Delwyn Remedios: The Man Who Can Make Fish Fall From the Sky

Like a magician with a paintbrush, Delywn Remedios whips up wacky and interesting illustrations in no time. An alumnus of National Institute of Design, he was a star during the #6FrameStoryChallenge that we ran earlier this year.

His vivid illustrations got a whole new spin when Ramendra Kumar used them in ‘The Day it Rained Fish‘ in our ‘Weave-a-Story’ campaign. 

How did it feel to see a story woven around your #6frame illustrations and up on StoryWeaver?

It felt wonderful to see a story written to the illustrations. It definitely made the story more engaging and gave a better insight into the characters. I too enjoyed reading the story.

Tell us a little about creating these illustrations.
  
I did a bit of brainstorming of various stories and possibilities from
the wish list of words. I initially wanted to cook up a story about a
pregnant bear as my wife was expecting at that time and I thought that I
could bring in that personal touch to the story. Well, I couldn’t take
that idea forward unfortunately and I finally settled on the story about
the bear’s birthday and made a few pencil and paper thumbnail drawings
and I was happy about the decision.

I used Adobe Flash to
illustrate the story and did a basic colour on flash and enhanced it a
bit on photoshop. I didn’t want to make the bear a regular brown colour
and decided to look at alternate colours and added a bit of pink to the
brown. The rest of the colours (yellows and greens) revolved around the
colour of the bear in order to bring the bear more into focus. The
colours were desaturated during the fish rain to create a different
mood. I had tried many colour options to get the mood right for those
scenes.

What do you do and where do you go when you desperately need inspiration to draw? Yes, we’re asking you to spill your secrets.

I do keep looking at various artworks online and I have a folder on my computer called inspiring work. The work could include anyone from well-established artist to people I have studied alongside with. The idea is to find something attractive and inspiring in each of their styles. I go back to these references every time I need inspiration.

For this particular story, I did the thumbnails in my bedroom which had scribbles and paintings all over the walls. Despite taking inspiration, I believe I have style that is unique to myself and back myself to do justice to the story and its audience. I also trouble my wife asking her for feedback for almost every stroke I make. I even trouble my friends with the same and sometimes the insights they gives can really add value to your story. The fish popping out of the water in the end was a suggestion that I liked very much. To me it meant that no fish were harmed in the making of this challenge

‘The Day it Rained Fish’ has only one translation right now – in Kannada. We’re looking for this story to be translated into more languages – Hindi, Marathi,Tamil, Punjabi, Assamese, German – all this and more! If there a language you’re fluent in, please go ahead and translate it. Together, let’s make this story available in multiple languages for more children across the world to read and enjoy. Here are some tips on translation to help you get started!