Andy Catling – Designer

My name is Andy (BA hons) and I am a professional illustrator with more than 80 illustrated titles under my belt. I work in traditional mediums and digital wot-nots to make artwork for book illustration, editorial projects, websites and advertising. I have worked for many different publishing houses such as Usborne, Oxford University Press, Little Tiger press, Parragon, QED, Franklin Watts and many others.

In a typical book illustration project I will design characters, story scenes and generally visualise the words of a story to work with and around the text on a page. With many projects I have designed the cover and internal pages before illustrating. I do this with a view to creating a harmony and flow with text and image.

In past employments I have also produced storyboards and 3D modelling and animation as well as 2D animation for video game publishers such as Microsoft.

Testimonials

Andy's illustrations for Police Nan and Spike the Cat-detective are brilliant - I was so pleased! He really brought out the characters and made the book fun. Thank you.

Dawn McNiff, Author for Harper Collins.

I had an idea of how Boo-a-bog looked, but it was only when I saw how Andy had brought this bumbling, dribbling, huggable, loving monster to life, did he finally become a true character for me. I adore the energy and humour of Andy's illustrations, but he also manages to convey real emotion. He was also an absolute joy to work with in every way. Not only did he indulge a proud mum by agreeing to make the child hero of the story look like my son, what really meant the world to me was his genuine kindness. The book was a fundraiser for the Children's Hospital of Wales and Andy went the extra mile - not only through his work, but quite literally! He made a very long train journey to the hospital for the launch, where we were joined by children who were being treated there. He'd even had some fabulous Boo-a-bog t-shirts printed. I think this big heart of his shines though in his illustrations, and it is that which brings an extra sprinkling of magic to his work.

Lucy Owen, BBC Wales presenter, author.

Andy's work is fabulous - his pirate illustrations are a riot of fun, and capture the dynamic between the characters perfectly!

Suzy Senior, Author for Lion Hudson.

Andy is always a pleasure to work with, and his beautiful illustrations bring atmosphere, joy and humour to even the simplest of stories.

Jackie Hamley, Editor for Franklin Watts