Computer Illustration: The One That Did Me In

This is the last one I worked on for Little Green Riding Hood on computer. It's unfinished – you can see that some of the outlines are still red (I always trace my rough sketches in red. I sketch in pencil, then adjust them to black and white images, and import them into Illustrator. So it's easier to trace in red, than use a black line over a black drawing).

I liked the composition, I liked the effect that Illustrator brushes give me for the lunar surface, but all the little tiny details that I would still have to do from this point on drove me back to traditional illustration. See all the segments on his space-suit arms? Each one needs a highlight and a shadow. And that's not including the shading on the rest of the alien, complementary splashes of color in the craters, details on the sand castles, reflections of the rings onto the dome of the spaceship... it could go on endlessly. All of which would be a lot more fun with a paintbrush.

So I did The Gingerbread Policeman. And the bear painting. And now the alphabet book. After that, there's the Christmas book to do first, but it's only a matter of time before you'll see some painted versions of the Little Green Riding Hood computer pics that I posted earlier.