Writing and or drawing a picture book; Next to making your own salt, pressing your own vinyl recordings or doing your own dental work it’s the most anachronistic of modern, commercial activities. What does it really say about those of us who do it? I don’t know. But I do know that it ranks as number 6 of the list of Top 100 Jobs you can do while not wearing pants.
And I have spent hundreds of hours researching the 7 Stages of Working on a Picture Book.Here they are. Originally there were 9. But who has time for 9 things on a list? That’s like a story with more than 500 words. Crazy…
1. Excitement . 32 pages of full color hj-inks. This will be awesome!
2. Bargaining. Change the text on this page. Make page 7 a full-bleed. Can you make the eyes less googly? How about a double page spread on 11 and 12? Would a bear be wearing pants?
3. Denial. I have plenty of time…Plenty…I wonder if I have any new emails. I’ll check.
4. Acceptance. 11 days to get it done. 11 more days. I don’t need to sleep, do I?
5. Relief. The cover is done. DONE I TELL YOU!
6. Depression. The proofs are in. They look fine…I mean, they look great. The colors are good. Everything is fine…except of course for everything I’d change if I could do it again.
7. Fear. Will anyone ever hire me to do this again?
I’m working on a photo book, and this is all too familiar. Can I set it on fire now?
Sounds like the same situation. Not unlike design projects for certain toy companies…ring any bells!?