Two different pictures and Bertie

I’m working on a new picture book.  It will be a novelty book, so I’m spending lots of time trying to work out all the holes and cut-outs.

On this page will be a hole and inside the hole will live a little mouse.

This little mouse.

Working out all the holes and cut outs may look easy, but it’s not. The mock up and the pencil drawings look OK, but once you start painting, you may realise, that it somehow doesn’t work. The picture is too dark, or too light in the places where is the cut out. The next page may not quite fit with the colours of the previous page. Then you have to start again. And that is exactly what I was doing this week. Painting, cutting and starting again.

I’m also working on a board book. The theme of the board book is a square and all the animals inside the book have to fit into the square.

It’s not always easy either.

 

I don’t mind skipping from the picture book to board book. The work is so different, that I can actually relax by swapping from one to the other.

Now the BREAKING NEWS. The breaking news is, that we have a new neighbour. ‘Alison next door’ brought home Bertie.

This is Bertie.

         Isn’t he beautiful?