Book cover illustration

Designing some book covers as part of a personal project. For the Peter Pan (By J.M. Barrie) front cover we decided to paint a night time scene with the text overlaying the moon to draw the viewer eye into the cover. We wanted to include small parts of the story into the cover like Tinkerbell and the pirate ship which draws your eye around the cover and gives the viewer things to spot. We decided to have the sea at the bottom of the cover which adds depth and gives visual interest to the book. We also blended the colours of the sea and sky to create a misty effect and capture the fantasy and far away feel of the book. The different plants around the outside adds a whimsical touch.

peter pan.jpg

For the Jungle book Cover (written by Rudyard Kipling.) We decided to use a warm colours using mostly oranges and yellows. We wanted to include a scene of the story into the book cover so we decided to have Mowgli with Bagheera on a tree branch to make the characters the focus of the cover and draw your eye up to the title. For the text we decided to to place it at the top-middle and uses the same colours on the text as we did in the illustrations to link them together. We decide to make the word “Jungle” bigger to give it visual hierarchy and add a sense of play to the cover. The tree running down the side of the cover draws you to the main characters on the tree branch and brings the whole cover together.

junglebook forntcover.jpg

Character designs

One of our favourite parts of illustration is designing characters. From coming up with an initial idea for a character to sketching them out in different scenarios and giving them a world to inhabit. When coming up with characters to design, we begin by gathering references, looking closely at facial expressions and getting an overall idea for their personality. We draw our character in lots of different poses. Often we sketch the character over and over again, giving them facial expressions and emotions which helps make them more believable.

little boy character design.jpg

When drawing child characters we like to exaggerate their movements. We find that by giving them lots of movement enhances the personality of the character and gives a playful feel to our work. When adding colour to our characters we try to keep in mind the original sketches, so as not to loose the original playfulness and spontaneity of the sketch.

girls sketches.jpg