This week, as part of our two week reading focus, we were visited by a published author and illustrator. Liz Million was incredibly enthusiastic and passionate about her work and inspired us.

She talked to us about her career and demonstrated the process she goes through when creating an illustration. In her portfolio, she had examples of how her style has developed from being a child to a professional illustrator. She emphasised the need to practise. We were all keen to have a go!

We were given a piece of paper with a starting shape outline for a character’s face. Liz then took us through the process of creating an Anglo-Saxon story character step-by-step. This included an identification of some of the problem areas that she came across as a child, including: proportion of limbs, techniques for drawing limbs, facial expression, hairstyles, using shading to show movement and depth.