CLIENT: Lerner Publishing Group, Minneapolis, MN

DATES: Illustrated 2020, Published 2022

DELIVERABLES: 10 full color digitally illustrated chapter openers, 1 full color digitally illustrated book cover (see final results below!)

SCOPE: This is an empowering book intended for 10-15 year olds and Lerner was looking to represent a wide variety of women, equal representation of skin tone, ethnicity, gender fluidity, disabilities, etc. They also wanted a trading / tarot card style, illustrating the type of "bitch" described for each chapter. 

I like to think of the first sketch round as a solid base for my client to jump off from. During this project, my round one sketches had only minor edits, including "please make them 'bitchier'" as seen above.

In order to assure we accurately represented a prosthetic-using middle-income teenager, I consulted friend and prosthetic limb technician, Trevor Kuborn (Minneapolis, MN), and together we determined the best choice of prosthesis was a split-hook.   

First impressions are important, so I drafted a few cover options. Not selected (above): floating heads, buddha-woman with arms representing each 'bitch' from the book, and a modern Black woman on a fantastical dragon.

Graphic Designer Kim Morales mocked up a dark purple gradient for the cover's background so, for consistency, I matched all chapter headpiece backgrounds with the same dark purple, and selected a complimentary/tertiary palette from there. 

TOOLS: Wacom Cintiq Pro 24" tablet, Photoshop CC

CHAPTER PHOTOS: