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My name is Gary Burley and in 1989 I started to illustrate 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne. I don’t know what I was thinking, or if it would look very good. Over the years my OCD made doing each of the 600 pictures, comforting.
From the comfort of my couch and a border collie called Ben on my lap, I tried to imagine each picture as if I was there, but only from the descriptions in the book. I also chose the hard way: illustrating with a brush and indian ink, so that the end result would look like an old fashioned book from 1900.
There were many times when I almost gave up; homelessness for one. The half finished book was put in city storage for four years until I had a home again. I consider myself lucky. Doesn’t matter how bad things got, I had my health, my son and daughter and an over whelming sense that someone up there liked me.
The book ended up having 700 pages and 600 illustrations, I hope you like them.
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What do you think ?
Kimberly Grau (Red Moth Art) 7 years ago
Wow, this is inspiring. Not to mention, you have some real natural talent. Did you ever take lessons or are you self taught! I love the old-fashioned look to them, it's perfect for the story. It may surprise you but, I found this very encouraging. The illustrations themselves are gorgeous, well done!
Gary Burley (Post author) 7 years ago
hi Kimberly, I taught myself, i never got to find out from work, i read books, took sculpture lessons, did technical drawing, and practiced with a brush pen. that was before i started in 1990. i was okay. but as i got better in my spare time, i took the first 150 pictures and changed or binned them as they weren't in line with the other 450. OCD helps too. Dave Gibbons (the Watchmen) became a fan of them, a friend and encouraged me to refine them and not release them until every one was up to spec. I respect his opinion so i spent 2 years just putting the book together untill it resembled the book of my dreams or a book from the last century. i did two things that also helped. a Calligrapher, fluent in copperplate and i worked for a company that made books. so i knew process. a book this size came at a cost though. it was expensive to print, hard to sell because of its size. amazons reviews proved me wrong though. hope that helps. Gary. i'd like to see Red moth Art. I love all art
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Kimberly Grau (Red Moth Art) 7 years ago
Wow, this is inspiring. Not to mention, you have some real natural talent. Did you ever take lessons or are you self taught! I love the old-fashioned look to them, it's perfect for the story. It may surprise you but, I found this very encouraging. The illustrations themselves are gorgeous, well done!
Gary Burley (Post author) 7 years ago
hi Kimberly, I taught myself, i never got to find out from work, i read books, took sculpture lessons, did technical drawing, and practiced with a brush pen. that was before i started in 1990. i was okay. but as i got better in my spare time, i took the first 150 pictures and changed or binned them as they weren't in line with the other 450. OCD helps too. Dave Gibbons (the Watchmen) became a fan of them, a friend and encouraged me to refine them and not release them until every one was up to spec. I respect his opinion so i spent 2 years just putting the book together untill it resembled the book of my dreams or a book from the last century. i did two things that also helped. a Calligrapher, fluent in copperplate and i worked for a company that made books. so i knew process. a book this size came at a cost though. it was expensive to print, hard to sell because of its size. amazons reviews proved me wrong though. hope that helps. Gary. i'd like to see Red moth Art. I love all art
Load More Replies... 
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