Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted
~ Martin Luther King, Jr., 1963
You can say anything you want, yessir, but it's the words that sing, they soar and descend...I bow to them...I love them, I cling to them, I run them down, I bite into them, I melt them down...I love words so much...The unexpected ones...The ones I wait for greedily or stalk until, suddenly they drop...
~Pablo Neruda
I hope some animal never bores a hole in my head and lays its eggs in my brain, because later you might think you're having a good idea but it's just eggs hatching
I just uploaded two new videos showing my illustration process for the book Shark Patrol, written by Ron Hirschi and released this year from Mutual Publishing.
And stay tuned for information about my upcoming book signings in November, just in time for Christmas!
Let's have fun! Join me this Saturday at 1pm at Basically Books in my favorite small town, Hilo! I'll be signing books, reading "The Castle that Kai Built," and more! Rumor has it that I'll do some sketching. And I'll bring my iPad, so I can show you how my illustrations for Kai were made.
Written by Ron Hirschi, illustrated by Tammy Yee Mutual Publishing, 2019
Illustrating Shark Patrol, A Discovery Adventure in Hawai'i presented a unique and fun challenge: how to incorporate author Ron Hirschi's fact-filled lively text and rich illustrations into an 8" x 9" 32-page format. Working with Ron and Mutual Publishing editor Jane Gillespie, we gave this story of young explorers Kai and Lehua, as told through mail correspondence, a fresh update by having the characters post their adventures on social media via Shark Grams. Shark facts were personalized by presenting them as journal entries made by the budding scientists...something that I did as a child pretending to be a researcher aboard Jacques Cousteau's famous vessel, the Calypso. Other devices included photos taken by the crew and Post-it notes from the desk of the ship's biologist, Auntie Jan. Here's a sketch of the layout. Each character has an avatar for their Shark Gram. And social media is no fun without emojis!
Another idea derived from my nerdy childhood was to use the endpapers to illustrate the relative size of sharks as compared to Kai and Lehua.
Growing up in Hawaii, you'd think I'd know a little about sharks--but there was much to learn! Threshers and great whites, blacktips versus whitetip oceanics (not to be confused with whitetip reef sharks)--so many sharks! This meant a lot of research and a lot of sketching.
My favorites were the deep-sea sharks. Did you know that Hawaii has two bioluminescent (glow-in-the-dark) lanternsharks? One was recently discovered in 2017.
The final illustrations were done in Procreate on an iPad Pro, which allowed me to record the illustration process.
And the best fun is receiving a box in the mail and seeing the book for the first time!
When my copies of River Rescue arrived in the mail, I immediately flipped to the educational content at the end of the book. As an illustrator, I am sometimes asked to create spot illustrations for the back matter, but rarely do I see it in its entirety before publication. Checking River Rescue's back matter satisfied my need to learn more about a topic that I spent many months researching and illustrating: the rescue and rehabilitation of birds impacted by oil spills. And the lesson plans that Arbordale provides on their website as a supplement for parents and teachers was icing on the cake. So how does a Hawaii-based illustrator work on a book about rescuing oiled birds? With lots of help from the author, editors, and expert Lisa Smith at Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research. Before working on River Rescue, I knew little about the havoc that oil spills can wreak on our nation's waterways. Then I learned about the 2004 oil spill on the Delaware River (see inset). While transporting oil to a Philadelphia refinery, the tanker Athos I struck a submerged anchor and leaked more than 250,000 gallons of heavy oil into one of the busiest shipping complexes in North America. Thousands of birds were killed, and the incident had lasting effects on the environment.
But the study of the effect that oil spills have on wildlife began long before the Athos I accident. On the day after Christmas in 1976, a tanker ran aground on the Delaware River. 134,000 gallons of oil spilled out of the ruptured hull, creating a 25-mile-long slick that threatened 60,000 ducks and geese. "As a result, Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research was founded in 1977 to study the effects of oil on birds and to find a way to successfully treat wildlife." My first task in illustrating River Rescue was to learn more about river habitats and the birds, insects, reptiles, and fish that inhabit them, and to make sketches. I asked myself, what birds lived along the riverbanks? Were they migratory? What did they eat? How did they co-exist with other river inhabitants? Lisa Smith from Tri-State helped me along the way, making suggestions and corrections.
Next, I researched how experts rescued oil-contaminated birds. How did they hold the frightened animals? Did they wear protective clothing? What did the rescue facilities look like? Every detail, down to the gloves and goggles, was scrutinized.
The cover took several drafts.
Once the rough sketches were approved, the illustrations were completed in Procreate on an iPad Pro. I imported textured backgrounds and used brushes to make the digital illustrations look more traditional. Procreate also allowed me to take videos of the works in progress:
I hope you enjoy River Rescue as much as I enjoyed illustrating it! For more information, please visit Arbordale Publishing.
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