Pre Production

Here's a little sneak peek at the book! These are thumbnails done by the amazing James Finch, who was production designer on Princess and the Frog. We'll be posting work in progress sketches and thumbnails on this blog, so keep an eye out!

So, We’ve been in production for this book for actually about 6 months now. These first few posts are going to be a bit retroactive, so you can get a peek at what went into this project.

Scott Watanabe came up with idea of a book to display the artwork of the artists here at the studio. We knew that there were many names that did not get exposure to most of the animation world, but were amazing nonetheless.

We actually went through a lot of ideas for themes for the book, some vague and wide, but then ultimately, took a cue from our story friends and went with a specific name so each person could show their creativity with a personal take.

This book we created is full of all original artwork! It was really amazing seeing everyone get inspired and turn their work in.

At the same time that we were making the content we also had to think about how we were going to produce the book. A lot of thought and consideration went into where it was being printed and where we could get the most quality for our money. Which was all split evenly among the artists doing the book.

The biggest problem was that it was nearly impossible to get a clear idea of who was the best. We ended up going with someone who we knew were experienced in doing art books, and had a location in our time zone, Global PSD.

They’ve been really wonderful and helpful. Dealing with stupid questions like “Is a page, like, one side of a page or is it two sides of a page like a physical page?” Man was I nervous when I had dumb questions like that, but they were always gracious and patient.

Pretty soon we are going to be receiving our “Wet Proofs” (real physical printed pages) of a few pages of the book for approval! We’re all very excited to start to see our project look like a real book!

Check back soon for more updates! We'll be trying to be consistent with a post every Wednesday!