Patriotic Book

So I'm sharing a few sneak peaks at a book I have coming out this June. I've shown a couple of things over the past year but it's all finished and at the printers. I've seen some color proofs and I am sooooo excited about this book. It's been a growing experience for me since I don't think of myself as a wonderful watercolorist...especially in regards to landscapes. But this book had a lot of landscape type backgrounds so what else could I do but stretch and learn (it was all my idea in the first place...crazy me).

So I had this idea. I took a landscape watercolor painting course. I practiced. I sketched. And then...

After a lot of research and looking at pictures and recalling childhood trips across country, out came the book in tiny thumbnail sketch form. I'll show you the art process for one of the book's illustrations.

tiny 1x2 inch thumbnail of Kansas illustration

printed out the sketch I drew onto watercolor paper...ready to paint the foreground elements

main elements painted

now time for the background landscape

cornfields under a  big Kansas sky. 

ready to scan in and join up

You'll have to wait to see the background and foreground all put together in the book. I wish I could show you right now. But...

Here are some peaks at a few more as they were in progress at one stage or another. Bonus points if you can guess where the locations are without seeing the full view. Good luck! (Can't wait to show you the rest!)

So I take the backgrounds I paint and the foreground objects I paint and put them together in Photoshop.