Jack & The Toddler Picturebook

Whew! Well, I've been working on the "Jack & The Toddler" project since March, and feel such a sense of accomplishment now that the artwork is completed! This project was huge: 41 paintings. The painting phase alone took me 10 weeks. Above, you can see a few of my favorites. Aside from the "whew!" feeling one gets after completing a project of this size, I am very pleased with another notable feature of these pieces: they were all painted digitally. Up until now, I have worked exclusively in watercolor, and this project marks the first time that I was able to confidently offer the client a digital option, which, after seeing some digital samples, is the route that the client decided to go with for the book. As I was working on these illustrations, I was really pleased with the vibrancy of the colors and the ability to experiment easily with colors and textures. For me, using the tablet and digital brushes felt very much like working in acrylics and colored pencils. The final illustrations still have that painterly quality of the "artist's hand", which made me happy. I don't tend to like pieces that have a plastic-like or too polished look that digital art can sometimes yield. Of course, the true measure of success is client satisfaction, and I am pleased to announce that the final art was accepted by the client without any revisions needed! Yay! No rest for this artist, though! As soon as I put the files on my ftp for client delivery, I began diving straight into the sketches for my next project, "Katie Kate Explains Asthma." It's going to be a busy summer, but I am still finding time to enjoy the pool :)