Roger Essley

Stories> Making Book> Dummy

MAKING A NEW BOOK
Here's a story I'm working on about a car who has just been dumped in the junkyard. The color picture shows junk yard -- lots of rusting cars and stuff growing, lots of animals living in the cars too.

Below is a black and white picture -- pencil drawings show in a full draft dummy book. The dummy book full of black and white pictures, and a few sample full color watercolors shows a publisher what I want the finished book to look like.

To see more about making this dummy book click here.

The story begins when Axel is towed to the junkyard. Here are the first two pages in the dummy. The text for these pages is below each page. In the final book the text will of course go in the empty spaces on each page.

I got the idea for the car story pretty much in one afternoon. Then I began brainstorming -- doing a bunch of sketches. Then I wrote the story (over and over) and did more pencil drawings.

Making the dummy book, putting the pictures on folded pages stapled together, helps me to see how the story will flow from page to page.

"When Axel was dumped in the junkyard, his windshield was cracked, his grill was smashed, and his engine was worn out."

"Just this morning two squirrels had gotten into his trunk and they were building a nest. Axel had never been happier."