The Secret of the Stone Frog

The Secret of the Stone Frog by David Nytra
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A building comes to life

TOON Books is dedicated to bringing the world of graphic novels to a younger audience. They have produced some wonderful books including the “Benny and Penny” series by Geoffrey Hayes, “Stinky” by Eleanor Davis, “Little Mouse Gets Ready,” by Jeff Smith and “Zig and Wikki in the Cow,” by Nadja Spiegelman and Trade Loeffler. The books are beautifully produced and feature art by some of the finest illustrators working in the field of comics and graphic novels. This one, written and illustrated by newcomer David Nytra is a stunner. Nytra’s black and white art, reminiscent of Winsor McKay’s “Little Nemo” comic strip from the early 20th century is incredibly detailed and full of surprises. The story starts off and ends in a child’s bed but whether what falls in between is a dream or not is left for the reader to decide. When two young children, Leah and Alan wake up in the middle of the forest, they are told by a talking stone frog how to get home. But their mysterious guide also gives them a warning: “Stay on the path!” Anyone who is familiar with the lore of fairyland knows that strange things can happen to those who stray from the path. It’s not a spoiler to tell you that it doesn’t take long for Leah and Alan to be tempted off the path, and yes, very strange things do begin to happen. They meet giant, fuzzy bees who steal words, a trio of foppish lions, giant rabbits, and some bizarre denizens of the deep sea, who ride a subway dressed in suits and top hats. Besides the aforementioned “Little Nemo,” the book’s surreal episodes also have the feel of Lewis Carrol’s “Alice in Wonderland.” This is a book I think kids will want to read over and over again. The fantastic illustrations by themselves are enough to keep readers coming back for repeat viewings. I loved this book!

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Illustration Friday - Bottled

It's been a few weeks since I've had time to work on an Illustration Friday challenge, but now that the Handmade Market that I was preparing for is over, I've got a little more time. This week's challenge is the word 'Bottled,' and the first thing that came to my mind when I read it, was the bottled city of Kandor from the silver age 'Superman' comics. For those of you who have not kept up on Superman lore, Kandor was a kryptonian city that was reduced to miniature size and placed in a large bottle by the space villain, Brainiac. Superman kept the city and its bottled inhabitants in his Fortress of Solitude in the Arctic. He made a vow to himself that one day he would find a way to enlarge it and its miniaturized inhabitants back to their normal size. I was a big Superman fan back in the mid sixties when I was a pre-teen, and to this day I still enjoy reading stories from that era. I haven't read Superman regularly for years, but from what I've read in The Essential Superman Encylopedia, by Robert Greenberger and Martin Pasko, the city was finally restored to normal size sometime in the late seventies or early eighties.

So my illustration this week is my tribute to the bottle city of Kandor. I created the image using both Corel Painter and Adobe Photoshop. I did all of the preliminary work in Painter and then used Photoshop to apply a 'Mister Retro' filter that gave it the look of a vintage printed graphic.  I hope you enjoy it.

Below is the original digital watercolor that I created in Painter, before I applied the text and the Photoshop filters.

Illustration Friday - Spent

On top of keeping our dog out of trouble, I've been so busy with other projects that I'm late posting this week's 'Illustration Friday' challenge which is the word "Spent." I ended up going with my first thought which was to depict a scene of how a boy spent his saturday, in this case, reading his stash of old comic books. I guess you could say that this illustration is somewhat autobiographical, since that is how I spent many a Saturday as a kid, not to mention days when I was sick and stayed home from school.

The image was created digitally using Corel Painter's water color brushes and a leaky pen brush that I modified somewhat. Below is the original digital pencil sketch that I started with and used as my guide for the finished piece. Beneath that is an intermediate stage where you can still see the pencil sketch showing through.