THE MAKING OF A PICTURE BOOK

I thought some of you might be interested in how I create a picture book. It is a long process and keeps me busy and out of trouble.  I am currently working on a book titled Grandma's Critters which will be ready to publish before the end of September I hope.  Here is why I say I hope. This is what I do for each page and there will be between 33 and 35 pages:

1. I have been working on this book for a very long time. It began years ago with the idea for the story which I wrote down.

2. The text has gone through innumerable versions until I finally got the words correct and a decided on a good ending.

3. I then drew out a rough sketch for each page of illustration and wrote in the text in pencil.


  

 



4. I then had to use a piece of tracing paper and trace the image onto it.




5. Then I turned the trace paper over and rubbed the backside with soft lead pencil.



6. I flipped the traced drawing over and placed it on to of a taped down sheet of watercolor paper and taped it into place so it wouldn't move.

7. I then went over the traced drawing with a pencil and thus transferred the image faintly onto the watercolor paper.

8. I then drew over the traced image on the water paper with waterproof ink.

9. Next I water-colored the page.



10. I then put the image onto my scanner and scanned it.

11. I pulled up the image in my graphics program and digitally enhanced it by cleaning up lines, watercolor over runs, re-drawing some images and making it look much more professional. This is often a pixel by pixel examination and takes a great deal of time for each page.

12. I then saved the image, pulled it up in Photoshop and darkened the colors.




 

13.  Then I copied and pasted the image into Power point where I am able to manipulate the size, add text and finish the process for each page. 



I have to go through this process for every page and it takes two or three days of work to complete the illustration and add the text.  Sometimes other life events prevent working on the project so it can take even more time to finish one page.

I am currently working on the illustration for the letter P to S so I still have a way to go before I finish the project and publish it online.  

As Winston Churchill said when the Battle of Britain was successfully completed in the skies over England during World War II, "This is certainly not the beginning of the end, but it is the end of the beginning."  

OLYMPIC GAMES NONSENSE

As we visited my son a few days ago I found him glued to his TV watching the beach volleyball contest in London between Brazil and Germany. I asked him why he was viewing the game. He said, "The bikinis to start but also, watching some sports is better than watching no sports."

Apparently that is the mantra of the International Olympic Committee as well.

2012 Summer Olympic Sports:

archery--Arrows into   
              paper targets, 
              extremely
              exciting mass 
              audience 
              appeal.
badminton--This is the backyard game on steroids
              but it's still just beating the heck out of a 
              little cone shaped piece of plastic.
basketball--Ah, now your talking, especially since
              they decided that professional athletes
              have more skill than armature players. 
beach volleyball--Who can deny the appeal of 
              bikinis and tight speedo trunks?
boxing--At least they don't let the participants beat
             each other on the head without giving them
             some semblance of protection for their
             brains.
canoe / kayak--what? How many people in the 
            world even care?
cycling--Still it's just riding a bike, and didn't we
            finish the Tour de France last week?
diving--Interest in this has to go back to when we
             learned how to swim ourselves and 
             someone told us, "Jump in. It will be
             fun." We jumped and have been looking to
             find the same raw fear in the face of anyone
             else who is crazy enough to leap off a 
             perfectly safe place into a pool of deep 
             water.
equestrian--Who can afford to feed a horse let alone
             train it to jump over obstacles?
fencing--One person poking another with a sharp
             stick. I want to see that over and over. 
field hockey--I think I'd wear a mouthpiece and a 
             helmet too. Something about swinging 
             sticks around trying to hit a ball remind me
             of the time I was bashed in the head with a
             bat while playing baseball.
gymnastics--Who in their right mind would say to
             themselves, "I'm going to climb up on that 
             six inch wooden beam and then I'm going
             to do a back flip, or I'm going to swing
             swing from those to wooden bars and then 
             let go, or I'm going to spring off this spring
             board and vault onto that leather covered
             table over there, or I'm going to hang from
             these rings suspended from the ceiling and
             then gyrate my body, or I'm going to 
             contort my body into near impossible
             positions while tumbling and keeping in 
             time to the music?
handball--This is a game you play in the park or on
             the school grounds, not in the Olympics.
judo--Let's watch people grabbing hold of other
             people's clothing and trying to throw them 
             to the ground. The prospect excites me.
modern pentathlon--Half a decathlon. Apparently
            modern participants don't care for ten trials
            of fitness strength and skills. Of course the
            athletes can't seem to make up their mind 
            whether to run, shoot, ride, swim or poke
            somebody with a sharp stick.
rowing--Who in this country besides a few people
            in the North East part of the US ever see
            these kind of races? In fact without TV who
            would ever see the races at all?
sailing--I guess it's hard to do, but I live in a desert
             and it's difficult to relate.
shooting--Wait a moment. You can get an Olympic
             medal for shooting a pellet gun? I'd like to
             see that. Oh, wait another moment. 
             No, I wouldn't.
soccer / football--They call it the beautiful game. I 
             keep wondering which is the beautiful part:
            The running back and forth chasing a ball 
             for 90 minutes plus stoppage time, the 
             frustration with the lack of scoring (just 
             give them six points for a goal and three
             points for direct penalty kick), the fake
             injuries cured by the magic spray the
             trainer rushes onto the field to apply to the 
             "injured" player, the horribly inconsistent
             refereeing or the magnificent stadiums the
             games are played in? It can't be the goals
             because there are very many of those. 
swimming--You can walk along the side of the pool
             faster than the swimmers can swim, and 
             there are so many different races you can
             loose track of your favorite fish.
synchronized swimming--How many people in the
             world do this activity or even know it is 
             being done. All it is is a tribute to Ester
             Williams.
table tennis--Ping pong! A medal for ping pong
             where all you do is bash a ball of 
             plastic back and forth until somebody
             misses the table.
taekwondo--Bouncing up and down and trying to
             kick each other in the ribs (protected of 
             course), now that is martial arts even Bruce
             Lee couldn't recommend. 
tennis--Don't we have enough tournaments during
             the year: the Australia open, the French 
             Open, Wimbledon, the US Open, etc?
track and field--Finally the true foundation of the
             ancient Olympic Games. Staged in
             a massive stadium with a appeal even for
             my wife. She likes the running the most.
triathlon (swimming, biking, running)--Particularly
             appealing to those who don't want to count 
             to five, poke anyone with a sharp stick or
             shoot defenseless clay pigeons.
volleyball--Okay, a sport with a place for spectators
             to watch and cheer even without the 
             bikinis.
water polo--Most of the action goes on below the
             surface of the water. Truly exciting now
             that we can see with underwater cameras
             all the attempts to rip an opposing players
             trunks down around his knees.
weightlifting--Gym rats love this. I'm not sure I do.
wrestling--There is a reason we called them 'pit
             smellers' when I went to high school. This
             is not to be confused with Wrasseling of 
             TV fame.

There you have the complete list of sport and pseudo-sport for the London Olympics. Lest we forget, Golf is set to debut in Rio in four years and softball and baseball have been relegated to the non-accepted category of Olympic sports. If you miss the balls and strikes just remember you can always tune in a watch the canoe / kayak events to get your sport fix for the day or get the MLB channel on cable.