Another gorgeous book from Yoshie Watanabe! (remember Brooch) This books pages are actually split in half with something on each side. When you turn one side a new dialogue is created with the next page and so on and so forth. For example one spread is of a closed bird cage but when one page gets turned, the cage gets opened- see below. It’s also fun to randomly flip through non-sequentially and connect pages that weren’t entirely intentional. I picked up a copy of this book at Spoonbill & Sugartown but you can also get it here.

Here’s a little about Paolo: Paolo Rivera was born in 1981 to creative parents who encouraged his every artistic inclination (even when it involved Ninja Turtles). A native of Daytona Beach, FL, he left the sunshine state in 1999 to attend the Rhode Island School of Design, eventually spending his junior year in Rome. In his senior year, he studied with David Mazzucchelli, who quickly became a major influence. Paolo broke into comics thanks to writer Jim Krueger, who introduced him to Marvel Comics, where he has been working since 2002. Paolo works underneath his bed in a loft in Brooklyn and currently divides his time between The Amazing Spider-Man and various covers. His best known project is Mythos, a series of 6 origin stories featuring Marvel’s major characters.

There’s a great interview I watched where Paolo talks about his work which you can watch here. And on his blog he shows the process of creating his work. He takes many many photos for reference and I love that he shares those along with the finished product every Wednesday on his blog. Some of the self portrait images he takes are hilarious because he is trying to grimace like a bad guy or pose like a super-hero.

Here’s what Paolo had to say about keeping a sketchbook: I love my job, so it is often difficult for me to separate business from pleasure. I draw every day, but most of it is for the superhero business, drawn on scripts and pre-printed Marvel art boards. As a result, it takes me a long time to fill a sketchbook. When I do find the time for personal work, however, it’s usually while traveling or visiting museums.

The majority of my sketches are to record something, be it a sculpture or a passerby. This has slowly given way to my point-and-shoot camera, which has become somewhat of a crutch.

Thanks so much to Paolo for sharing his work! Keep up with him on his blog here.

Kevin Dart’s new book is all based around a character he has created called Yuki 7, “a swinging 60’s spy girl”. The book is written as a tribute to the Yuki’s 7 character played by actress Kimiko Suzuki in many adventurous movies like “Danger is a Female” and “To Catch a Temptress”. Of course these are all fake movies Kevin has made up complete with gorgeous movie poster art, prop and costume designs, and synopses of the 1960s- Bond-esque films. I love that Kevin has created an entire mock world around this character and used the theme to create a self-driven project of retro artwork and designs. He had other artists create Yuki 7 works for the book as well- his partner at Fleet Street Scandal Chris Turnham and the incredible Jon Klassen to name a couple. Kevin even created a fun trailer for one of his made-up movies which you can watch here. And there are fashion paper dolls of Yuki 7 available here. Kevin has blogged about the process of creating the character and the making of the book starting here. Get a copy of the book here. More of Fleet Street Scandal here. Thanks to Kevin for sending this over!