{"id":3005,"date":"2013-09-15T00:01:57","date_gmt":"2013-09-15T06:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=3005"},"modified":"2013-09-14T14:57:20","modified_gmt":"2013-09-14T20:57:20","slug":"7-imps-7-kicks-347-featuring-adam-rex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=3005","title":{"rendered":"7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks #348: Featuring Adam Rex"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“I walked over and under and around
to where Mom and Dad waited. ‘What now?'”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge spread)<\/center><\/p>\n

Morning, everyone. Author\/illustrator Adam Rex<\/a><\/strong> is visiting today to tell us a bit about his newest picture book, Moonday<\/a><\/em><\/strong>, released by Disney-Hyperion earlier this month. Moonday<\/em> tells the goosebump-inducing story of the moon lowering itself into a young girl’s backyard, putting all the town under its sleepy spell. Was it real or a dream? That’s for readers to decide. <\/p>\n

I really like Adam’s paintings for this story. No need to describe them; you can see them on display here. And the writing? The writing is superb. This one makes an outstanding read-aloud, best for (but not excluded to) a cozy one-on-one read with your favorite child. It possesses a rhythm and cadence to savor. Kirkus<\/em> gave this one a starred review<\/a><\/strong>. I just read the entire review, and they put it this way: “Gentle rhymes, recurring consonance and almost subliminal rhythms make murky, dreamy paintings vivid and the surreal story sleepily spectacular.”<\/em> <\/p>\n

Yep. What they said. <\/p>\n

Here’s Adam. I thank him for visiting … <\/p>\n

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Adam<\/font><\/strong>: Here’s the first image I tackled. It ended up being kind of a proof of concept piece. I thought it was going to be the cover, too.<\/p>\n

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“It was in our backyard.”<\/em>
(Click image to enlarge)<\/center>
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\n[Here’s] the process for this piece:<\/p>\n

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“At school we slumped in desks and slept through lunch. I looked through my heavy lashes, through the window, through lean trees to see
my blue moon staring back at me.”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center><\/p>\n

My earliest sketch was just a thumbnail, which I then overlaid with some crude perspective lines to pint out and use as guides to refine the drawing.<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

That got me here, and this is what my editor saw when I put together a dummy of the whole book.<\/p>\n

Looks like I basically sketched this whole thing in Photoshop with my Wacom, actually. I’m doing that more and more, but I didn’t do it much back then.<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

Shot a lot of photo reference. This poor kid ended up filling in for the whole class.<\/p>\n

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All of the images for Moonday<\/em> got rendered in vine charcoal on paper, with my photo reference as a guide.<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

Then I tinted the drawing in Photoshop …<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

… and colored it on a different layer.<\/p>\n

(This is actually the same [image as the one from earlier]. But I had a narrative going, so …)<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center>
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\nShot a lot of photos of me …<\/p>\n


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\n… and my wife, too. We’re the mom and dad. Had to borrow a kid.<\/p>\n


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\nHere’s another photo …<\/p>\n


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\n…and the accompanying sketch …<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center>
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\n…and the finished piece:<\/p>\n

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“That was when the tide came in. It trickled into our backyard.
The tide came in, smooth and thin, and settled underneath our moon.”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center><\/p>\n

I had to draw a number of views of the same building, so I actually built a little 3-D neighborhood in Google SketchUp. I made the buildings in the foreground, but not in the background. (The background buildings didn’t actually end up in the book anyway.)<\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

More random sketches:<\/p>\n

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(Click either image to enlarge sketch)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

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(Click to enlarge)<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n

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Final art for sketch above: “Then I started a yawn that swayed up the block,
crossed two policemen, rounded the square, and followed me home.”<\/em>
(Click to enlarge)<\/center><\/p>\n

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MOONDAY. Copyright \u00a9 2013 by Adam Rex. Published by Disney-Hyperion Books, New York. All images here are used with permission of Adam Rex.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Note for any new readers: 7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks is a weekly meeting ground for taking some time to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things from the past week, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. New kickers are always welcome. <\/p>\n

* * * Jules’ Kicks * * *<\/strong><\/font>
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When I was a child, I would have been utterly spellbound by Moonday<\/em>.<\/p>\n

1)<\/strong><\/font> I love how challenging my piano lessons are (even if I was all, “THERE IS ANOTHER HAND POSITION TO LEARN ALREADY?” on Thursday of this week). As I discussed with a friend the other day, piano lessons are working lots of different parts of my brain. And that is good. <\/p>\n

2)<\/strong><\/font> Dinner with friends, followed by free bluegrass in Nashville. <\/p>\n

3)<\/strong><\/font> My girls and I have been dancing around the house to this slammin’ tune below. When my second grader comes home with worries and anxiety (which seems to be a theme this year), I listen and hug her and do the “there there now, it’ll be okay”s, and then we get up and dance, too. <\/p>\n

Come on, y’all. None of this “but I’m dance-challenged” will be accepted here. Put on your best dance face, and let’s do it: <\/p>\n