Well, you definitely need to be a reader to be any kind of writer, illustrator, or anything. Actually I think if you’re making books, whether you’re an illustrator or a writer, I think you need to read a tremendous amount, and you need to focus, you need to be a writer, even if you’re not doing, not the one who’s primarily doing the writing, because it’s all about storytelling.
And I just look at the illustration as another tool in the arsenal for storytelling. I also did graphic design for many years, and I just, I still approach kind of our comics, and our books in the same way, like what elements do I need to use visually and textually and everything else to tell this story, to get this information across.
But, to do any particular genre or format you need to know that format, you need to know that genre, you need to read and read and read to the point that you don’t even have to think about what the forms, how it’s done, you just know, it just comes out, just like people that are going to be film directors they watch thousands and thousands of hours of movies, so that they know instinctively what kind of shots to cut into and everything.
And so, same thing with comics, I don’t have to think about, now where do I put the speech balloon? It’s just automatic, obviously it would go there, and obviously this is the kind of reaction that a character would have, and it would convey that kind of emotion.
And so, I of course still read comics, I’m, I don’t have that much time to read things anymore, unfortunately I’m so busy making stuff. I try to keep on top of the other children’s comics creators right now, which is a big task because there’s so many of us now, which is amazing, you know I just read “Sisters” by Raina Telgemeier, and I read “Boxers and Saints” by Gene Yang.
I just, the other day read Bryan Lee O’Malley’s “Seconds”, that comic, not for kids, but still great. And then the rest of my time is either spent reading science stuff, I’m really interested in anthropology and that sort of stuff, I don’t know, I’m like, I’m interested in human origins, and just where things come from and happen.
And I also read a lot of science fiction. So, I’m a big nerd, and I’m dying for the next Game of Thrones to come out, you know, so.
