Storybook Illustration

This was an illustration done involving a friend's pets in a narrative play on story of the Chinese Zodiac. The aim of the illustration was to have the pets involved in a scenario similar to the story and overall appear as if it were almost out of an old school children's book as I always really liked those watercolour pictures and how they helped tell a story. To create the watercolour effect, I would roughly paint portions of the character colours, then use a mixer brush to digitally smudge the colours together.

The story tells of a race and how it decided which Chinese new years come first (i.e year of the rat). Towards the race's finish, all animals had to cross a river to get to the other side. Here, both the rabbits and the dogs are playfully stood by the water's edge, before they decide to cross. I was lucky enough that dogs and rabbits are actually secret friends according to the Chinese Zodiac story, so the pets all worked well together in this narrative.