How I’m writing a comic and maybe saw a UAP – Letter from the studio, January 2025

Art in January: A funny dog, a short comic, and a creative writing technique

I regularly meet with fellow illustrators in and around Bremen. Last time we did a drawing session, with poses from Line of Action. We did humans and animals. I especially like how this greyhound came out :)

For the sake of keeping it real, I thought I’d also show you the one I was most frustrated with – the first animal pose. Can you even recognize what animals they are? 😅

Also I’m currently enrolled in a course / mentoring for illustrators who want to write their own stories. My project is a children’s comic based on the picture book story I wrote back in 2020 in Lilla Rogers’ “My Kid Book Pitch” course, or at least on its main character Loukoum. As I’m still finding out what I want to tell, I started drafting short comics (well, for now, one 😁). This is the first page, from four (it’s in German, sorry 😳).

And this is how the first draft looked – it took about 8 hours to bring the 4 pages to the above version, i.e. readable by the others students and the mentors 😁.

Admittedly, the story has flaws but I was really happy to be able to create it (up to the “first draft” version) within a few hours 😊. I used the technique from the My Kid Book Pitch course: randomly picking 5 of Lilla’s “Magic Cards”, describing what I see and what pops into my head (typical Lilla Rogers phrase 😂). Believe it or not, this kind of brings your mind into story mode – and you come up with something unexpected 😊. It may not work the first time, you may have to draw several sets of cards, or/and let it sink in for a day or two ;)

For me the key is to not be precious about the story. I tell myself: “this is not meant to be the story of the century; just make a lot of them, and see what happens”!

From my camera roll: A… merhorse?

Taken on New Year’s day at Schwerin Castle. Maybe inspiration for a sketch / drawing / painting? ;)

Also (because I had too much of a hard time choosing ;)), a stormy sky with a silver lining, taken from my bedroom window :)

…Wait, is that a UAP?? 😁

Have to tell you about: Sophie McPike

My Sophie-mania has actually receded a bit lately 😁, but I still am a major fan of her work and taking great inspiration from it: how she works with colour, negative space, collage, shapes in general!
She’s also really good at making videos, both short and longer form! So maybe the best way to get to know her and her work is her YouTube channel. She’s also on Instagram and TikTok.

Maybe you knew her already? Would you like to geek out about her delicious colours, wonderful sketchbooks and flowing ink technique? Or what is it that you especially like about her work?

Now you! ;)

So, that’s it for this (almost) first letter from my studio! I hope it wasn’t too long 😅, and that you found something interesting!

If there’s anything you would like to ask, something you would like to read about in the next letter, or anything really – send me an email at hello@reinekurth.com! It would be lovely to hear from you 😊.

With love,

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