ILLUSTRATION KNOWHOW Creating a strong image: readability
In children's literature, especially picture books, pictures play a vital role. Images are meant to:
- communicate the story/text,
- help the reader empathise with the character and guide their eyes across the page.
Equally vital as text, illustrations are there to support and enhance the story. The images need to communicate and tell a story while still being visually appealing.
The READABILITY of an image is important. Below are two ways to check an
image’s accessibility:
1. Zoom Out
Zooming out or making the image really small on the screen is a good way to know if your image loses its clarity and is blending together or, is it strong enough to read clearly when small?
This is especially essential as our worlds have become more global and virtual, so our images appear as tiny icons on search engines.
The book covers are viewed as such on Amazon and other websites.
Readability of the image at a very small size is crucial and zooming out is one of the best ways to see how they would appear when reduced.
If you are working traditionally, then you can photograph your work from afar with more background. In this case, make sure your background isn't busy, maybe place some plain paper or sheet behind. This avoids detracting from your illustration.
Here is an example of how an image would appear when zoomed out:
2. Squint
Squinting your eyes is one of the most effective tests and needs no additional time or effort. This enables you to instantly detect any errors or missing links since it's all blurred out.
If you do not want to play squint-squint then you can also use the Gaussian Blur tool. It instantly blurs the image.
See more of Rekha's work here. Follow her on Instagram and on Twitter.
Follow her on Instagram and Twitter or www.titaberredo.com
Contact her at: illuscoordinator@britishscbwi.org
No comments:
We love comments and really appreciate the time it takes to leave one.
Interesting and pithy reactions to a post are brilliant but we also LOVE it when people just say they've read and enjoyed.
We've made it easy to comment by losing the 'are you human?' test, which means we get a lot of spam. Fortunately, Blogger recognises these, so most, if not all, anonymous comments are deleted without reading.