THE CAT WHO WALKS THROUGH WALLS (1985)
Acrylic on Watercolor Board - 31" X 14"
Sometime after the book was published, I hung the painting at a convention and a fan came up to me and said, "The girl is great and I love the cat, but you know the guy is supposed to be black?" 1/4
#sciencefiction #scifi #sff #scifiart #illustration #robertheinlein
I was flabbergasted. I usually read a manuscript through the first time for story line and make notes along the way, but I skim through it a second and often third as I write detailed notes and sketches. For this assignment, I did all that and then submitted a detailed comp... 2/4
...and nobody ever said anything about the hero being black. I did the painting, the book company loved it and printed the book. But when they printed the reissue, someone in the art department retouched the guy with the patch and made him darker. 3/4
He looks a bit ridiculous, but that's the story. Somehow the editors, the art director, and I all missed that important detail. 🤦
Cover illustration for THE CAT WHO WALKS THROUGH WALLS by Robert Heinlein, published by Putnam and Ace.
https://www.michaelwhelan.com/galleries/cat-who-walks-through-walls/
4/4
@MichaelWhelan Are you sure that they did a specific touch up on the one character? Considering the overall darker tone of the entire picture, it looks more likely that the histogram of the entire picture was adjusted to get the effect they wanted. That would be the quick-n-lazy method of darkening that character's skin tone if the histogram curve was adjusted just right.
@iolar No photoshop back then, but the easiest/cheapist edit is the right assumption.
@MichaelWhelan I was using the term histogram to imply what they had done and not necessarily how they did it. I apologize for implying that some digital technique was used. As I'm sure you know, publishers had used analog techniques to achieve similar effects long before the digital art revolution changed everything. I've since found that information on HOW they achieved similar effects via analog techniques is VERY hard to find now. I sincerely hope these techniques aren't dying.
