2 minutes reading time (368 words)

When Illustrator Meets Manuscript by Sandra Severgnini.

In my last blog post, I shared the story behind my latest picture book, In the Shadow of an Elephant.

Now I would like to share with you Sandra's creative process as the illustrator of our book.  

I also recommend visiting Sandra's website to view more of her fantastic work. www.severgnini.com. 

Over to Sandra.

Anyone that knows me is aware that I love animals.

And, I particularly love elephants.

So, I was ecstatic when Little Pink Dog books asked me to illustrate the story 'In the Shadow of an Elephant'.

My emotions took a huge swing when I actually read the script. 
I cried.

Not because I was unhappy, but because Georgie Donaghey has written such a beautiful tender story. 

Being a visual person, I immediately saw the images form as I read. The special love between Lualani and her Mother, the love between Jabari and his father and then the lifelong love of Jabari and Lualani. These were all inspirational and I'm pleased to say not much changed from the original roughs. 

We trimmed Jabari's hair and aged him a bit more (see above sketch) but generally the whole illustration process went quite smoothly.

Now, the issue with illustrating elephants is they have a very small color range – Grey.

And there were a lot of elephants in the book. 

So I did some research and came up with an African inspired colored band that runs through the book. I then used these colors throughout to add interest to each page. 

The other thing I love is my pencil. I put it to full use here and spent some very meditative time coloring in. Creating the elephant's skin, wrinkles and all. 

I am so appreciative of little Pink Dog Books for not just trusting me with this special story, but also allowing me such artistic freedom to bring Lualani and Jabari to visual life, in my way. 

It's been a real pleasure working on this book and I feel the love and passion from all involved has created a book that will be treasured.


In the Shadow of an Elephant due for release 1 April 2019 can be ordered through Little Pink Dog Books. littlepinkdogbooks.com

In the Shadow of an Elephant launch.
The Story Behind the Story - In the Shadow of an E...
 

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Tuesday, 19 March 2024

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