Our process: from sketch to final art
When people find out we make children’s books, they often express interest in seeing some of our process. In this post, we’ll like to give you a quick tour of how we took one illustration from sketch to final art. This dragonfly spread is from our book ONE TINY TREEFROG (coming to bookstores near you in early 2023).
Step 1: Composition
2019 Mak early sketch of dragonfly spread
The ‘dragonfly’ spread from ONE TINY TREEFROG is one of the clearest examples of our illustration process. While you usually think about the amazing colors and details when you think about your favorite art, one of the most important things to solve is the composition (the arrangement of elements within an image). Mak originally sketched this outline of our dragonfly spread on a piece of scratch paper, and Tea saw its potential immediately.
Step 2: Value or Color Rough
2020 Tea color rough of dragonfly spread
With the composition solved, normally Tea would do a more elaborate black and white drawing, exploring the arrangement of light and dark, but knowing we intended to stick with a bold, graphic aesthetic, he dove right into mapping out a color rough of the dragonfly spread. You can see how similar it is to Mak’s composition sketch. This image has been a fan favorite in the development of our book.
Step 3: Look Test Sample Illustration
At this point, we had not done a final illustration for our book, and we needed to choose a color rough to develop into a final illustration, in order to help sell our project. Mak thought this spread would be a great candidate to explore the final look of our book. Tea thought it would be a great challenge to maintain the graphic quality of Mak’s original composition and the bold color palette of the color rough, while layering in complexity through naturalistic details. This illustration was one of two test samples we provided publishers to help sell the book!
2020 test sample illustration for our publisher
Step 4: Final Illustration Ready for Publication
After signing the contract, we received notes and feedback on the art of the book as a whole and we made changes to the dragonfly spread to harmonize it with the rest of the art. Here’s where the final illustration landed, a sneak peak of the one you will see when you get ONE TINY TREEFROG in 2023.
2021 final art for dragonfly spread for ONE TINY TREEFROG with Candlewick Press
You can see how Mak’s original messy sketch is the backbone for the wonderful final image Tea brought to life with his deft use of color, light, naturalistic details, and love!
