Happy Halloween Witch's cat!

'My Mom is a Witch and I am her special Witch's Cat. She is a good witch and together we are just right.'

My little witch's cat (who I have always called Tabitha) returns for a second story where she has to decide whats she wants to wear for Halloween. Should she be a white ghost? Or a green frog? Or a pink ballerina? Or...?

Again, I created all the pictures by making 3d dollhouse size sets and then photographing them.

Here are a few of my favourite scenes from the book:

I do really love the kitchen scene because I like how I managed to get the light coming in through the window and on to the table. That took me hundreds of shots to get right! I also really enjoyed making all the tiny cookies and the bar of chocolate.

The cookies are all made from cardboard and painted and the rolling pin is made from rolled up paper!

My other favourite scene is the one I have used as my blog header where Mom and Witch's Cat are going shopping.  In the book it says 'COSTUME SHOP' on the blue banner bit but I don't have that version on my computer as the publisher put the writing on. 

I really loved trying out different lighting for this image. I am a fan of dramatic lighting so I enjoyed trying out a quick snapshot where it was darker and it looks like Mom and Witch's Cat are going late night shopping. I think it looks cosy when the shop is all lit up like that. However, I know the lighter, brighter one works much better for the book. I was just experimenting for fun.

Another scene I enjoyed making was the one with the ballet tutus in it. I loved making all the tiny little tulle skirts and all the glittery crowns. I remember my string of multicoloured miniature fairy lights broke during making this scene. I was being too rough with them, pulling them on and off the blu tack too hard. I had to rush to the nearest miniatures shop (40 mins away) to buy more!

This one was just a quick snapshot taken on my smaller camera. You can see the whole set. I had it mirrored on one side as I thought that would be fitting for a costume shop but that part never made it into the shot in the end.

Here are Mom and Witch's Cat entering the costume shop. I think this was the first set I made of the whole book.

And here is Witch's cat looking at the vampire section. Should she be a vampire?... or is a vampire too toothy maybe?

What about the tutu? (I don't know why she looks so unimpressed here. I would have LOVED a tutu like this as a child!)

What about a skeleton?

Here's a view of the whole skeleton set. I actually made it quite a lot bigger that it ended up needing to be. I was originally going to have lots of things in the box that the skeleton is on top of but ended up zooming in on the image more.

All the little boxes in the background I constructed out of card and hung up on wire hooks. It took a long time!

And here's just a work in progress shot of Witch's Cat eating her boiled egg for tea.

I have to say I absolutely loved illustrating this book. I had about six weeks to do it and I remember that it was intense. I actually enjoy intense bursts of work though, I think I work quite well under pressure. It was the middle of summer and some days were quite hot and I just remember sitting in my studio/bedroom at the time, just working solidly every single day. I had breaks for bike rides and eating but that was it. I don't think I even really socialized during that time. It felt so good to finish the whole thing at the end of those six weeks and especially because we went to Cornwall with friends straight afterwards which was so fun and relaxing after doing all that work. It was a good time in my life. I think back on it all with fondness. :)

I hope you enjoyed my post about the book!

X

Happy Halloween Witch's Cat Cover!

Last year I showed you the process I went through to create the cover for I Am a Witch's Cat. This year I am going to show you the process behind Happy Halloween Witch's Cat. (Out in the US 21st July by the way! And now going to be out in the UK as well 27th August!!!)

It all started with some VERY rough sketches.

This didn't quite cut it but did get used for the back cover in the end!

The one on the top left (below) was the chosen one:

Then I did a slightly more detailed sketch but still pretty rough

And then I decided to mock it up in 3d to check it was all going to work and fit in the frame:

It did, so I moved onto colour. 

This one is actually my favourite one. Personally I really like the darkness and the lighting in it, I think it looks cosy and I like more dramatic lighting. However I think the colours were too similar to the first book, or maybe the sky was too plain, I can't remember, but I was asked to do a different more evening-y sky rather than night time to make it look very different from the first book and also brighter.

I went a bit overboard to be honest, trying to make it different and ended up with this bright garish sunset sky. Which unsurprisingly did not make the final cover! Also you'll notice I was asked to put a witch's hat on the mum character.

So then I toned it down a bit. Made a less dramatic sky with a smaller setting sun, but this one looked like Witch's Cat had a halo and it still didn't quite have that punch. 

Here's what the whole set looked like zoomed out:

And a detail:

So THEN it was decided that maybe a big round moon would look good but in a different colour to the one on the first book which was white. This one was to be a big yellow moon. This is what the set looked like with the lighting switched off (Lighting adds so much!). I put a bright yellow sheet of paper behind the moon so that when the lamp behind it was turned on it shone a nice yellow colour.

 Here's what it looked like once the lights were turned on. I have to admit I really loved having the light shining through the front door and out of the hallway but I was asked to not light that bit up so as not to distract from the main character in the front and also to remove the mum character from the doorway. I was actually a bit sad to not have the hallway all lit up but oh well. It made sense why not. 

 And so there we have it. The final image for Happy Halloween Witch's Cat!

An October Activity

Quite a while back I designed an activity to go along with Witch's Cat. It is a guide for how to make your own little paper diorama based on the kitchen scene in the book. If you have kids maybe it is something they would enjoy as an autumn/Halloweeny activity.

HERE is the link to where you can print out a pdf of the activity. I would suggest printing it out on card if possible.

This is what is included:

A little Witch's Cat character with lots of kitchen items, some of them left blank for you to draw in your own things. 

The table with the red spotted table cloth as seen in the book:

And lots of food boxes which can be cut out and constructed.

Not included in the pdf, not sure why they left them out, are a couple of other things.

A chair:
A saucepan:

 And also the background which you can print out and set behind the character if you so wish.

Harpercollins actually made a little video showing how to make the diorama which is on twitter. This is how theirs looked at the end:

★★★★★★★★★ 

I am a Witch's Cat cover

I thought I would show you the process behind creating the cover for 'I am a Witch's Cat.'

It was a long process. From my short time working as an illustrator I have learned that covers always take the longest. I think I have done a total of six covers so far and they always seem to be the most tricky to get right.

So the idea behind this cover was to have some sort of pumpkin field with little Witch's Cat frolicking around in it. Initially the idea was to have it as a daytime scene but you will see that changes through out the process. 

It started out with a sketch...

...and the sketch was tweaked until it was right. The line of washing was removed and so was the tree and green house.

Then I started to build the image in 3d. I began by drawing all the pumpkins.

And then painting them.

Then I made the base from a sheet of cardboard covered in crinkled tissue paper.

And painted it to give it texture.

Then it was time to arrange the pumpkins and character on the base.
 

And put some vines in between the pumpkins.

Then I painted the sky and took some shots!

The clouds looked too solid and the pumpkins at the front and back looked too out of focus. It definitely wasn't right at this point.

Tried it with a different background but there was still something missing. The editor asked if the pumpkins could be 3d rather than standing cardboard so I went back and made some 3d ones. 

Things started to turn around when I added some sparkle to the pumpkins. I suddenly began to feel more inspired about the cover and began to see it was looking much better.

But during the time I was sparkling up the pumpkins I had another idea and I wanted to try it out. What if instead of daytime it was night time and the title was surrounded by a big round moon? I tried it out.

I had to use about three (or maybe even four) lamps behind the moon to fully light it as it was so big! All the pinprick stars had to be lit too.

I liked the result. Luckily the editor did too but there were still a few changes to be made like lighting the moon up more and making the lighting more dramatic.

But we went with it!

And this as you know, is the final result:

It took a long time to get this cover right but I'm so glad I persevered with it. I am really pleased with how it turned out in the end.