ABOUT

This project was created for the Macmillan Illustration Competition while I was studying at De Montfort University. Although it did not place, I am still very pleased with the outcome and many of the techniques I learned during this process I intend to apply to future projects. The competition required us to illustrate a piece of work, so I chose 'the Owl and the Pussycat' poem by Edward Lear. I wanted this traditional poem to have a modern edge so I decided to change the setting and have the Owl and Pussycat travel through space. All of the wording remained the same, except for one word at the start. Instead of travelling "by sea" the Owl and Pussycat travel to "Bay C" which is where their peagreen (space) ship is housed. Owing to the other worldly nature of this new setting I wanted to try something different than hand drawn media, so I sewed and fabricated all the characters and their world. After photographing all the characters in situ, I edited and refined them in photoshop. I was so pleased with the outcome that it extended even further as a project, and I created an animation based on the images. Ideally this project will be rolled out even further in the future and I will be creating an interactive e-book to accompany it.