Making progress

Yesterday was a good day for me. I got through with the illustration for the first page. I'm trying to put more line work into my work. My mark making is a bit wonky but I bet by the time I finish all the illustrations for the book I'll make better and more confident marks. Below is my tight sketch and inked version.

I won't show the process of every illustration because I'll feel like I'm giving the book away. But I will share some future plans with you. The book will be in black and white. I don't think I'll make copies to sell because I'm not really confident in my writing. But if someone wanted a copy I wouldn't mind selling them a copy, only if they asked though. But I think I'll sell a pdf of the colored illustrations on gumroad. Well I"m looking forward to making more progress. I might post my favorite sketches and stuff in the future.

Slowly but surely

I had to put postgal on hold for a while because I was working on a test for a company I wanted to work for. I finished working on the test and I'm back to working on postgal and things are going so slow. I started off trying to work on 5 thumbnails at a time and that wasn't working. So my new plan is to just take things one page at a time. I think by doing this I can take my time and not rush things. And by not rushing things I can make less mistakes. I really want this project to come out well and look professional.

Here are some sketches of postgal. I haven't come up with a name for her yet. I was thinking of naming her Gabby but I don't know if I'll stick to that. But I wanted to draw her more. When I first started on the this project I was having problems drawing her and making her look like she did in the collage I did. But I'm glad these came out decent. I hope to make some progress soon and start posting some works in progress here.

Working on a book: Postgal

I always wanted to start a personal long term project and actually finish it. Of course I worked on long term projects for school but never for myself. So I decided to write, illustrate, and self publish my own book. Even though I wouldn't consider myself a great writer I wanted to try anyway. I mean it is a personal project, it shouldn't matter. But I do want to give it my all and not cut any corners with this project. My goal is to have the book printed and bound by June, or at least be done with the whole book by June. If the book is done I could print and bind it anytime.

 The story will be called postgal and it's basically about a girl delivering a package in a busy city. It all started with the image to the left. I always liked postal stuff so I did a collage depicting a delivery girl looking at a map. After looking at the finished illustration I begin to make up a story for the girl and it eventually turned into postgal. Right now I have some of the character designs done and I've typed out 50% of the story. Typing out the beginning and end was easy but filling in the middle is more challenging. But I figured out how to fill up the middle it's just a matter of actually typing everything out and making sure it flows the way I want it to. 

I've been reading children's books and short stories for reference. I was hoping they would make me a better writer lol. But I guess I'll get better the more I write. I want to visit the closest library and check out some more book and study them too. It's been so long since I've been to an actual library and I'm actually looking forward to it.

I made a sketchbook specifically for postal sketches. I'll be posted progress pictures once I start the actual illustrating process. I made a schedule for the book and I'm suppose to have the whole manuscript typed by March. I'm glad I'm about half done with that.