The Boy and the Wolves

Its been quite a few weeks since I illustrated one of the stories from my Fairytales from around the World book! Today I've created an illustration for The Boy and the Wolves. This is a pretty short and not too cheery tale of a boy who is abandoned by his siblings after his father's death, left to live in the woods and slowly turns into a wolf as a result! ( I did say it wasn't very cheery!)

So I've illustrated the boy becoming a wolf and becoming a part of the forests surrounding him:

I've got a few more fairytale illustrations lined up so hopefully it won't be as long this time until the next one!

Queen of Hearts

For day 24 of #the100dayproject I illustrated a character design for the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland.

Rather than leave her in my sketchbook I thought I'd scan her in, give her some colour, and turn her in to a playing card design!

You can keep up to date with the project over on Instagram with the tag #emi100characters

And see another character I developed in to a finished illustration here.

Rosanella

This week's fairytale was Rosanella, a lovely story involving beautiful maidens, fairies, roses and giant bumble bees.

I've illustrated one of the maidens being carried away by the bees, surrounded by 12 roses representing each of the maidens and their lovely qualities, that altogether make up the beautiful Rosanella.

The Nettle Spinner

In an attempt to catch up after a few missed weeks, I'm back today with another new Fairytales from around the World illustration to share.

The Nettle Spinner

I went for quite a simple image for this one, just illustrating the title of the story and the main objects within it. I'd see this being used on a book cover or a title page for the story.

Little Golden Hood

I've gotten a little behind on my Fairytales form around the World series and haven't shared a new illustration for it for a few weeks now. So this week I'm catching up and I'll be sharing illustrations from two fairytales, starting with this one:

The True History of Little Golden Hood

This is a re-telling of the story of Little Red Riding Hood, in which the main character wears a golden coloured cloak instead of red, and her and her Grandmother are the stronger characters and are victorious over the wolf (trapping him in a well at the end)

For this one I revisited the characters I created for my University work and illustrated Little Golden Hood as a deer in the woods.

I'll be back in a few days with another new fairytale illustration!

Drakestail

This week's fairytale was a new one to me: Drakestail.

Its about a small duck who is owed money by the King. He hides various "friends" inside himself so they can help him when he confronts the king. Its a little weird but makes sense by the end!

I've illustrated a silhouette of Drakestail made up of the "friends" that help him: the Fox, the ladder, the river and the wasps.

Jack and the Beanstalk

This week I have two illustrations for the latest fairytale from the Fairytales Around the World book, Jack in the Beanstalk. 

I haven't illustrated a quote yet in this series so I thought I'd change that and create something with the most well known line from the story: "Fe, fa, fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman"

Surrounding the quote is a pattern made up of the beanstalk and a cow pattern, representing the cow that Jack sells to obtain the beans at the very start of the story.

 The second illustration for Jack and the Beanstalk is of the items that Jack steals from the Giant after seeing them through the keyhole of the wardrobe in which he is hiding.

Soria Moria Castle

This week's fairytale was Soria Moria Castle.

I'd never heard of this one before so had no idea what to expect when I started reading. It turned out to be filled magnificent castles and enchanted objects (and multi-headed trolls!)

I created two illustrations for this one...

The three castles amongst the rolling hillside. The number of flags on the top of each castle represents the troll inhabiting it (and the number of heads he has!)

This one is a pattern made up of all the objects and spells that Halvor uses throughout the story:

The sword that kills the trolls, the drink that gives him the strength to do so, the ring that takes him home, the boots that help him walk, and the wind and moon that guide him on his way.

Blue Beard

This illustration isn't technically based on the story of Blue Beard. As I mentioned at the end of last week's post, its a pretty unpleasant story (read: locked up room full of dead ex-wives!)

However, I didn't want to skip another story just yet, and there's a line that's repeated a few times in the story that gave me an idea for a simple illustration:

"I see nothing but the sun, which makes a dust, and the grass, which looks green."

I'll be back again next week with the next fairytale!

Toads and Diamonds

In my last Fairytales from around the World post I said that the next story I'd be illustrating was the History of Whittington. After reading it and spending a few days putting off making a start on the illustration I decided to skip that one as no ideas were coming to mind!

I've counted and there are enough stories in the book to last me two years if I keep illustrating every single one, one a week! So I've decided to be a little less strict and skip any that don't appeal.

The next story in the book was Toads and Diamonds. Its a very short story but full of imagery and it didn't take long to get the idea for this illustration. The girl in the story is given a gift:

"At every word you speak, there shall come out of your mouth either a flower or a jewel."

Her sister was given the opposite punishment of snakes and toads, but I thought this one would be much nicer to illustrate!

The next story in the book is Blue Beard. I'm not sure how that one will go as I know its a pretty unpleasant story!

Puss in Boots

This week's fairytale is Puss in Boots (or The Master Cat).

The original idea for this one was a simple character illustration, however after reading the story through I went with an image of the cat performing a slight twist on one of his current tricks. Here he is with a bag of corn to lure in the partridges...

Next week is The History of Whittington.

Beauty and the Beast

I'm a week late with the Fairytales from around the World illustration as I had a horrible cold last week and didn't get as much done as usual!

I had a quite a few ideas for this one but the time restraints meant I've just picked one. But I may return to this story later on and try out my other ideas!

So here's my illustration for the third story in the book:

Beauty and the Beast

Next up is Puss in Boots!

Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp

Happy Friday!

Today I'm back with the second instalment of my new illustration series (read the first one here)

This week's fairytale is Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp.

I've created two illustrations for this story: 

-A book cover design

- An image based on the description of where the lamp is initially seen: "These halls lead into a garden of fine fruit trees. Walk on until you come to a niche in a terrace where stands a lighted lamp."

Next week's fairytale is Beauty and the Beast.

East of the Sun and West of the Moon

One of my favourite Christmas presents from Jamie this year was a beautiful book of Fairytales from around the World. As much as I want to start reading it right away I decided to put it aside until the New Year, and to read one at a time and create some illustrations based on each one.

So this is the first post a new series 'Fairytales from around the World'.

Sometimes I'll just be doing the one illustrations, other times I'll do several. I'm hoping to do a combination of full illustrations, patterns, book cover designs and mini comics, so I should have a big variety of things to share in the next few months!

First up was East of the Sun and West of the Moon.

As I read through the story I made notes of all the interesting descriptions , scenes and objects, and came with ideas for four illustrations:

The girl riding away on the Great White Bear

The door of the castle in the foot of the mountain

A pattern made up of the three golden objects she was given to help her

And finally, the North Wind blowing over the storm, East of the Sun and West of the Moon 

The next story is Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp. I'll be back soon with some illustrations for that one!

Illustration Friday: Ink

My submission for Illustration Friday this week was quite a simple one, as I've been busy getting lots of new products up in the shop and preparing for Crafty Fox Markets.

The theme this week was "ink" so I went with a simple scroll and dip pen with the words "Once Upon a Time". This one was again a little bit inspired by the TV show by the same name, and the character of "the author". (If you love fairytales and haven't watched Once Upon a Time yet, you definitely should!) 

New Illustration: Enchanted Forest

I've been catching up with Once Upon a Time while I'm working this week, which inspired me (along with my general love for anything fairytale related) to illustrate an 'Enchanted Forest'.

Imagine a swarm of fairies hiding amongst the leaves and big bad wolf hiding behind the trees...

Illustration Friday: Villain

I actually had quite a few ideas for this week's Illustration Friday prompt, 'Villain'. Any good fairytale always involves a villain so there were plenty to choose from! I picked the witch from Hansel and Gretel, as I've wanted to use that story in one of my illustrations for a while but hadn't had the opportunity. 

I've illustrated Hansel and Gretel peering through the window of the gingerbread house (of course complete with one of my favourite sweets, snowies, and my favourite biscuits, chocolate bourbons!) to see the witch cooking up a spell in her cauldron.

I've got plenty of new work to share over the next few weeks as well as another look inside my sketchbook pages very soon.

And of course I'll be back next week with another Illustration Friday piece to show you.

Illustration Friday: Work

I'm nearly back on track after my holiday! I came back to a little flurry of orders in my Etsy shop which has taken up a bit of my time this week, but I'm slowly getting on top of things now.

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is 'Work'. I was a bit stuck with this one to begin with, as work isn't something thats mentioned much in fairytales! The two ideas I cam up with were the seven dwarfs and "whistle while you work" from Disney's version of Snow White, and the woodsman chopping up trees in Little Red Riding Hood.

I went with the Little Red Riding Hood idea but including a little bird with musical notes as a nod to the "whistle while you work" idea.

Illustration Friday: Pointy

This week's Illustration Friday prompt was 'Pointy'. All of my initial ideas were pretty similar to those that I had for 'Sharp' (the prompt for the first week I took part). One of the first new ideas that came to mind was a wolf, with its pointy eyes and pointy teeth, so I went with Little Red Riding Hood as my inspiration this week.

I've illustrated Little Red Riding Hood approaching her Grandmother's cottage, with the wolf watching her from the inside.

I've also included a slightly adapted quote from the story, replacing the word "big" with "pointy" to say "My, what pointy teeth you have..."

I won't be taking part in Illustration Friday next week as I'm away in Norway (unless I really like the prompt next week in which case I might create something for it once I'm back anyway!)

The blog will be pretty quiet next week while I'm away but I'll have plenty of things to share once I'm back the following week!

Illustration Friday: Nature

This week's Illustration Friday prompt was 'Nature'.

I struggled to come up with something for this one. Nature features in most of my work and its one of my main inspirations, but I didn't want to just draw another forest or bunch of flowers.

I also had to find a way of relating it to a fairytale or story which made it even harder not to do anything too obvious. I went through several ideas involving trees, apples, animals etc but they were all something I had done before. In the end I decided to illustrate something with nature where it wouldn't normally be: In Rapunzel's hair.

The idea is that she has been sat in the tower for so long that her hair has become connected with her surroundings, and she is now a part of the nature. I also added in her holding an apple, and a framed picture of a flower on the wall so those symbols were still included.

I realised after I'd finished this that I've ended up using the same colour palette as last week, oops! I'll aim to make next week's one quite different.

I've been enjoying taking part in Illustration Friday so far, and I love opening that e-mail on a Friday to see what the next prompt will be! Hopefully I'll be keeping this up for a while longer.