Frances McKay Illustration

Happy New Year !

Happy New Year All !

Illustration by Henning Lohlein

Donough O' Malley's editorial work

When not drawing cuddly creatures or pesky kids, I spend my time thrashing out some editorial illustrations for a number of publications.

?Nichts fuer Weicheier?.

In September my latest book (cover) is going to be released. This is my first book cover for 10-year-old boys. When Maya Geis, my editor from Oetinger Publishing House called me on the phone I was very surprised. She had only seen my illustrations for small children and my newspaper illustrations. But she said she thought I would do a good job on this bookcover, so I felt encouraged to do my best on it.

The Guardian - Buy of the day!

Just as I am gluing the word “end” on the final page of “A Frisbee to Fly”, the latest of Secret Seed Society books, I was very excited to hear that they have been featured on the Guardian as the “buy of the day”! 

Donough and The World of Norm

Who remembers what it was like to be a young lad? Well maybe if you are of the Lady persuasion it might be a stretch to do so, but if you are a man/boy like me(and we are many) it can all seem far far too close to recall. Someone else who seems to have a perfect insight into the world of the pre-teen boy is the writer, comedian, actor and all round creative type Jonathan Meres.

Wilma Tenderfoot and The Fatal Phantom

 
I've just completed my first project with Frances which I'm chuffed about. I'm happy for two reasons, firstly it was a project I got after only an hour of signing up with Frances, and secondly because the book I got to illustrate is such a good read. The work involved black and white chapter headings and some 'clue boards' for Emma Kennedy's novel 'Wilma Tenderfoot and The Fatal Phantom'. This is the third book in a series published by Macmillan.
The first two books are called 'Wilma and the Case of the Frozen Hearts' and 'Wilma Tenderfoot and the case of the Putrid Poison' and were both illustrated by Sylvian Marc.  I hope Sylvian isn't too dismayed at my take on his existing characters. All three books do stand alone as novels in their own right, whilst at the same time there is a rather good narrative arc throughout the series. If you want to read them all, and you haven't read the first two yet, the timing could be just about right as The Fatal Phantom hits the shelves this November.

 
Thanks for reading about the new boys efforts, I will always try to do better.

Tom.

Inkymess

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Insecure Caterpillars and Slightly Mad Crabs

Phew! Just finished a book for the RSPB. Over 100 full-colour gag illustrations on the subject off, well – everything actually. But a short list would include juggling woodlice, woodpecker burgers, insecure caterpillars, angry mushrooms, skateboarding slugs, grasshoppers in bandages, slightly mad crabs, woodpecker poo and unexploded seeds. (It's amazing what you don't know you can't draw until you try).

It's odd. There are some things that even after all these years I just can't draw. I've no problem with cartoon horses, or bears, or dogs, or people, or elephants. They hold no fear for me. On the other hand, I can't draw cats or birds at all. I mean, I really can't!. I once did a job for Aardman animation, and spent weeks drawing hundreds and hundreds of cats. I looked at endless reference books, but at the end of it I still hadn't produced a single illustration which I liked (or frankly looked anything like a cat). Weird.

On top of producing so many humorous (hopefully) illustrations in a very short space of time, there was the added complication of getting to grips with the new program that I mentioned in my previous post. I'm now fully up to speed on this, and it's proving to be a godsend.

Anyway, here are a couple of my favourite gags from the book. I came up with most of them but I have to give credit where it's due, the author came up with the fork in the road joke, which still makes me laugh.

All the best

John

Die Oma im Drachenbauch (The Grandmother in the Dragon Belly)

These are some black and white images, for a collection of short stories written by Gudrun Pausewang, and published in the autumn by Gerstenberg, Germany. I really enjoyed working in black and white, and would love to do more work like that. It is so much faster than colour illustrations. The drawings were combined with photography to give the pictures more texture.

Henning Löhlein

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