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 Illustrating Picture Books With Acrylics
By Mark Teague
Here's how I illustrate picture books.
First come the sketches, which may be the most important part of the whole process. I sit with a text for
days, sometimes weeks, making lots of small, quick pencil drawings. In this case the story is the one I am currently working on, a sequel to Dear Mrs. LaRue. (Scholastic, 2002).
These sketches help me define my characters. They also give me ideas about what passages are most
visibly interesting and how best to put them across. I work out ideas about perspective and overall design at this point too. Design especially seems to reveal itself most clearly in small drawings. I work
through the story page by page, paying particular attention to how each image flows into the next.
Small, loose drawings are often extremely expressive. I try to preserve that expressiveness as I move from the first sketches towards the final art.
The next step is making a book "dummy", a more formal set of sketches, which approximate in pencil
what the actual paintings will look like. I share the dummy with my editor and art director, who offer comments and suggestions. Sometimes major revisions are necessary before the project is approved,
but it is much easier revising sketches than changing finished art.
When everything is approved I'm ready to paint. My pictures are usually the actual size they will appear
in the book. I use 140 lb watercolor paper and apply gesso to the surface.Gesso is a kind of paintable glue that is used to seal permeable surfaces such as canvas and paper. It is more typically used in oil
painting. Even though I use acrylic paints, I like the surface texture created by heavy brushstrokes in gesso. Often those brushstrokes are still visible in the final art.
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Next I draw my picture, using the dummy sketch as a reference but not bothering to copy too closely.
Careful copying tends to defeat the loose, playful feel I'm trying to achieve. Now I'm ready to begin painting. I use acrylic gouache paints, which I like because they are quite versatile. Heavily diluted with
water they look and behave a lot like watercolors, but they can also be applied fairly heavily, like oils. My paintings are built up using many thin washes, with thicker coats applied at the end. The final painting
won't have the translucence of oils, but it will have some of that quality.
The first color I put on is burnt sienna, which provides a warmth that can still be felt at the end. I paint
the entire drawing using only this color, establishing gradations from light to dark.
Next I put in highlights, using white paint (or sometimes gesso, which is more opaque). Then I sketch in
the darkest tones and shadows using paynes gray, which undiluted is nearly black.
This picture is somewhat unusual in that more than half the image will be black and white. The black and
white section represents a scene in the imagination of Ike the dog, a highly melodramatic character. Black and white serves to clearly differentiate the dog's daydreaming from his actual situation (a critical
element of the story), and I think it works on another level, since dogs supposedly do not see color. In terms of the art it means that much of the image will be painted using exclusively paynes gray and
white. At first I apply the colors separately, but as I begin to "beef up" the image I mix them together and with matte medium, which gives the colors more translucence.
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In the color section I also do not mix paints at first. From-the-tube colors lightly applied, help me map
out the color scheme and put colors into the underpainting (the early stages or layers)that will continue to peek through in the final art. Gradually I build the colors up. I want them to remain bright and friendly
as a contrast to the black and white, so I'm careful not to mix too many colors together, as they begin to muddy after a while.
Final work is mostly on small details, though I also spend some time "fading" the background so that the
foreground features pop out. This painting took about three days to complete. More detailed images can take five or six days. Overall I need about four months to illustrate a book. •
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About the Artist:
Mark Teague
was born in San Diego, California. He graduated from the University of California Santa Cruz with a degree in U.S. History. He is the author/illustrator of eleven books, and has illustrated about
40 books in all. Recent titles include How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon? by Jane Yolen and Dear Mrs. LaRue, Letters From Obedience School. He developed his skills without formal training. He lives in
upstate New York with his wife and two daughters.
Five recent books using the illustration technique described on this page are:
How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon? written by Jane Yolen (2002)
Dear Mrs. LaRue, Letters from Obedience School (2002)
The Great Gracie Chase written by Cynthia Rylant (2001)
How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? written by Jane Yolen (2000)
One Halloween Night (1999)
(all titles published by Scholastic)
In the Artist's Studio:
Jeff Smith, May 2006
Ann Grifalconi, December 2005
Iza Trapani, August 2005
Robert Sabuda, October 2003
Mark Teague, August 2003
Stephen Alcorn, April 2003
David Wisniewski, November 2002
Paul Zelinsky, August 2002
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