Oliver the Kitten

I have just completed the watercolor book, Oliver the Little Kitten.

I started making from a watercolor notebook that Sue gave me for Christmas. The hand made paper and the the binding were made in India. The paper is so rough and absorbent that making color changes in the watercolor washes was pretty easy and really fun. It was a little more difficult to make scenes that were realistic.  The book by virtue of its media became pretty impressionistic.

What is really fun with this book is that the aspect is pretty extreme about 4  by 9. The 9 inches is the height.

In 51 pages the reader taken  from a decidedly little kitten of about 8 months old to becoming a little more adult at a year and a half.

I have written commentary for the book. It outlines Oliver's favorite activities and how he has integrated into the colony with a couple of human adults and two other male cats.

I have grown as an illustrator in the process of doing this book. Unlike most books that are illustrated after the story is written and the quality of the illustration and the writing are even, this book was made over eight months and there  are some pages that are not very good from the the illustrator's prospective. There are also some pages and illustrations that I am very proud to be the illustrator. 

It was really fun to do a diary of sorts of a nonhuman animal. I also cut my chops on how to do background furniture and day to day situations when painting Oliver in his day to day activities.

I showed the almost completed book. My dad was pleased at the voice I gave the little kitten in the story. 

The illustrative style for this little book is a pen sketch done with a watercolor wash over it. I used .5 lines in the sketches that are made from unipen pens. They are permanent and do not lose their point easily in the illustration.

Most of the pages use a common watercolor palate of yellow ochre, Quin gold and Paynes Gray. Payne's Grey is a combination of lamp black with Ultramarine blue.

Olilver is a tuxedo cat with yellow green eyes.

Each page as been scanned is will soon be sent to my niece and sister who have shown interest in making it into an E-book.

I think that I will take the scans and print the results on a color printer and see if a canvas like paper will work for it.  It might me fun to have as a printed book as well as an E-book.

: ) Pat