In which it takes cutting out a surprising number of chains of paper-dolls to get just the right look.
A deceptively simple piece of a art for a very exciting new project from Serial Box!
And here are just a few of the progress stages!
Here is the cover art for the final episode of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
The final episode of a season is almost as difficult to illustrate as the overall season cover. How to represent what happens in this particular episode, while being true to the overall arc of the season and catching the right elegiac or hopeful note…
As a result, there were a lot of thumbnail sketches.
We went with the image of a Kinwiinik ship taking to the waves. Here are the final pencils.
And at last, alas, the finished cover (I’m particularly fond of the poppies). The final layout and design is, as ever, by Charles Orr.
(And remember, patrons on Patreon get early previews of some projects).
Here is the cover art for the next two episodes of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
Episode 11 or The One In Which Nothing Good Happens. Since I read manuscripts to look for images to illustrate, my reader-reaction is usually somewhat muted. Not in Episode 11. I’ve obviously read Season 1, but also I’ve read the novels that are set later, and suddenly a whole lot of events started rushing together to squish my beloved characters.
I had to keep putting the manuscript down to worry, and then read on with my hand covering the bottom of the page so I couldn’t spoil it for myself. If you click on this link it should take you to the Twitter thread of me mostly just gasping and hiding under the sofa cushions:
However! We decided to go with the silhouette of the city, looking back to the original cover for episode 1.
And it was so much fun to cut out. Sort of a Schroedinger’s Advent Calendar.
Here’s a detail:
To avoid spoilers for episode 11, I have cut off all the captions for the thumbnails for episode 12.
But you can probably guess life isn’t great for all our characters.
Not great at all.
(And remember, you can see behind-the-scenes peeks of future art if you become a patron through Patreon.)
Here is the cover art for the next two episodes of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
So much drama! And everything is winding towards the TERRIBLE EVENTS of the last episodes.
So we went for pure drama – a scene at the theatre, and lots of fun to be had with draperies, fringes and evil leaning gentlemen.
And getting confused by all the curly bits.
I should have put together a selection of Diane reaction shots from these thumbnails. She’s such a contained, boiling character.
We had a bit of difficulties narrowing this one down – I ended up putting together full pencils for two of the thumbnail designs, and two of one image, because old fashioned locks aren’t always easily identifiable as such, especially at a small scale (worth image searching, though – so lovely).
In the end we decided on Kaab, emoting.
Here is the cover art for the next two episodes of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
I still have a soft spot for thumbnail D, with Rafe and Kaab rolling drunkenly through the streets.
The image we chose was that of the game of strategy – Shesh, not quite chess. It is always enormous fun devising glimpsed bits of games.
Although the border was quite fiddly to cut out!
Apparently I was going through a phase of wanting to draw brawls. It would still have been fun! There were a lot of nuances and connections to earlier (and Season 1) episodes, so more thumbnails than usual.
We settled with the bird, which I promptly realised would not be as simple to cut out as it seemed at the time! It was definitely one of those situations in which one begins to appreciate Peter de Sève’s statement that “An artist’s drawing is a catalog of the shapes that he loves. When I’m drawing something, I’m trying to find the shapes that please me. I believe that’s what makes up what people refer to as a style”.
And I am very happy with it! I love those swirls around the bird (as with the other covers, it was all cut as one silhouette and areas selected for recolouring after it was scanned in). It obviously owes a lot to the “whiplash” of Art Nouveau style.
And remember, you can see behind-the-scenes peaks of future art if you become a patreon through Patreon.
Here is the cover art for the next two episodes of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
Episode 5 had some lovely floral imagery, but fortunately Serial Box restrained me from getting too wild with kingfishers in mid-flight, and other embroidered details from the episode.
I still rather like the little Kaab middle left, and Micah, Tess and Kaab at the bottom right, but then I’m very fond of Micah.
But I was pretty happy with the final selection, and still have vague thoughts that it would make a nice crewel embroidery.
As with almost all the episodes, the final image was cut in one piece of black paper, with colour added digitally afterwards. With many of the covers I’ve selected parts to be coloured. In this case, however, the colour was simply added to spaces in the image: the black is all of the original cut-paper.
Episode 6 had some rather fabulous introductions, and I would like the chance to illustrate the opinionated, angular woman at the bottom right and middle one day.
But this image, with its flowing draperies and a chance to attempt an impression of transparency in black paper was the final selection (and a good thing, since she showed up first in the thumbnails for Episode 3, and there was a chance she’d have kept returning indefinitely).
Again, she was cut in one piece. Once the image was scanned and tidied, I chose areas to recolour.
Here is the cover art for the next two episodes of Season 2 of Serial Box’s serialised prequel to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, Tremontaine!
Earlier posts:
I’ve cropped the descriptions out of the thumbnail sketches, in case of spoilers, but as you can see there is quite a variety of actions in each episode (it is an ensemble cast). I make notes on the printed draft as I read the manuscript, then narrow it down to a few thumbnail sketches from which Serial Box can choose. There are quite a few considerations: what appeals to me, what I can practically achieve, what summarises (or at least doesn’t detract from) the main theme of the episode, how it connects to previous episodes and to future ones (which I may not have read yet), how it fits in the sequence of images…
Here we went with the second (top right) image, but the third (lower left) made its way into a later cover.
Sometimes the image is directly from the episode (as above). At other times we choose something more thematic (I’m still fond of the fancy fighters on the lower right, however).
I posted a couple weeks ago about the cover art for the new season of Tremontaine. Following this, I set to work on the individual episodes.
I did quite a few sketches for the first cover, sounding out the direction in which the art would go this season.
We began with the fan – I’ve always wanted to do a fan design (and I did cut out the whole image, although it’s cropped here).
Episode two, then, we began to introduce more action.
The images are cut as a single silhouette, but I separate them into coloured areas so that the Serial Box design team can adjust them for the overall continuing design.
It is also a lovely excuse to go to parks and sketch swordplay.
And may I say, if you thought the writing was good in season 1, the authors have levelled up in season 2.
For more behind-the-scenes fancasting, dresses, swords and http://oh-fee-oh-my.tumblr.com/‘s cartoon reactions, check out http://tremontainetheserial.tumblr.com
Season two of Tremontaine, the prequel series to Ellen Kushner’s Riverside novels, is on its way from Serial Box, beginning October 19.
You may recognise the style from the covers I did for Season One (see also Tor.com’s post on that art).
This year, however, we’re cooking in colour!
I had a lot of fun with this image. A second season can expand out into the world or drill down into characters. This season pulls in more countries and cultures of the world beyond Riverside, but these add to the force and layers of what is happening to our spies and chocolate merchants, duchesses and politicians, swordsmen, forgers, mathematicians, scholars…
Once a final thumbnail was chosen and the sketch approved, the process proceeded much as for the previous covers. I still cut it as one piece, but this season we are reserving key areas for the highlight colour.
22-29 Jan on Twitter etc
Kathleen Jennings 