FOLLOW ME ON TUMBLR FROM NOW ON

I'm moving! But don't worry, you can still find my inane ramblings and pictures over on my tumblr page. Head on over and say hi :)

New story new story new story...

I'm totally into this new story. And now that I'm out of uni I don't want to spunk it all on the internet before I've finished it for fear of sneaky, sneaky story thieves. With that in mind though, I don't mind showing you a) the first image that sparked the story b) the second image that helped me develop the book style and c) the first page of my story. So feast your eyes and that!

I think I'll be reluctant to share much of anything else on this for awhile. Unless it doesn't go anywhere of course! But yeah, we'll see. Keep your eyes peeled and that.

Book cover design...

I got this awesome project in the other day to design a book jacket cover for an e-book called A Witch's Trail. In the end the final image chosen was the side-on view of the main character, though personally I prefer the front-on view. More of these jobs, please!

Mermaids apparently...

I never, repeat, NEVER expected to be drawing mermaids. Is that even politically correct? Aren't the guys mermen? Should I really be worrying about using PC terms to describe things that don't exist?

Here's some preparatory sketches for a page in my fox story. 

Oh I also did this cheeky chicken drawing to promote veganism. I actually did the drawing independently for a portfolio page and decided to put it to good use later on.

The first double page spread...

Need I say more? I'm really excited to start work on this! Also, I've uploaded as a single page too so that I can submit the link to illustration friday.

Character experiment numero uno.

I love this character and I can't wait to have him to all kinds of mad shit in my new story! This isn't in the context of the world but just drawing him doing *something* was enjoyable. I suppose I'd better get finishing the written part so I can settle into illustrating the whole thing.

I've also got a batch of business cards featuring this guy on the way. Should have all that sorted by Friday.
OH ALSO, today my book was sent off to the Macmillan prize thingy! Hooray! I think the winners are notified by the 2nd of May so we'll find out if anything good or not is happening by then :)

New story, website live and doodles...

Hello again! Well, it's almost time to send my book off to Macmillan. Exciting! I don't expect much to come from it but there's always Kickstarter. I know for a fact that I can create demand in vegan circles for this book even if it's only a run of 100 or so.

I've got a new story on the go too. So far the working title is "Liar" but that's probably going to change. It's about a fox that tells elaborate stories about how he is the best at everything. Here's an early sketch of him to feast your eyes upon. I'll keep y'all in the loop with regards to what happens with this story but I'm loving writing it and I absolutely can't wait to get drawing!

Also my website is now live. I've registered the name danwiddowson.com for a year and I've upgraded my moonfruit account to remove all of their branding from the page. Let me know what you think!

Oh and I drew this MIB doodle last night while watching, can you believe it, men in black. The main reason I do seemingly pointless doodles like this isn't just because it's fun, but because I'm finding my feet with this way of working. I've basically only drawn monsters in this way of working so a lot of these not-so-brilliant images are testers to see what's possible. So for this I was drawing humans that had to resemble their real life counterparts. This is something I haven't had to do yet and I didn't know how far I could take it. The same applies to the Eiffel Tower image I posted about earlier. I hadn't had a chance to draw a building until that doodle so I didn't know it would work. I expect there will be lots of these little testers popping up over the next few months. I'm not really big on this image overall. I think it's too obvious, there's no action occurring and it resembles a standard poster of the movie too much. Still, we draw and we learn. That's the point.

Portfolio piece and THE FIRST PRINT OF MY BOOK EVER

The book printing wasn't ideal but it's sufficient enough to send off to the Macmillan prize thingy-ma-bob. Nice to see it to scale finally too! And yeah, He-Man. Need I say more?

Ohh Deer...

For a limited time only, two of my designs are available to purchase through Ohh Deer! There is also a kind of voting system in which designs are voted for by *liking* or *tweeting* through the website. So below are the links to my designs if you fancy a look :)

GRUMPY MONSTER

EIFFEL TOWER

Thanks in advance!

Update tiiiiime...

Well it's been a flippin' long journey but I've got all of the artwork done (as far as I'm aware) for my book. I'll be printing it on the cheap this week to send off to the macmillan children's book awards. In the meantime, here are a couple of sketches that I've done since. I'll keep you informed about the book as ever.

I'm also submitting some images to Oh Deer's seam there done that competition. When my first image has been approved I'll be sharing that and it will be available to buy as a tshirt. The image will be the above Eiffel Tower design but with the shadow and big ben label removed. I'm also working on a little monster drawing that may or may not be entered into the competition, depending on how well it goes. I'll keep you informed and that!