by Timothy Young

In my new book I’M GOING TO OUTER SPACE! I tell the story of a boy named Luis who tells us all about the exciting things he wants to do and see when he gets to outer space. I was inspired to write this book as an homage to all of the science fiction I’ve loved since I was young. I remember watching old B&W films like “This Island Earth” and “Invaders From Mars” on television and cartoons like “The Jetsons”. As I got older I would read books by Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury and Robert Heinlein and watch “Lost In Space” and “Star Trek”. I was already an avid sci-fi fan when “Star Wars” came out and my love for Science Fiction only grew further and continues to this day.

When I started to flesh out the illustrations for my story I decided to pay homage to the entire genre. I have a spread with spaceships from the 1930’s to now. I have a page of robots that I challenge any sci-fi fan to name them all. They are from movies, television, comics and even other picture books.

When it came time to draw aliens, I realized I had a problem. I love designing aliens, it’s one of my favorite things to draw. But I also wanted to have some classic aliens as I had done with the spaceships and robots. I decided to have one spread with recognizable aliens that kids and parents will have fun figuring out who they all are. For the rest of the book I put my own original creations designed just for this book…all except one.

Back when I was just out of college I was hired by a friend who was an art director at Doubleday Books. They needed an illustration of an alien artist. At the time I was creating sculptural illustrations, 3D models that were photographed for print.

I created a number of sketches for the alien and when one was picked I sketched the final scene. I then sculpted the character and built his props; the easel, canvas and box of paints he uses. Another artist built the landscape and a sky backdrop was rented.

Everything was brought together at a photographers studio in lower Manhattan and the photograph was then used as the cover of a catalog of Science Fiction Art Books.

So when I started drawing aliens for I’M GOING TO OUTER SPACE! I decided to include my first alien from one of my first professional illustration jobs. He appears a few times in the book including this spread with a bunch of his friends.

I’M GOING TO OUTER SPACE! released just a few days ago…on December 15, 2017 from Schiffer Publishing.

Thanks, Tim! This was like time-traveling through outer space!

You can go to outer space, too, because Tim is giving away a signed copy of I’M GOING TO OUTER SPACE…THIS WEEK.

Leave one comment below to enter! And good luck!