2008 November

papertigers.org

We’ve recently discovered a very nicely done website that is about books for young readers with a special focus on the Pacific Rim and South Asia. But this month they feature several articles on the themes of “war, peace and social justice” in relation to children’s books. And they’ve included an article written by Lita!

In the introduction to the articles they ask, “How can we help children to cope with the divisiveness and contradictions at play in the world today? And how can we help them to feel that they have the power to change things for the better?… At no other time in recent history have these themes been more relevant or their challenges more urgent than they are now. ”

Here are links to the articles:

Books for Thought and Action: A Taste of Jane Addams’ Legacy
by Jo Montie

Learning That War Is Not a Game
by Kathy Beckwith

Finding One Thousand Tracings
by Lita Judge (reprinted with permission)

… and from the PaperTiger archives: Strengthening the Good, Stamping Out the Bad: Children’s Books & Good Causes

They also have a blog here so please take a look.

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Creative Process: Developing Characters — Part 2

For the second part to my series on developing characters, I thought I’d discuss the process of developing my animal characters for Pennies for Elephants. As I mentioned before, this book takes place in Boston, 1914. I demonstrated how I developed my little girl in the first part. This story also has three elephant characters. The children in the story are painted in a style which is not realistic, but rather reminiscent of an old fashioned style. Because they weren’t realistic, my elephants couldn’t be realistic either. I needed to make them slightly anthropomorphic to fit with the style of the children, but still real enough so my readers feel they were true characters.

I started as I always do by gathering reference. I found an elephant named Dinde, and her trainer was happy to work with me. Dinde did tricks and took poses that I needed for the book.

And since the characters in my book got to ride elephants… so did I! That’s the best part of creating my characters – immersing myself into the role so I can bring life to my sketches.

After working with Dinde, I was ready to begin sketching. I did hundreds, searching for the proper style to fit the children in the book and finding enough expression in the elephants faces to bring them to life. The sketches often start very crude and simple, then slowly build in character and detail.