Children’s book illustrators — draw your pets. That’s our message for today.
He really did have a pet mouse while working at Laugh-O-Gram, his commercial animation studio in Kansas City.
And when Universal Studios, his cartoon film distributor snatched away the rights tothe Oswald the Rabbitcharacter, which he’d developed with his animator partner Ubbe Iwerks, he started making doodle sketches of Oswald’s replacement — an innocent, irreverently childlike mouse.
Iwerks re-drew and simplified the character to make him easier to animate. But although the final artwork on the screen was Iwerks’ — the personality and “soul” of the mouse came from its creator, Walt Disney.
The first two cartoons featuring Mickey Mouse could not even find distribution. But when Disney and Iwerks added music and a voice to the third animated short, Steamboat Willie Mickey became an “overnight” sensation.
Mickey’s recorded voice, by the way, was actually Disney’s — and he continued to provide Mickey’s distinct vocals until 1947.
Mickey continued to lead the way for short sound cartoons through the 1930s and 1940s. Metaphorically speaking, he still leads.
Trivia question of the day: Mickey was not the first moniker picked for the mouse. Do you know Mickey’s original name?
Leave your answer in a comment.
We’ll randomly pick one of the comments (it must contain the correct answer) next Wednesday, May 2, 2012.
Children’s book illustrators and aspiring illustrators were among those who tuned in from the U.S. to Portugal, and Australia to South Africa Saturday morning (Texas time) for an online class on the InteractBuilder software.
They were learning about a new venue for their narrative art: A new kind of book for iPads, iPhones and other touch screen gadgets.
Such books combine elements of an illustrated storybook, e-book, game app and toy for a new kind of reading and learning that engages with your fingertips.
Videos shown on this post today are not InteractBook brand books and were not made with InteractBuilder. They were made by other book app publishers. But they give an idea of the interactive book experience. We’ll see some InteractBook examples in the next post, including winning entries of the InteractBuilder Contest that concluded in October.
The classes, which are free, amount to a complete training on InteractBuilder.
This software is presently offered at no charge to individual “book builders”, developer and company founder Ezra Weinstein said Saturday.
You’ll learn enough in the class series to be able to build your own digital book on your PC or Mac — and in plenty of time to enter your creation in the 2nd InteractBook Contest, he said.
He announced the new contest in Saturday’s class. Deadline: April 1, 2012.
First prize: a new iMac and an iPad2, so the winning author-illustrator can go into digital book production on a grand scale (with a little help, maybe from the online InteractBuilder Publisher’s Community.)
(Note: Although you can download the software and build an InteractBook on your computer, you need an iPad or an iPhone to test how it will function on the interactive tablets and devices — their sensitive touch screens are key to the interactive book experience.)
The company is working on a simulator for the PC, however.
Also it expects to have the InteractBuilder software ready to work for Android tablets (such as theKindle Fire) sometime next year, Weinstein said.
“I knew I was behind in tech knowledge. I just never dreamed how very far behind,” said a student after the two hour introductory class Saturday.
The series of trainings aims to bridge the knowledge gap and inspire illustrators and writers to think about a new kind of content — unfamiliar and perhaps even a bit unfathomable to those of us who grew up with paper books, but not mysterious or strange to a new generation of young readers.
On Saturday Ezra showed how to assemble a page with text and images (created in tools like Photoshop and Gimp) and bring it to captivating interactive life using the InteractiveBuilder dashboard.
He introduced the building blocks for structuring the reading experience of an InteractBook: Elements, Intersections, Interactions and Behaviors.
He also explained how the publishing business model would work for creators.
For example, if your book sells for U.S. $1 on Apple iTunes in the InteractBooks store, Apple will get its cut — 30 percent.
InteractBooks, as publisher would take 21 percent.
The author-illustrator would receive what’s left — 49 percent.
Grandpa and Rufus from "It's Time for Carrots"
Illustrators could generate additional revenues from the sale of bookshelf designs and shelf “decorations.” Think: Stickers. Virtual bracelet charms. Pokemon. Hello Kitty.
A book would not have to begin and end its life as strictly InteractBook virtual property, either.
“You own the copyright so you are free to take your book to other delivery platforms — e-books, audio books, paper books.” Weinstein said. “In fact, we encourage you to do so.”
And he offered an editorial tip to book builders: “Try not to distance the reader from the story” with all the distracting interactive features one of these books can offer, he said.
“You could put a your activity or little game at the end of the book, or something in the middle. We feel that the story is the most important thing.”
Eight week online class on InteractBuilder
This Saturday, April 17, Weinstein will teach the second of the eight free classeson how to produce an interactive illustrated children’s book for the iPad, iPhone and other touch screen devices using InteractBuildersoftware.
The class continues live on Saturday mornings (10:00 a.m. U.S. Central Time.)
See more details, a class schedule and a replay of this past Saturday’s class here.
From idea to iTunes
Discover how author-illustrator David Tribble produced his technology themed-picture book Lord of the Scribes for the iPad, using Apple’s Fixed Layout ePub.
He shares his processin the replay of an online presentation that he gave to “Marks and Splashes” students on Monday. See more.
Normally,Marsha Riti, who illustrated the new children’s picture book The Picky Little Witch penned by Elizabeth Brokamp (Pelican Press) does not sport pink platinum hair.
Marsha surrounded by her colleagues from the Austin SCBWI Girllustrators at the signing of “The Picky Little Witch” by Elizabeth Brokamp at BookPeople
But it was a costume bash/book launch and the celebrated independent Austin bookseller BookPeople is always up for a party and a crowd on its second floor.
Author-illustrator Shelley Ann Jackson and a hula girl friend.
Illustrators Amy Farrier and Emma Virjan with Marsha.
Illustrator Lalena Fisher and a little witch friend.
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All of us at last week’s group critique session for the “Marks and Splashes” course learned some lessons about professional mindset from illustrator Karien Naude. She co-moderated the critique with me from her home in Johannesburg, South Africa. Read our interview with Karien and see some examples of her marvelously fresh work in this week’s How to Be a Children’s Book Illustrator blog. Check her Alice in Wonderland — drawn in ink with nylon tip pen on paper, then colored on the computer with Corel Painter software.
