artwork – Page 7 – James Foley

Making a marionette

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Late last year I was feeling overworked; firstly I was working too hard, but secondly I wasn’t doing anything creative just for myself. Then along came an opportunity to do something different … Spare Parts Puppet Theatre was running a 6 week marionette-making course.

Spare Parts is an incredible company that creates original puppetry productions; they’ve also adapted quite a few children’s books for the stage over the years. They’re based in my hometown of Fremantle, and I remember seeing some of their shows as a kid. I signed up for the course straight away.

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How to make a picture book in a day

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Narrogin Primary School kids are creative legends. Last August I got to hang out with 20 of them, making a picture book in a day.

Impossible! I hear you cry. What form of sorcery is this? It cannot be done! Well, we did do it, and here’s how.

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Making a mural at the Perth Writers Festival

The Perth Writers Festival is over for another year. The weekend goes by so quick! I was very happy to be back this year as a presenter on the schools’ day and family day, and this year I also got to work on something a bit different – a massive mural.

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How to make a book for a Giant

This year’s Perth International Arts Festival will see a 6 metre-tall girl walking down St George’s Terrace. She’s called ‘the Little Girl Giant’, and as part of her visit she’ll receive an enormous book from the children of the City of Perth. I helped schoolkids produce some art for the book. More details on the Giants and the book below.

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Evolution of a scene: the final version of ‘Big Trouble’

pg22-23-5-final Last week I posted the roughs for this scene from The Last Viking Returns. This post will show how I got from my almost-final rough to my final illustration.

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Evolution of a scene: the rough sketches for ‘Big Trouble’

pg23-rough-vs-final — final rough on the left, finished version on the right

There’s a scene in The Last Viking Returns called ‘Big Trouble’ where Fafnir the dragon is finally revealed in all his terrible glory. The scene went through a lot of changes during development, so I thought I’d share them here.

It’s a lot of pics though so I’ll share them in two parts. This post will show you the roughs, and next week’s post will show how the final illustration was put together.

(And if you haven’t read the book yet, there’s a few SPOILERS below.)

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“My Place”: whimsical stories from Mount Hawthorn Primary students

Briony and James with student artwork

This year, Mount Hawthorn Primary School invited myself and fellow author/illustrator Briony Stewart to collaborate on a 13-week residency project.

Our project was called ‘My Place’. The aim for each year four student (all 87 of them) was to complete a polished story and accompanying illustration based upon their favourite place in Mount Hawthorn. They also made the amazing map you see above!

Hit the link to see more work by the kids.

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Designing Viking World – the entrance gate

TLV2---2-weeks-to-go

There’s only a fortnight until the release of The Last Viking Returns on Sept 1st! This is my last behind-the-scenes post before then.

I’ve been focusing on one of the main settings in the book – a theme park called Viking World. There’s a moment early in the book where the family arrives at the park for the first time, and I wanted Josh to have a sense of awe. The text only says “Wow”, so I was free to fill in the rest.

My first sketch looked like this. Not terribly impressive, not awe-inspiring at all, but it helped me to figure out what goes where.

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Designing Viking World – the visitor map

TLV2---3-weeks-to-go

There’s only 3 (!) weeks until the release of The Last Viking Returns on September 1, and I’ve got a couple more behind-the-scenes things to show.

I’ve been focusing on one of the main settings in the book – a theme park called Viking World. I had to figure out the rough layout of the park early on so that I could map the journey made by Pop, Josh and the family. I also wanted to make the backgrounds of each illustration consistent with the map so that the reader could really believe in the fictional setting.

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