Last Highlights Picture Finds

Here are my last two picture-find assignments that I drew for Highlights Magazine last year, and which were printed in the Eagle-Eye Hidden Picture series this year.  First up is the Henry Ford Museum, which I drew for issue #38.

And my very last picture-find was of a paddle boat on the Mississippi River.  In the text on the adjoining page, the characters said they couldn't see into the water because it was brown, and then said "Now we know why the Mississippi is also called the Big Muddy."  I looked up some reference and colored the illustration as you see it below, which was approved by my editor.  When the magazine arrived in the mail, Highlights had recolored the water green (!?!)

Sadly, after this assignment, Highlights changed the way these illustrations are commissioned.  Instead of hiring a talented illustrator and agreeing to pay them a fair fee through a contract, they are now requesting that illustrators send them fully formed ideas and then they may select them, or they may not.  For me, that qualifies as spec work, so I will not be working for Highlights any more.  

It was already a work-for-hire assignment, which is a very low priority me these days, but it was fun being in this historic publication that I used to enjoy when I was a kid.  Perhaps someday they'll revert to a more fair contract and I will do some work for them again.

2014 Recap: Highlights Magazine - Part 4

This week I'm posting the last of my work that was published in Highlights Magazine during 2014.  The following hidden picture drawings were printed in the Eagle-Eye Hidden Picture series.  They were part of the Gabby's Journal feature, which follows a little girl as she travels around the United States of America with her family.

In issue 32 they visited The Alamo in San Antonio, Texas.  I tried to load this one up with a lot of Texas stuff, like the state flag and the shape of the state.  Initially when my art director saw the lizard in the bottom left corner, she asked me to take it out, because she thought it was distracting.  But once I told her that it was, in fact, a Horned Lizard, the official lizard of Texas, she let me keep it!

In issue 35, Gabby and her family visited the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.  I have fond memories of visiting this museum as a kid, along with my grandfather who flew B-24 bombers in the Army Air Corps during World War II.  It was fun revisiting it through various reference photos.  

Believe it or not, that finally catches us up with all of the illustration work that I had not posted from 2014.  Next week we'll look at some new stuff from this year!

2014 Recap: Highlights Magazine - Part 3

This week I'm continuing to post some of my work that was published in Highlights Magazine during 2014.  The following hidden picture drawings were printed in the Eagle-Eye Hidden Picture series.  They were part of the Gabby's Journal feature, which follows a little girl as she travels around the United States of America with her family.

First up is the Liberty Bell which appeared in issue 27.  It was cool drawing this landmark because my extended family is all from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where the Liberty Bell resides.

Next up was the Cherry Blossoms in Washington D.C. which appeared in issue 29.  Did you know that the Cherry Blossom trees were a gift to the United States from Japan?  Talk about a gift that keeps on giving!  I visited these trees in March a few years back with my wife Claire, and it was a wonderful experience for us both.  

Washington D.C. has so many great, free museums... one of which you'll see next week as we continue the tour of American landmarks that I drew for Highlights in 2014!

2014 Recap: Highlights Magazine - Part 2

This week I'm continuing to post some of my work that was published in Highlights Magazine during 2014.  The following hidden picture drawings were published in the Eagle-Eye Hidden Picture series.

First up was a page and a half illustration of the Taj Mahal that ran in issue 25 (the fold was right between the main building and that right-most tower).  I was able to sneak my wife Claire and I into the left side of the illustration as a pair of tourists, even though we have never been to India.  Maybe someday!  (click to see it bigger).

Then, in issue 26 I drew another illustration for the Gabby's Journal feature, which follows a little girl as she travels around the United States of America with her family.  In this issue they visited the Walk of Fame is Hollywood, California.  I made sure to cram in as many cars as possible into this scene, to make it feel realistic.  Also you can see that I tried to feature the star of cartoonist Charles Schulz, which seemed appropriate, since I am a cartoonist too.

Next week we'll continue the tour of American landmarks that I drew for Highlights in 2014!

2014 Recap: Highlights Magazine - Part 1

Okay, last week I showed some of my work that was published in Highlights Magazine during 2013.  This week we have finally made it up to 2014.  The following hidden picture drawings were made for the Gabby's Journal feature in the Eagle-Eye Hidden Picture series, which follows a little girl as she travels around the United States of America with her family.

In issue 21 Gabby stopped by the Old North Church in Boston, Massachusetts.  Well, when I think of Boston, I think of my cartoonist pal Liz Prince who has lived in the Boston area as long as I've known her.  I decided to sneak her into my drawing, walking a dog.  In reality, it would be more likely that Liz would be hanging out with her cats Dracula and Wolfman, but I couldn't figure out a way to get them outside with her in this park!

In issue 24 Gabby and her family visited Arches National Park in Utah.  Both of these were a lot of fun to color because of the bright orange of the rocks and autumn leaves respectively.  

Next week we'll continue the tour of American landmarks that I drew for Highlights in 2014!

2013 (?!) Recap: Highlights Magazine

Yikes! The next illustrations I was going to post from my "2014 Recap" were from Highlights Magazine, but when I checked to see which ones I hadn't posted, I realized I still had some left over from 2013!  So this week we're turing the clock waaay back to look at some hidden picture assignments I did for this magazine.

This one was actually the first one I ever did for Highlights!  It was a page and and a half illustration of some kids making little faces with rice cakes.  It's hard to describe how much fun this was to work on.  Besides the obvious enjoyment of hiding objects inside a big complicated drawing, it was also a thrill to work for a magazine that I used to enjoy as a kid (though usually in the waiting room at the dentist's office...)

This one also had a spot illustration of the little girl working on her rice cake face.  I don't know which issue these illustrations ended up in, because I never received a copy, but they're out there somewhere!

My next assignment for Highlights was for their Eagle-Eye Hidden Pictures series, which are jam-packed, cover-to-cover with nothing but hidden pictures!  I began drawing famous landmarks around the USA for the reoccurring "Gabby's Journal" feature, in which a little girl, Gabby, travels the country with her family seeing the sights.

Here's one I did for issue six, of the Golden Gate Bridge, which was especially fun to draw because I had recently relocated to the Bay Area when I drew this!  I was able to go check it out in person to do some sketches.

I've posted before about my process for getting these scenes to look realistic, but one of the things that I figured out when I made this one, is that sometimes you can break the normal rules of illustration to help hide items in your drawing.  For example, usually you are trying to use lots of contrast between foreground and background objects so that it is easy to visually separate them.  But here, by making the sky a darker shade than I normally would, I could more easily hide objects in the negative space between the foreground and background (for instance the fork to the left of the first tower) or in the dark clouds.  The same goes for tangents, which you usually try to avoid as an illustrator, but when hiding an object, they can create a nice visual distraction or point of confusion that can help you hide an object.

For issue eight, I was assigned the French Quarter.  Although I have never been to New Orleans, this is the second time I have done a detailed illustration of its famous iron balconies, and in college I designed a set for A Streetcar Named Desire.  I'll have to get down there someday to experience its charm firsthand.  

Okay, next week I'll actually start posting some of the illustrations I did for Highlights in 2014, as originally planned! 

Highlights Hidden Pictures #2

Another issue of Highlights Magazine showed up in the mail a few weeks back.  If you see this issue on the newsstand, check it out, it's got one of my illustrations in it!

Most of the hidden pictures I have been drawing are for the "Gaby's Journal" feature, in which Gaby and her family travel the United States, seeing all kinds of historic buildings, museums, national landmarks and parks.  This time it was the dinosaur exhibit at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C.

Since these illustrations are based on real places, I usually start out by collecting a bunch of photo reference.  The internet makes this extremely easy!  I usually find some general "official" photos on Google Image Search and then try to find some more personal first-person photos on Flickr.  I've even found some 3D models in the Google SketchUp 3D Warehouse so that I can position a building just how I want.

My next step is to mash up all this reference in photoshop to work out the composition of my drawing.  Since illustration does not have to perfectly mirror the real world, I can grab one element from a photo that I like and flip it, or draw on top of it to extend it, and then drop other photos in the background or foreground, etc. etc. etc.  Here is an example that I made for this illustration, which uses three or four photos and a lot of digital drawing.

I decided I didn't like that one very much, so I made a second composition, which I ended up using instead.  Once I settle on the composition, I print this out and lightbox the general shapes onto my bristol board.  Then I can finesse the drawing, and make everything look consistent.  This digital "comp" technique saves me a lot of time, so that I'm not trying to figure out all of the perspective and angles of things from scratch.

The last step, of course, is to add the hidden objects!  ;)

Highlights Hidden Pictures #1

I don't think my family ever had a subscription to Highlights Magazine when I was a kid, but I definitely remember reading it at every single one of my dentist appointments growing up.  My favorite feature was always the "Hidden Picture" challenge, where you'd look through a large illustration to find lots of little drawings hidden inside.

Well, imagine my delight, earlier this year, when Highlights got in touch and asked me to draw some hidden pictures for them!  I did five of these before things got hectic with my big book project, and the first one arrived in the mail the other day.  It's always a thrill to see my work in print!

This Highlights: Eagle-Eye Hidden Pictures book is cover-to-cover hidden pictures, so if that is your kind of thing, than this book is for you!  My drawing was for the "Gaby's Journal" feature, in which a little girl named Gaby travels around the USA with her family, seeing cool landmarks and roadside attractions.

If you see one of these magazines, pick it up!  The next string of issues should have some illustrations by yours truly, and hopefully I'll do some more of these in the future!

Guide Magazine and Gag #3

Last summer at the Heroes Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina I met an incredibly talented illustrator named Brandon Reese.  A few weeks after the show, he dropped me a line to see if I'd like to do some illustration work for Guide Magazine, where he works as an art director.  I said "Yes!" and we got to work.  It was a real pleasure working with an art director who was also a working illustrator.  He made my job easy and didn't noodle with things or ask for a ton of changes.

Anyway, when I came home from Florida the other week, there were two copies of the magazine in my mail with my illustration on page one!  I drew this wintery image during the summer, when it was hot, so it seems VERY appropriate that it arrived in January (the low in Vermont today was 19 below zero!).  Below you can see the finished illustration and a small scan of the magazine spread, so you can see how it was used.

I really enjoyed working on this drawing.  It's not often that I get to just read a story and come up with an illustration to enhance it.  I would love to do more of this kind of work in the future.  Also, since I knew it would be printed in full color, it gave me a chance to try a new rendering method for snow, which was to overlay a sheet of dots (drawn with a sharpie and a lightbox) and just color them white with Photoshop.    It was MUCH faster than The Basewood Method, but I still think I probably spent about an hour moving around individual snowflakes, to avoid weird tangents.  That stuff is important!

Lastly, here is another gag that was originally published in Nickelodeon Magazine way back in 2006.  This was my third one, and as you can see here, it shows how much I love a good pun!