Graces is a dark children's book where we see into the mind of a man who lets failure consume his mind. The world is bleak and empty, with all his personified “failure” feeling lost and heavy. Things begin to change as a small secret is revealed...

Materials used - watercolor, ink and digital.

I aimed to capture a surreal yet whimsy atmosphere for the whole project. The theme of this children's book is heavily inspired by the quote "Failure is the stepping stone to success". 

You can look at some of the process images and storyboards below - 

I wanted the character of "failure" to look genderless and expressive. I wished to experiment with how much detail I could put in without using too many form shaping strokes.

These were the background I created using watercolor on paper and scanning it to give the character's mindscape a bleak but surreal atmosphere. I took inspiration from the Rorschach inkblot test as the tests are heavily dependent on interpretations, similar to this mindscape.