Inspector Graham Book 9 Uncovered!

We start here with four different sketches from Richard based on the brief I gave him – sunbeds, pool, inflatable, sea in the background. I chose #3 as closest to my goal, but without the umbrella.

This is the first draft. I particularly liked the sunset context. Wasn't too keen on the inflatable but I had given Richard clear instructions about what it should look like so I wasn't too worried.

Here Richard is starting to fill in the sky and hedge detail. I simply love that sky!

Now he's really working. The poolside and the water are nearly complete and he's worked on the inflatable to get the angle right so that it looks as though it is floating on the water.

More details are added to the hedge and trees and the story objects are added. You can see now that the super yacht is added close to the horizon. Richard has added his trademark robins. They have no relevance to the story but we like them!

I requested some changes to the previous version. It was necessary to change the colour of the sunbeds to make them stand out. And we pulled in the story objects into the middle to provide a more connected feel. One thing we have to bear in mind is that a lot of this illustration is obscured in the final cover and we don't want important elements at the margins.