Eric Carle Gone Digital

Everyone knows Eric Carle's work and how he revolutionized children's books with his colorful paper collage technique and unique book designs. First he draws the image, then chooses from his hand painted tissue papers carefully cutting and gluing.

This is a technique that everyone should try but I couldn't see that advantage of all the careful cutting and gluing. Why, says I, could we not just play with it in the computer where we can control every variable.

So first I made a drawing:
Then I made a bunch of painted papers and had a lot of fun making textures and colors. I didn't have tissue paper so I used tracing paper, acrylic airbrush paints (wonderful liquid colors), a brush and a spray bottle. Here are some samples:

I scanned all this into the computer and then just used the selection tool to draw around areas of my drawing. I transferred the selection to the appropriate paper and used the move tool to drag the selection back to the original drawing file placing it where I wanted.
I also used the burn tool strategically to create a sense of separation between the layers in a few spots. One could easily use a little bit of drop shadow to add more of that kind of effect. Give it a try!