Illustrated novel, part 5

This is part 4 of a series of illustrations that I developed for the book A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle. This is a full page, full-color illustration of the planet Uriel, the first planet to which the children tesseract. Uriel is the mountainous home of beautiful centaur-like creatures with wings.

Illustrated novel, part 4

This is part 4 of a series of illustrations that I developed for the book A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle. This is earlier in the book when the children (Meg, her brother Charles Wallace) discover a grave threat to our planet.

Illustrated novel, part 3

This is part 3 of a series of illustrations that I developed for the book A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle. This is near the end of the book, where the main character Meg finds her father on another planet.

Illustrated novel, part 2

This is part 2 of a series of illustrations that I developed for the book A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle. This is the introduction to chapter 2, with an illustrated capital letter.

I chose to do a starry background, since the novel is science fiction and involves space travel. The manner in which they travel is by tesseract, or a "wrinkle in time." A tesseract involves passing through the fifth dimension; the concept is explained to Meg (and the reader) with the demo of an ant travelling across a string. So, I also included a string to represent the tesseract for the letter illustration.

Illustrated novel: title page (part 1)

The next few weeks I will present five illustrations that I developed for the book A Wrinkle in Time. This is the title page with Meg and Aunt Beast, full page in black and white.

The title page illustration features Meg, the main character, being carried by an alien who helps her recover when she is almost frozen to death. The aliens live on a planet that gets hardly any light so they are blind. They also happen to have four arms with lots of tentacles. Meg fondly calls her alien caretaker Aunt Beast. It was perhaps my favorite part of the whole book, and I remember Aunt Beast fondly myself.

Illustrated novel concepts

The chapter opening illustration will be of a W (there are a lot of W's, with three characters named Mrs Who, Mrs Whatsit, and Mrs Which). I chose to do a starry background, since the novel is science fiction and involves space travel. The manner in which they travel is by tesseract, or a "wrinkle in time." A tesseract involves passing through the fifth dimension; the concept is explained to Meg (and the reader) with the demo of an ant travelling across a string. So, I also included a string to represent the tesseract for the letter illustration.

The full-page, full-color illustration is of the first planet that the children travel to--Uriel. Uriel is the mountainous home of beautiful centaur-like creatures with wings. The image reference I used below is for the landscape.

The quarter-page illustration will be of the Happy Medium's globe looking at the earth. The Happy Medium is a cheerful sort-of sorceress who has a globe that can look at anything in the universe. The Mrs W's take the main characters to see the Earth, which has a hazy cloud around it. The children--Meg, her brother Charles Wallace, and friend Calvin--learn that the Dark Thing is pure evil and is threatening the universe. This is what they are fighting against, and it is what has trapped Meg's father, whom they are trying to find.

These are the stock illustrations for the earth, hands, and globe of the illustration.

The title page illustration will feature Meg, the main character, being carried by an alien who helps her recover when she is almost frozen to death. The aliens live on a planet that gets hardly any light so they are blind. They also happen to have four arms with lots of tentacles. Meg fondly calls her alien caretaker Aunt Beast. It was perhaps my favorite part of the whole book, and I remember Aunt Beast fondly myself.

The reference images I used were mostly for Meg, but I also did some research on tentacles to find an example that didn't look too creepy. This example on the left is from a sea anemone.

When Meg finds her father, he is trapped inside a glass-like column. He's been there for a couple years, so his hair is unkept, and he's also sad, of course. This is a reference image I used for the position of his body and lighting.

Inspiration for illustrated novel

I really liked the scratch board-style illustration I did a while ago, so I looked at some more illustrations for books with that style. First I found Darrel J. Stevens, who does sci-fi and fantasy work. I really like the bold composition of this one:

Another illustrator I found was Eugene Smith. This one is for "Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters." His work stands out because even though it's in black and white, it has a lot of texture and detail and doesn't feel simple or bland.

Illustrated novel brief

Client: Yearling Publishing (Random House)

Project: Illustrated novel

Specifications: Create five illustrations for a novel that is for high school students. The sample illustrations include (1) the title page, (2) a full page illustration, (3) a half page, (4) a quarter page, and (5) an initial capital for a chapter opening.

Reproduction: The proposed page size is 10 inches square. All illustrations will be in black except for one in black with one spot color and another in full color.

Justification: I'm choosing to do A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle. This was one of my favorite books when I was a young adult, and it's really fun to do because it's science fiction/fantasy and has interesting aliens and characters.