Boys' Life Sketches

"You know the Grady house is haunted, right, Evan?" This Boys' Life fiction story opens with young Evan being scared by the boys in his neighborhood. He turns the tables on the bullies and discovers that the sound they heard was just Mr. Grady's pet monkey which needed care after the old man's accident. Evan also figures out that Mr. Grady is an interesting person and worthy of his friendship. For the opening spread, I wanted to portray the moment when the two wanna be bullies are taunting Evan to enter the house.

I came up with several idea sketches and proposed my three favorite ones to nBoys' Life art director, Scott Feaster. I usually will only present my favorite idea and then show others if the preferred one does not fly, but in this case, I was intrigued with all three and would have been fine if any of the three had been selected. The final drawing needed a little more width and more of a  dilapidated feeling was given to the house. I enlisted my son and a couple of family friends to pose for reference and then I finished up the drawing. As soon as it is approved, I will render it in color using Photoshop.