Thursday, April 24, 2008

The Foot Brothers Three

Foot was his name....not an ordinary name and most of all not an ordinary rabbit. He had lots of friends with ordinary names. Fluffy, Carrot Top, Big Ears Ernie, Bunny O'Hare, and all the rest. But his best and dearest friends were his two extraordinary brothers.........
Foot-Foot and.......
Foot-Foot-Foot.
The three of them would play every rabbit game together.
HOP!
FLOP!
SKIP!
and THUMP!
Their favorite place to play was a brier patch because that's where rabbits like to play. Thorns, stickers, nasty chiggers nothing bothered them because...........they were singers. Harmonies, melodies so many similarities...the notes rolled off there fuzzy whiskers like busy bees humming. And they would hold each other's lucky rabbit feet, and rub their floppy ears together....'round and 'round, and 'round and 'round, they would sing this happy song..........

THERE'S ONE FOOT; AND FOOT-FOOT;
AND A BROTHER THEY CALLED FOOT-FOOT-FOOT
THREE RABBITS THEY PLAYED GAMES
THEY HAD PECULIAR NAMES
THE FIRST'S CALLED ONE FOOT
THE SECOND'S CALLED FOOT-FOOT
AND THE THIRD'S CALLED FOOT-FOOT-FOOT
AHHHHHHHHHHHH-MMMMMMMMMMMMM
One day something happened in the brier patch.Something no rabbit had experienced before. Three...count 'em...One, two, three hunters with the biggest guns a rabbit had ever seen! And raised three guns to make a gigantic sound.
But when they heard the rabbits sing their magic song those guns fell silently to the ground.
Then hand in paw, the rabbits and the hunters began to dance 'round and 'round and 'round and 'round singing................................There's............Chorus.

Notes
This is the first rough draft of The Foot Brothers Three or The Foot Foot Song (or what ever) written by Stephen Cormey, (see blog address to the right) Illustrated by Yours Truly.There are more pictures but i wasn't sure how many blogger would handle and it's sort of tricky because you have to load them up and write the story from the last page to the first. Hard work for a bear of little brain!It can be edited but i'm not sure how to edit the pictures without getting everything out of whack! So I'm learning as i go. I also left out one line,"They would play all day long under the bluest sky a rabbit could ever imagine", because, so far, the pics are only in black and white. What I'd really like to do is the color part in photo shop or illustrator. I'm working on those programs now. Meanwhile I'll probably use layered colored pencil and ink. So stay tuned. I welcome any comments and /or constructive criticism.We have a ways to go!
Cheers for now, Ronnie Roo.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

The Foot Foot Story by Steve Cormey

Here is the Foot Foot story by Steve Cormey. It might be a while until I get the story plus pics up and running but bare with me. Corm is also working on the accompanying music. Click on the writing to make larger.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Roughs/introducing the other characters

FOOT FOOT

I love doing the roughs for my illustrations. They seem to have a lot of energy in them. Maybe it's because I'm not so concerned about getting everything in the right place and can be more free and have fun with the placement of lines. These will probably keep changing as the picture book evolves but will give you an idea of how the characters might look. eg I'm thinking of giving them little ball caps.
FOOT FOOT FOOT
The rabbits with ordinary names. FLUFFY
CARROT TOP
BUNNY 'OHARE
BIG EARS ERNIE



THE HUNTERS!

Saturday, April 12, 2008

Portfolio continued/Foot Foot Song

Here is my very first rough sketch for the main character of a story written by my good friend Steve Cormey http://stevecormey.blogspot.com He has fashioned the story after a song called the Foot Foot song written a long long time ago by Ray Bolger.The song also features in the story and the whole thing is really cute. I would use this song when i was a storyteller years ago.Cormey had three really dilapidated rabbit puppets with button eyes that didn't match. I used these as props and still have them here in my studio closet. The kids loved them. When my stories just weren't working and things were not going well on stage I'd just pull out the rabbits and sing the Foot Foot song. Anyway, the story, the song and more illustrations will come later. Stay tuned.

Monday, April 07, 2008

Portfolio/Silly Magic



SILLY MAGIC written and illustrated by Ronda Eden Willy and Waly Wombat lived in far away Australia. They were happy little fellows and had good reason to be. Australia is a really BIG place so they had lots of room to run around and play. And when they weren't playing they were napping. All day they could play, take a nap then play some more. When they weren't playing or napping they would do what they loved best of all...........ride their bikes!
One day they discovered a mysterious trail that lead them into an even more mysterious forest. After a while they became a little pooped and decided to take a break and have a snack on some sandwiches they had swashed in their pockets.
As they relaxed under gigantic mysterious trees they didn't notice the magic stuff falling onto them from the branches above.They gobbled down their sandwiches and still didn't notice the magic stuff. They couldn't have possibly know this was 'silly magic', the kind that makes you do the strangest things.


SUDDENLY they felt really dizzy and the world started spinning around them. Willy's skin began to tingle and and the hairs on his neck stood straight up on end.


Then he leap t to his feet and ran full speed through the trees.Wally ran after him and they ran and the ran and they laughed and they laugh. They were being really silyl and having so much fun that they didn't notice it was getting dark..............until.......IT WAS.
Willy and Wally were lost! And they weren't feeling very silly any more! They couldn't possible find their way back home in the dark, so they used their 'wombat sense'. They dug a shallow hole, covered themselves with leaves to keep warm and went to sleep.
In the morning when the sun came up they could easily find their tracks. They followed them around and around and around and around and around until they finally found..... their bikes.
They jumped on and peddled out of that mysterious place as fast as their little wombat legs could carry leaving all of that silly magic behind them.Well almost all of it!


To be edited etc