I really need another tutorial...

I'm burning out on this because I'm worried that I'm not making any progress and I'm not sure what to do about it. I'm not particularly comfortable working in this scan and colour way and I just want to scream.

Leafy characters...

So these are some textured leafy characters. Obviously I still like my original design for the main character but it certainly does work when it's leafy. It might be worth making some parts of the takers more leafy and having exposed parts like the faces. You know, like in that old kids program the herb garden? "I'm a very friendly lion named Parsley..." right? RIGHT!?
Oh also, new character design for the protagonist. Prefer this little lady, she's at least 50 times more awesome.

Background element testing...

I decided to go all out and fill an A3 page with foliage. I think this sort of stuff might look good on the inside pages of finished books and at the same time it was good practice at drawing quickly. I need to apply more thought into putting my characters into context and this is basically my starting point. As you can see below, once I coloured it (which took ages by the way) I was able to change the hue however I wanted, which is a really useful facility that I make use of frequently.

Oh and this is just a really quick sketch I coloured in. It's horrible.

Webcomics...

Now, if I'm going to be cheeky enough to include this piece in my final major project then I suppose I'd better have a good reason. It just so happens that I do. Basically, I was thinking of starting a webcomic and popping that on to my learning agreement. It took me about a day to get this page written, drawn and coloured so I think you could get quite a lot done by the end of the project. Still, this isn't related to my kids book so I feel a little cheeky.

New characters...

So I'm thinking this could be one of the new characters. I've also left the background blank just to see how the minimalist look works. Hmmm. I don't know.

Background testing...

I've still gotta run my design by my tutors but I thought I'd experiment with some character in context images in the meantime. I think that the characters would look quite nice against a majority white background so I've drawn some light digital lines to contrast against the rough pencil lines to see how that works. I do really like the idea of the characters being the only elements that possess colour but it might not make for a very pretty book. I don't know, I'll think about it. Also if this works as a style then it would also be worth trying the background elements as scanned, uncoloured pencil lines too. Also line thickness is another thing to test if we're exploring the uncoloured line backgrounds. Aside from that I could try having lineless shapes as background elements etc. Also if everything but the characters are colourless in the world it makes me wonder how they would interact with objects. So if my protagonist picks up a stick or something, would the stick remain white? Is the idea to make it sort of feel like a paper world?

The image above is the smooth digital lines.

This image is scanned pencil lines.

I actually really like how a background colour makes the white trees and background elements stand out. I think this might work rather well with fewer background elements though.

I probably won't use speech bubbles although they do have a certain charm.

Characters should have character...

This drawing is perhaps a little more cartoony than previous incarnations of her, but I like it. I would hate for my characters to be rigid, I want their personalities to shine through. So anyway, I hope this goes over well with my tutors because I really like it. I suppose this is the greatest balance I've found between drawing how I want and drawing in a way that is appropriate.