300dpi, ‘colour’ mode)
5. I save the original scan as a tiff file (and keep a copy separate)
James Foley 