About 8 years ago, I sent the Angel story to several animation companies who all advised that I should create it as a book first to find an audience as they thought it would be difficult to fund without proof of readership. So I set about rewriting the story as a book. Storybook apps were just emerging and I saw this as a middle ground between animation and books. The idea of publishing the story myself really appealed to me. I could be proactive, join with like-minded creatives, see my story come to life as I imagined it. And so, while I researched how to create a picture book, we created the app and I couldn't quite believe it had happened. This Angel who had danced around my mind for years was finally smiling at me from the screen and if I tapped her, she moved! More importantly, I sat with children as they read the story and saw the smiles on their faces. That, for me, was what it was all about.
So, now, on to the picture book. When I was little my favourite book in the world was The Story of Father Christmas by Ann and Dennis Mallet. It made me feel so cosy and comforted and I would love the Angel's Great Escape picture book to make children feel the same way. Having published the story as an app, I'd like to share the story with more children, to reach those who don't have an iPad, whose parents prefer books. And I'd like And So We Begin to take it's first steps towards becoming a traditional publisher. Stories come in all shapes and sizes, apps and books. Even though I am essentially self-publishing, I like Joanna Penn's thinking of it as independent publishing. It is far from simply myself creating this book. I am slowly establishing a lovely team around me who care as much as I do about the book and who are all contributing to making the book as good as it can be.
So after a rather rambling introduction, here are three stages we have been through with the book on it's journey so far.
1. Illustrations
Self-publishing has really opened up for novelists with the use of CreateSpace and Lightning Source so writers can be completely independent if they choose to be. But a picture book isn't quite so straight-forward. The finished product needs to be a perfect balance of words and pictures, with the two feeling as if they were always meant to be together. I had already commissioned the fabulous Kristyna Litten to illustrate the app and chatted to her agent at Arena about amending the contract to incorporate the use of the illustrations in a picture book too. Luckily, Kristyna's illustrations for the app were already high resolution and print ready due to the requirements for this for the retina display on the iPad.
So how can you find the right illustrator for you? When I was first looking for an illustrator, I went to graduate illustration shows such as the Cambridge School of Art MA Show to seek out emerging talent and I also spent a long time loitering in bookshops browsing through the picture book shelf seeing what style felt right. Karen Inglis has written a great blog post about her own journey and reveals that she found her illustrator through Elance. In the end, it was Arena Illustration who recommended Kristyna to me saying they thought her style would fit the story and as soon as I saw her sample sketches, I knew they were right. The picture below is just a tiny peek but you can see how close the original designs were to our finished product.