This week's blog is guest written by Deputy Editor Emma.
You might be surprised to learn that a lot of complex work goes into making our RSPB children’s magazines simple, clear and engaging.
When it comes to communicating with our youngest age group – wild times readers aged 0–8 – it’s all in the pictures. The artwork we use needs to be bright and enticing, clear and simple, but also informative and accurate. For that, we have to call in the experts.
Kate slater is the artist behind our beautiful bedtime story and, each issue, she creates a magical scene designed to excite and inspire our young readers. Take a look at how she does it…
After the intensive brainstorming of ideas by the magazine team, and the expert writing of author Pat Kelleher, Kate is handed a complete bedtime tale to illustrate. With an idea of our issue themes, and a bit of expert advice from RSPB Youth Editor Jack, Kate will take Pat’s story and make it her own.
She starts by sketching out her designs in pencil. She might go through two of three ideas before she settles on one she likes.
Kate’s initial sketch of the “Chew & Poo” diner, which featured in our compost story in the July–August 2017 issue of wild times. Photo: Kate Slater, Instagram @kateslater
Once Kate’s happy, she’ll work these sketches up as a rough. This involves either painting by hand or digital colouring. She then sends them to us to look over.
Kate digitally colours her sketches to supply us with a rough. This was the draft for our big feast story in wild times September–October 2017. Photo: Kate Slater
We mock up the page with Pat’s story and send it to Jack to get his thoughts.
If everyone is happy, the roughs go back to Kate. She’ll spend hours carefully creating each scene. Working with a combination of painting and collaging, Kate builds up each scene from the background to the foreground.
Kate builds up the background using a combination of painting and collage techniques. Here, our hedgerow for the September–October 2017 issue of wild times comes to life. Photo: Kate Slater, Instagram @kateslater
Kate’s technique creates depth, texture and colour in her scenes. She carefully cuts out each character and adds them to the scene to bring her initial designs to life.
The rockpool scene for our May–June 2017 issue takes shape. Photo: Kate Slater Instagram @kateslater
Watch a video of the painstaking process here.
For some designs, Kate will actually hang a scene like a mini set. She’ll then photograph it and digitally edit out the wires to create a final flat image.
The final artwork for our bedtime adventure story, in the November–December 2016 issue of wild times, was made by hanging multiple collaged pieces together. Photo: Kate Slater
The finished result is breathtaking.
Our latest issue of wild times, September–October 2017, features a story about autumn foraging and a whole host of colourful characters. Photo: Kate Slater
"I really enjoy illustrating these stories," says Kate. "It’s often quite a challenge to condense an action-packed story into two illustrations, and I love learning about the different creatures as I carry out my research."
See Kate’s designs on the front cover of your latest issue of wild times, and look out for her latest work in the November–December 2017 issue, where a very sleepy owl has a long night ahead of him!
Find out more about Kate and her amazing work at kateslaterillustration.com, follow her on Twitter and Instagram.