Entries by johnmanders

Hide and shriek!

Here’s the opening spread from Where’s My Mummy? This scene shows Mama Mummy getting Baby Mummy ready for bed—but Baby wants to play one more round of hide & shriek. Since they’re mummies, I designed an interior to look like the inside of a pyramid, with lots of Egyptian details.  The legendary art director at […]

On the road again

I’ll be visiting my friends at Sewickley Academy, Edgeworth, Osborne, QV and St James schools Wednesday-Thursday-Friday.  Saturday morning at 11:00 I’ll be on hand for storytime at the Penguin Bookshop in Sewickley, Pa.  I’ll read a book and paint a picture.  Please stop by and say hello on Saturday if you’re in the neighborhood!

K is for Knight

This image comes from Z is for Zombies by Merrily Kutner.  I painted this one a long time ago.  I think this was my second book, and the only one I didn’t do for laughs.  Very unlike me.  All the images are kind of scary…

How do I know when I’m plagiarizing?

This is a question I got all the time when I taught graphic design, and it is a big issue in this digital world where images are seemingly there for the taking. Shepard Fairey’s case seems to me to be a no-brainer—there’s hardly any difference between the AP photo and his poster, so I’m calling […]

Irish ghost story

Only two weeks til Hallowe’en… Fergus O’Mara bargains for his soul in an Irish graveyard—from Fergus and the Night Demon by Jim Murphy.

A nice review of Minnie’s Diner

…over at PBwithJ. This image is several photos taped together of the interior of Charlie’s Diner in Pittsburgh—not far from where I used to live.  Believe it or not, they had a waitress named Minnie, although she wasn’t working when I took these photos.

Way out west

The stars at night are big & bright (clapclapclapclap) deep in the heart of Texas, or so I’ll be able to tell you soon.  I’m heading out to Houston to visit my friends at Matzke, Ault & Swenke schools.