Children’s Book Drawing Illustration
HUANG YA-LING
黃
雅
玲
CONTENTS Children’s Book 02 Who broke this plate?
HUANG YA-LING
06 LUCY
10 The Mailbox Tree 14 The Wall
16 The Christmas Party 20 The Fairland
E-Book
22 Popular Ocean Science
Gift Book
26 My last 28 days in Australia
Illustration The captures of my life story I 28
HUANG YA-LING
The captures of my life story II 30
The captures of my life story III 32
The 12 Animals of the Chinese Zodiac 34
Bridge Book
The Ghost Cousin 36
Children's and Young People's Literature Illustration
T’ao Yuan-Ming: The Pastoral Poet Author 37
Children’s Book : Who broke this plate?
2 Children’s Book : Who broke this plate?
This story talks about a boy, Shiung, who claims that the plate was broken by a bad fish. His mother was angry and punished him. He therefore wants to find evidence of the fish’s crime so he asked his brother for help.
b
c
d
Choosing an ideal material This story developed from one of my cartoons I saw when i was skimming through my sketch books. At first, I wanted to do a quick comic sketch with a ball-point pen (a), I then drew with a colour pencil (b), acrylic (c), and marker pen (d) for comparison.
An advantage of acrylic is its sufficient gradation of colours. Using acrylic with colour pencil helps present a nervous pace. Although the result of drawing with marker pen (d) is interesting due to its lavish colour, it is difficult to do the foreground.
3 Children’s Book : Who broke this plate?
a
4 Children’s Book : Who broke this plate?
What is this story tryng to asy It is quite usual in Taiwan that children are punished when they make mistakes and not admit it. Parents correct and educate their children in order to avoid negative behaviors. However, in some cases, it can cross the line. Parent's mistrust and anger are the primary reason a child may lie. To response to this point of view, at the end of story the mother broke plates and experienced the same embarrassing situation.
5 Children’s Book : Who broke this plate?
Left Shiung’s brother gave him a full-length fish suit so he could trick the fish into being his friend.
Children’s Book : LUCY
6 Children’s Book : LUCY
A girl whose name is Wen was told by her classmate John, that her face will be dyed red if she ate too much tomato.
below A storyboard sketch Rumors are often spread among friends.
My idea started with my personal experience as a child when I was told that I would get a watermelon tree in my stomach if I ate the seeds. When Wen was in a panic with the thought of a red face, she decided that she would rather have a yellow face because her favorite little bear Lucy is yellow.
7 Children’s Book : LUCY
Confusing rumors
Children’s Book : LUCY Left A storyboard sketch
8 Children’s Book : LUCY
Wen doesn’t like red because her mother will be angry if she got a bad score and her hands are hurt and red.
Story arrangement I tried a few times to portray Wen’s awkward feeling with adequate material and considered colours as an important factor for arranging scenes. Hand-written words are flexible and help reveal the interesting characters of pictographic words. I chose collage as my method as I like its simplicity.
7 Children’s Book : LUCY
Above Although Wen loves strawberry, she changed to say Banna is her favorite fruit
10 Children’s Book : The Mailbox Tree
Before starting A number of houses and trees is illustrated. The tree is growing with the colour varied with the changing seasons.
Children’s Book : The Mailbox Tree
What work involved The Mailbox Tree was experimental work where, for the first time, I started with paper cuttings from newspapers and magazines. I simplified many figures and organized it considering colour, texture and position in order to make a lucid and lively story pace.
11 Children’s Book : The Mailbox Tree
What is the Mailbox Tree This story is about a tree which looks like a mailbox which brought Mr. GuBo many annoyances such as people thinking it was a mailbox and posting their letters. Eventually he got his happiness back when he opened a post office.
13 Children’s Book : The Mailbox Tree
Character setup I set up leading roles before starting any story. There are some decisive factors such as character, age, habits, lifestyle, temper and favorite things. I have to think of details; I see he/she as a good friend who I really understand. Mr. Gobo is a officer working in a small trading company. He is a 38 year old single man. His life is routine and he does not like change. He drinks orange juice and coffee for breakfast everyday. His manager at the office is bossy.
Children’s Book : The Wall
14 Children’s Book : The Wall
Duo-Duo heard some strange noises on the way to school and stopped to check it out. He found that the noises are made by animal paintings which popped out from the wall discussing solutions intensively. They complained to Duo-Duo that they have been daubed by a boy which really annoys them. At the end of the story, the boy who daubed the wall apologizes and repaints the wall. The animals are happy and got beautiful clothes.
Beginning of a story
What is this story trying to say
This is my first childrens book and the first time I used acrylic as my material. The sequential movement was used at the beginning of the story to get the reader’s attention and follow Duo-Duo’s pace when meeting those painted animals.
The idea of the story is from my childhood memory. I did nothing when I saw my classmate daubing a tree. I am not trying to emphasise the importance of citizenship education. As the boy apologized for his behavior and was forgiven by the daubed animals, it shows a different value in this ethical issue.
15 Children’s Book : The Wall
16 Children’s Book : The Christmas Party
Children’s Book : The Christmas Party
Starting with curiosity To satisfy my curiosity of oddities, I developed this story with kitchen items displaying emotion and personality. A coming Christmas keeps those little things busy preparing for a party. They have to be careful not to be noticed by the house owner. I used a quite heavy colour as I wanted to present a mystical and secret atmosphere.
18 Children’s Book : The Christmas Party
Children’s Book : The Christmas Party
Anything from life can inspired me. I always imagine what life an inanimate object can have. By imagining they have characters, i get some interesting consequences, such as a clock could be a hot-tempered lad; a pepperpot could be a gentle old man; a glass could be a fragile lady. Finally, I chose a kitchen as the place where a party is held
19 Children’s Book : The Christmas Party
Getting ideas
20 Children’s Book : The Fairyland
Children’s Book : The Fairyland This is the book which I submitted to an Imaginative Journey of a Picture Book award a few years ago. There is no written conversation and several storyboards were used. I suppose in this way, it left more to the imagination of readers.
21 Children’s Book : The Fairyland
E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
22 E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
In 2010 to 2012, I started cooperating with an oceanographer who wanted to promote popular ocean science.
a a Photosynthesis of Marine Phytoplankton
Getting through the difficulty Because I knew so little about ocean science, the difficulty was the mistakes between language communication and visual expression. Through monthly meetings and discussions with members, we managed to correct the illustrations.
c
Character Sheet
b Sketch of Photosynthesis c Diatoms character setting
First, I learned the general idea of its process and searched for some images of Phytoplankton. There is a wide range of Phytoplankton. I started by researching Diatom which is one of the prevailing species. Those unicellular Diatoms have very unique form so I spent some time to adapt to acceptable cartoons. This project aimed to encourage students to be interested in ocean science unfamiliar and
and there was an idea that those Diatoms characters should have emotions such as: shyness, tricky, noisy and friendly diatoms. By doing this, I felt that I was close to those unfamiliar and tiny lifeforms.
23 E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
b
24 E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
Microbial Loop
b A sketch of Zooplankton
25 E-Book illustration : Popular Ocean Science
a An initial sketch of a Microbial Loop It was a one-way storyboard. Thinking of a vital factor of the Microbial Loop is the concept of circulation, I converted it into a circle.
26 Gift Book : My last 28 days in Australia
Gift Book : My last 28 days in Australia During my 2 years (2012 to 2014) in Australia, I always sketched when I went out. By doing this, I have gained many experiences of the OZ lifestyle.
More than a word This book was made as a gift book to show appreciation to one of my best and cool housemates who gave me help and friendship. In counting down the last 28 days to leave Australia, I drew cards everyday in local cafes. The cards were roughly placed on each page with some photos and memories.
27 Gift Book : My last 28 days in Australia
28 Illiustration : The captures of my life story I
Illiustration : The captures of my life story I
Capturing ideas I always take a little sketch book with me as I travel so I can capture unexpected ideas whenever they pop out and I can jot down a little sketch. For the duration of my working holidays in Australia, I sketched many works as I experienced their lively lifestyle
A street light and a rubbish bin stood at a park on my daily way to work. Because of the angle, I wondered if the street light can be easily moved around by pushing the bin. Although it can be awkward to mention to friends, this kind of misunderstanding really satisfied my day.
29 Illiustration : The captures of my life story I
A misunderstanding
Illiustration : The captures of my life story II
30 Illiustration : The captures of my life story II
What is this illustration taking about Everyone are wrong? Everyone is wrong? There are many conventional regulations in our society which trained people to adapt to the regulated system. I purposely wrote ‘ are’ so as to respond to this concept. Pedestrians are well dressed and walk forward in an orderly fashion. I simply drew with pen and pencil, emphasising the red arrows with red ball-point pen so that readers easily catch the idea.
a
Reading signs in different way Both (a) and (b) indicate that signs have a profound effect on our life. People are educated to recognize their meanings. When the sign is reversed, are people wrong? Right The sign in picture (b) stops her from leaving the room which is ridiculous. Actually the sign does not really matter.
b 31 Illiustration : The captures of my life story II
32 Illiustration : The captures of my life story III
Illiustration : The captures of my life story III
This is a general phenomenon for girls that gives the message about the distortive fashion industry and social pressures
34 Illiustration : The 12 Animals of the Chinese Zodiac
Illiustration : The 12 Animals of the Chinese Zodiac It was popular for fortune-telling years ago. However, it is now quite old-fashioned and few young people would talk about it. Getting rid of the stereotype of black and white with the Chinese ink and brush, I transformed it into digital figures with intensive colours and adorable animal characters.
Illiustration : Gift card
35 Illiustration : Gift card
It was nearing the Christmas and the Dragon year of 2011. I drew cards for sending my greetings to friends. Red Santa Claus represents the Western Christmas Day while Green Dragon symbolizes the East Lunar New Year.
They get together with happiness playing musical instruments which suggests a blessing for world peace.
36 Bridge Book Illustration : The Ghost Cousin
Bridge Book Illustration : The Ghost Cousin This was the first time that I had the chance to collaborate with a writer who is known for children's literature. Through a girl’s misunderstanding where she thought her cousin was a ghost, an unexpected consequence results.
Children's and Young People's Literature Illustration : T’ao Yuan-Ming: The Pastoral Poet Author I was informed by one of the biggest Taiwan publishing companies that I received an invitation to illustration a poetry book. T’ao Yuan-Ming (AD365–427) was a Chinese poet who is often regarded as the greatest poet during the centuries of the Six Dynasties.
37 Children's and Young People's Literature Illustration : T’ao Yuan-Ming: The Pastoral Poet Author
T'ao's favorite flower was the chrysanthemum. On each page I drew a few modest images of these flowers. For instance, on one of the pages the sky is covered by clouds which looks like a chrysanthemum.
HUANG YA-LING
Thank you See you soon