This is Getting Repetitious but It's Part of the Self-Publishing Business

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Today was like yesterday — I replaced another low-res jPEG with the full-sized PSD file. Okay, I’ve learned my lesson. Enough! Let’s move on!

That’s what the impatient part of me is saying, the part that quits a project when it gets tedious/repetitious/grueling/hard. I’m talking to myself when I say, I ain’t falling for that line of reasoning. I’m going to ignore the noisy propaganda coming from inside my own brain and focus on getting this project repaired and completed. One inch at a time still stands as my guiding principle.

Here’s the image I replaced today. Because I’m displaying it on a web page, the resolution looks fine, but it’s way too low for printing. What looks good on a web screen looks like crap on paper. This image is for the square print version of my book. I’m planning to use a 4:3 aspect ration for all images in my next book. It’s a decent compromise — there will be reasonable black bars on HD devices, but it will be perfection for print and the iPad.

The Lessons You Learn When You Create Your First Picture Book!

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One lesson I’ve learned, after drawing and painting Buddy Butterfly several dozen times is this: plan and simplify your detailed characters before you start drawing. Even though I did some character sketches at the beginning of this project, I didn’t anticipate that drawing a butterfly with a segmented body and delicately veined wings would create a major time management problem. When I look at my images with dozens of flowers, trees with variegated coloring, skies with lacy clouds, butterflies with exactly 44 segments for all four wings, I realize why cartoons do not have crazy details in them — they take too much time.

Lesson learned. I’m curious to see how well I apply my brilliantly obvious insight to my next picture book, which will be done with pen and ink! But I’m getting distracted with future thinking. I’m going back to work now. I’ve still got 20 more pictures to color this week!