Illustrating the town’s stories

Original non-fiction-style practice text.

The town's storybook was intended to bring together twelve short tales contributed by residents. The editor commissioned two artists so that the work could be completed before the winter festival. Both produced attractive sample pages, and the committee expected their different styles to give the book variety. The difficulties appeared when individual drawings had to form a readable sequence rather than stand alone in an exhibition.

A character who appeared in three stories looked much older in one artist's version. The editor had supplied separate descriptions without noticing that the same person returned under a nickname. A house shown with a side entrance in one picture had its door on the front in the next. The colour schemes also changed sharply between adjoining pages, making a continuous scene seem to move into a different season. Neither artist could judge the overall sequence from the isolated pages each had been sent.

The text continued changing while the drawings were made. One contributor removed an animal which already occupied the centre of a finished picture. Another lengthened a paragraph, leaving too little room for the planned illustration. The artists used different page dimensions, so the designer had to ask for revised versions rather than simply place the files together. Two files carried the same brief name and were initially confused. One image looked clear on screen but lost important detail when reduced to the size of the printed page.

Communication added delay. An artist working elsewhere could answer questions only in the evening, while the editor was available mainly during the day. The committee had budgeted for finished pictures, not for repeated joint planning and revision. Several residents also disagreed about how an invented scene should represent a familiar local building. The editor eventually created a shared reference sheet and circulated the complete page order. The sample drawings had proved that each artist could make a fine image. They had not proved that twelve separate contributions would automatically become one coherent book.

According to the text, summarise the difficulties involved in combining two artists’ illustrations for the town’s storybook.

Use continuous writing, not note form, and use your own words as far as possible. Your summary should not be more than 120 words. Up to 10 marks are available for reading and up to 5 marks for writing.