One of the books that’s currently in the making, has finally been announced, and it’s being illustrated by yours truly. This is quite of a surreal opportunity for me, and I’m very happy to be a part of this.
Short recap: There are these well known children’s books and TV shows in Sweden, that many people from my generation read and watched during 90’s. One story about a boy called “Bert”, and the other one called about a boy called “Sune”. However, they don’t have anything to do with each other, story- wise. These two characters been revamped, mostly through new movies a couple of times through out the years, and they’re still very well known, to this day.
One fun fact is that one of the authors, Sören, actually created and wrote the stories about Bert and Sune.The work is currently quite intense, and I’m dedicating a large amount of my freelancing hours to this book. Still got plenty of work left on it, but I have a good feeling.
The work is currently quite intense, and I’m dedicating a large amount of my freelancing hours to this book. Still got plenty of work left on it, but I’m having a good feeling.
In the meantime I can show you the jacket art.
Here’s also a plain version without the title design.
I rarely paint night scenerey so this was a nice challenge for me. It has to be colourful and not too dark so that we won’t lose all the details when it goes to print. I think that this will work fine, though.
Saved the very first thumbnails for the cover. My initial sketches are always super tiny and scribbly :)
I often start thumbnailing on some random sheet of paper, with any pen or pencil that I can find. Keeping it simple.
Early character explorations.
I wanted Luna to look a bit tomboyish, guess that’s just my personal taste when it comes to female characters ;) Not sure whether I can reveal too much of the story quite yet, but I can say that it’s a very special girl with magical ears, hehe.
I sketched three versions, and we went with the first one I actually like the bottom one too though!
Probably, because it reminds me of that music video of that song “Sitting down here” by Lene Marlin. Which by the way, was one of my favorite songs during my teenage years :)
Throwing in some steps for you as well, to show the progress :)
- Greyscale sketch
- First color pass
- Adding more details to the colored sketch. Both line art and coloring.
- Starting to render everything, starting with the largest areas, and hiding all the layers with detailss for now.
- Adding more and more details and keep tweaking the colors as I work. Flattening all layers, and start with the final polishing on top.
- Done!
That’s all for now. This is a large part of my freelance life at the moment. I hang out a lot with Luna, trying to explore her characteristics, and the world she live in. Really trying my best to enrich the story around her, I really hope that I can pull it off.
You’ll probably see more of her, later this year :)
Ni känner säkert till böckerna och filmerna om Bert Och Sune? Jag tillhör generationen som vuxit upp med de. Fritidspedagogerna högläste Suneböckerna för oss barn, och TV serien med Bert gick på SVT om kvällarna.
Författarna Sören Olsson, Leif Eriksson och Martin Svensson, har en ny bok på gång. Som jag fått chansen att illustrera. Luna och Superkraften. Sören är även, just författaren bakom Bert och Sune. Kul!
Har postat lite skisser samt första bokomslaget här ovan.
Boken kommer ges ut av Bookmark Förlag senare i höst, och jag är just nu mitt uppe i att illustrera alla inlagorna till boken. Sjukt intensivt, men väldigt roligt. Och jag hoppas så, så mycket att ni ska gilla den när allt är klart.
3 Responses
Congratulations on the project! The illustration looks fantastic. Can’t wait to see how you develop this character further through your illustrations. Good luck :)
Thank you! I’ll do my best :D
Congratulations and thanks for previewing your latest project. The “Luna” cover is extraordinary! You mentioned in your previous blog you might consider doing a calendar. I hope at somepoint you’re able to find time to make that happen. Might I suggest a calendar of all your woodland animals with, of course, a fox or two ?