Dragonology: The Complete Book of Dragons
Even though it’s been ages since I read this book, Dragonology has to be (hands down) one of the best-illustrated children’s book I ever had. There was just so much thought put into the making of the book as they’ve included little puzzles, “dragon scales”, envelopes and tasks to help you on your way to become a “dragonologist”.
I must admit that as a child I adored this book; I loved it so much that I fancied myself being a dragonologist and whenever me and my family went out for a walk I wanted to go “dragon searching”. We never did find a dragon in the end.
I took a few photos of the illustrations in this book that I found most inspiring, and have gathered them into a mood board to see what their similarities are.
The use of watercolour for the main illustration creates a soft, cloudy appearance, and this is definitely shown in the mixture of red shades on the wings. Even though the dragon is red it isn’t too bold because of the use of soft watercolour, and so doesn’t distract the reader too much from the text and other illustrations.
The cloud effect gives a silky texture to the dragon’s wings whereas the little scales in the darker areas shows the roughness of its hide. I really like this method of only doing the detail in texture in the darker areas as it would be too much to do it on the whole of the dragon.
Despite using watercolour the colouring has been done extremely neatly, and this surprised me because I could never achieve such neatness in my paintings! I really like how they’ve blended all of the different shades so that it looks like a gradual change instead of just lining up colours next to each other.
The overall softness of the paint could be a reference to the dragon’s kind and tamed nature. They were once wild but now are “friends” with human beings, and in Western culture this could be quite important because in old myths and legends dragons are known to be evil and greedy creatures (but it’s different in Asian cultures).
The pencil sketches have a lot of detail for such small illustrations as they’ve even paid attention to the spikes on the dragon’s tail, it’s facial expression and the “veins” of the wings. When I looked closer I realised that even the shading is slightly textured to give off the impression of scales, but this is only on the darker areas where the shadows would be. This gives the dragon a sense of realism because on normal everyday objects we don’t really see the texture when it’s rested beneath a bright light, and yet we could see the textures in the shadows created.
The pages are bordered by what reminds me of Celtic-styled shapes, although aren’t stretched all along the edges so that they could give the main illustration room to spread out. This creates a 3D effect as the bottom of the dragon’s wing goes over the border and bleeds over the page.
The fact that the borders are drawn in a way to imitate stone gives the page “strength” as it supports the edges of the page by its stone pillars, and this perhaps relate to the strength of dragons. The stone had been coloured in green that could symbolise moss and therefore age, and could also link in with the dragons being old and wise creatures.
Conclusion:
What surprised me about this is that the dragons haven’t been drawn as if they were evil creatures, as the use of watercolour paint generates a soft appearance and the illustrator had reflected their strength and age on the other elements of the page (e.g. the borders). They are also drawn in enough detail to make them look realistic, as it were, but not in too much detail like the illustrations shown in Illuminated Manuscripts. This could be because the target group for this book is at children, and children would be more fascinated by kindly looking creatures that have bold and bright colours than at intricate detail.
This has shown me that I perhaps don’t need to go into too much detail as it might be overpowering, and that I should do a mixture of detail and minimalist design. I could achieve this by doing a detailed illustration but a minimalist design for the page of the invitation.
Wizardology: The Book of Secrets of Merlin
This is another book done by the same editors as Dragonology, and I thought that they might have similar illustrations but I was surprised when I realised that there was a lot more detail in the borders that reflect the Illuminated Manuscripts style. This could be because they wanted to reflect that era, and connects Illuminated Manuscripts with magic (which would be great for me as it would therefore connect with fairy tales!)
As with my previous section, I chose a DPS that featured different media within. I have a feeling that unlike the watercolour paint effect used in Dragonology that the main one is in fact done digitally because of it’s sharp and pristine lines and incredible detail. There is definitely something digital about this because of the incredible shading and the way they’ve achieved different textures for each object scattered around the wizard and owl. Either that or they are just incredibly good painters!
For example, nearly all of the feathers of the owl are drawn although at different sizes and angles to imitate the feathers of a real owl, and they’ve even included little tufts on its ears to complete that overall “fluffy” appearance. The expression on its face looks slightly annoyed (perhaps it’s because the reader is finding out its master’s secrets?) and yet sleepy at the same time because of its heavily lidded eyes.
The presence of the owl reflects how wise the wizard is and of all of the knowledge he has, and this is because the owl was sacred to Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom. However during the Middle Ages owls were linked with witchcraft, but this belief is slowly dying to be once again a symbol a wisdom.
The books in the background and the loose scrolls emphasise the wizard’s wisdom, as he is in the middle of observing one but instead the reader distracts him. His facial expression is reflected in the owls; this shows that they are mirrors of one another, and that this owl would be the wizard’s Familiar.
This connected could be quite spooky because it’s as if the wizard and owl are one being.
Another thing that could be quite spooky are the little instruments that he’s using as well as the skull right next to him. Could he possibly be tapping into some witchcraft? Or would this be the origin of a scientific experiment?
This illustration isn’t the only one that details, but even the borders are! This reminds me of the style reflected in Illuminated Manuscripts (as I had mentioned right at the beginning of this section) and yet the illustrator has added their own style to it by using pencil and soft greys. This allows the main focus to be on the illustration as it’s the only one in colour.
But even though it’s in soft greys it doesn’t hide the fact that there is a lot of detail and brilliant shading within. The two lizards at the bottom of the page look very 3D like because of the shading and so they “pop out” of the border and brings up the connotations of stone statues.
Instead of just having the stereotypical vines within the border the illustrator has also included some reptiles – could they possibly be the subjects of the wizard’s experiments? What I also find interesting is that they had added another border within the border, so the flowery border looks like a background pattern instead.
Conclusion:
I like how they’ve added elements of an old style (e.g. the borders) and yet changed it to their own style, and I really hope to do this during the sketching stage as I really like the borders in Illuminated Manuscripts.
Dans le carton de Nenant (Clément Lefèvre) - http://nenent.blogspot.co.uk/
I stumbled upon this illustrator just recently, and I find his illustrations absolutely adorable. It’s his style, the way he drew his characters and the soft texture in the colouring he uses that completes that cute, childlike appearance.
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| Images from http://nenent.blogspot.co.uk/ & https://www.facebook.com/pages/Les-cartons-de-N%C3%A9nent/106856362708793 |
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| https://www.facebook.com/pages/Les-cartons-de-N%C3%A9nent/106856362708793 |
Now I’m not a big fan of children illustrations because I find that they are normally drawn with simple forms (which is great for the target market) but there are exceptions, and Lefèvre is one of them. His illustrations are detailed but not too much that there’s too many things to look at. Take this illustration here; there’s detail in the flowers but not so much that we can see each individual flower, but enough to know that she is sitting in a field amongst them. It’s got that perfect balance that I would like to display on my design.
His lines are almost invisible in this illustration, and this could be why it has that overall soft appearance. The lack of lines means that the colours and the shading form the shapes within. Sometimes he has added a line of white as a highlight to bring out some of the characters such as the one around the girl. This creates depth to the image.
What makes the illustration cute is how the characters are drawn, the girl in particular. She has a really round and chubby face that reflects a child’s face, as she hasn’t been touched by age yet. This actually brings up the connotations of a baby face and symbolises her youth and innocence, and her serene expression shows that she is happy in her fantasy world. She hasn’t yet been marked by the evils of the world and despite how strange the other creatures are, they aren’t there to harm her.
The creature in the background mimic her serene facial expression, yet I’ve noticed that the smaller ones are drawn to look up at the one at the front as if its their leader, and they are seeking approval from drinking tea. It might be that the girl is enjoying her cup of tea and these creatures have approached her, and she has given them tea as a sign of friendship and the leader tastes it to accept her gift before allowing the others to try it.
The way their hands are clasped together made my mind immediately jump to angels, as it’s the pose that angels normally have in paintings as they clasp their hands in prayer. The little sticks that floats above the leaders head would then be the halo, and as these “angels” are surrounding the girl it emphasises her innocence and purity.
The colours Lefèvre used are very soft to reflect the friendliness of the illustration, and even his shading has been done so that the shadows aren’t too deep nor a heavy contrast to the highlights. I liked how he picked his shades so that they are close to each other to create that gradual change.
Conclusion:
I really admire Lefèvre’s work because of the way he paints and also of how he paints it. I probably wouldn’t be able to use the same techniques as he does as I’m doing a wedding invitation and not a children’s book, but I would like to create that same “softness”.
Mark Hearld - http://www.booktrust.org.uk/books-and-reading/children/illustrators/illustrators-gallery/47
Even though Mark Hearld is a book illustrator I really like how he laid out his type within his illustrations so that they look as if they belong together. When I looked at his profile on booktrust.org he talked about one of his spreads in his book ‘A First Book of Nature’: “Paper-cut pigeons fly through the air and collaged fish swim in a rock pool - Nicola's text is so observant and particular, its rich cast of creatures a delight to bring to life.”
It was this illustration that he was talking about above, and even though he mentioned that it’s a collage I still can’t tell whether it is or not as all of the objects within have a consistent style. He has somehow merged all of the elements perfectly so that it looks as if he had drawn everything. Take the fish along the top edge as an example: they entwine with the reeds so it merges them together.
This illustration is so dynamic and the movement of the fish leads the eye across it to go down towards the seabed and shells. The viewer would first look at the crab “waving” at the fish, then the fish, then the prawns, and down towards the seabed. This is a clever technique because the illustrator ensures that the viewer would be looking in the right direction just by adding movement to the piece.
I quite like how Hearld added a bit of texture as it were to the crab and some of the shells because it brought up the connotations of sea weed and moss that grows in the coral reef, further enhancing the sea life effect.
Conclusion:
I really like the layout of the book spread because even though it is mainly focused on the illustration, the little gap allows the viewer to focus on the writing first before letting their eyes travel around the page.
I really like the layout of the book spread because even though it is mainly focused on the illustration, the little gap allows the viewer to focus on the writing first before letting their eyes travel around the page.
The Art of Disney Tangled –by Jeff Kurtti
This time I wanted to look at the way the type has been laid out, and what better than to look at a Disney book? My classmate had the art edition of Rapunzel and how the creators came up with their designs, and when I opened it my eyes were immediately attracted to the type.
The book was quite large, probably the same dimensions as the Dragonology and Wizardology books, and there is definitely an emphasis on the illustrations yet there was quite a lot of decorative type in there as well.
I shall look closely at one of the spreads that I find most inspiring to analyse their typeface choice as well as how the type works with the illustration.
The typestyle they’ve used is the traditional Blackletter, the style typically used in Illuminated Manuscripts and medieval times. It is the typestyle that Disney has used for all of their films where their opening scene is the story of the main character set out in a book (a key example of this is in Sleeping Beauty and Snow White). It wasn’t surprising that they’ll use a similar typeface for the main headings for this book!
However I find that this has a more decorative and modern feel than their other films. They’ve added some curls – possibly to mimic her hair or the vines climbing up the tower – on the ends of some of the letters such as T, h and R. I think that these little curls look somewhat awkward because they don’t flow from the tips of the letters, although this is my personal opinion. It looks as if the designer just stuck these vines to the letters randomly without properly merging them together to form a smooth design. The only one that probably flows beautifully is the h in “The”, and it brings up the connotations of a tree slowly growing upwards and spreading its branches.
I really like how each letter has a thin line right next to the thickest stroke because it makes it look more elegant as without it the letters would just look too thick. These lines remind me of the lines of the lyre or a similar string instrument, perhaps the harp, because they are very thin and have that delicate appearance.
There is thus a heavy contrast between the thick and thin strokes, creating a perfect balance between the two. I do not think of a monk scrawling over a sheet of parchment when looking at this, but perhaps a professional type designer taking their time to do letter by letter because of how thin the thin strokes are. They look as if they could snap at any moment!
I find it quite strange that they have a little banner beneath the main heading because it isn’t centred and looks a bit… out of place? In fact the main heading isn’t aligned to the left nor centred but a bit all over the place. I feel that if they have shifted the “the” to be left aligned or even centre aligned then the banner would’ve fitted in a bit more. I understand that they wanted the bottom of the t to form around the curve of the o, but it doesn’t look quite right.
The first line of this paragraph is done in a similar but less decorative typeface, and is at a larger pt. size to the rest of the paragraph. The similarity between this first line and the rest of the text allows it to blend nicely into it, as I didn’t pick up that the rest is in a serif typeface and isn’t the same. This means that the first line “flows” into the second line beautifully.
Unlike traditional medieval writing there isn’t a drop-caps, and this is probably because of how decorative the main heading is. The first letter is a bit larger and bolder than the others on the first line, but this doesn’t stand out too much from the page, as it is only slightly taller.
At every new paragraph they’ve added a large indent and this is something I haven’t seen in books before. I know that some have a tiny indent, but not one like this. These large indents create a river effect and remind me of the way Rapunzel’s hair curves down like a stream of gold.
Conclusion:
I find the arrangement of type a bit messy especially the heading. As I have mentioned above I think that if they had centred it then it would’ve looked a bit better. Although saying that I looked at their pages such as “Once Upon a Time” and their headings look a lot better arranged… If this page was done like those then maybe it would’ve looked a lot better!
I do like how they have created that river effect by having large indents in the main text because it brought up connotations of Rapunzel’s long hair.
Overall Conclusion:
Overall I find that it is the detailed illustrations that I'm most attracted to, especially those which have a "meaning" behind them all. This reminds me of the way Jan Pienkowski did his illustrations, and I feel that I should do something similar to my design as it's obvious that it has an influence on me.
Overall Conclusion:
Overall I find that it is the detailed illustrations that I'm most attracted to, especially those which have a "meaning" behind them all. This reminds me of the way Jan Pienkowski did his illustrations, and I feel that I should do something similar to my design as it's obvious that it has an influence on me.
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