Ella the Gorilla is Out on Amazon (and Kindle)

When Rama Alshareef and Mawya Alfadda contacted me to illustrate a children’s book on science, I was not super fascinated. I didn’t think the story, any science-oriented story, would be fun. Also, with a gorilla and a bee as protagonists, I did not want to tackle the scale problem. The young writers had a dream, but they didn’t have the vision. They were not ready at the time. So I asked them to work on a detailed briefing which they shared a month later. When I read it, I jumped in without a second thought.

Why? I’ll tell you in future blog posts . I’ll write about the creative process, character design, thumbnail sketches, color design, the actual painting process and the different methods I followed, and I’ll tell you also about the visual storytelling approaches I adapted working on the scenes: how I thought about composition, perspective, visual effects, the use of blur, hiding in the story, appeal, relatability, the passage of time, mood, and other concepts that I really enjoyed playing with consciously as I worked on the book.

Get Your Copy

For now, I’ll leave you with some of the illustrations and a link to the book on Amazon. Get your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/603039553X.

Seeking a freelance children’s book illustrator to hire? Contact me today: https://www.alhyari.art/quote-form

“Muhammad at-Tayieb” al-Hyari
Freelance Digital Artist & Illustrator