Behind the Book: Daddy Fartypants illustrated by Matt Hunt

This January saw the publication of the hilarious new picture book, Daddy Fartypants, written by Emer Stamp, featuring a very windy bear! We’ve gone behind the scenes of the laugh-your-pants-off story from Orchard Books to find out how the tale of an embarrassed son and his unapologetic Dad was brought to life.

Matt Hunt, the artist behind the book’s wonderful illustrations, shares with us his creative process and why he loves doing what he does.

Daddy Fartypants is fantastically funny! How do you create humour in your artwork?

It was quite easy to inject humour into this book because it’s about farts! The story is inherently funny (who doesn’t laugh at farts!?). I also find the right facial expressions make a real difference to how funny a scene is, so that was important, giant green fart clouds also help…

What’s your creative process?

It includes a bunch of different things! A lot of the time I’ll start by sketching roughly into a little note book, or, more recently, an iPad and then I’ll play around with shaping up the characters and colours in Photoshop. If I want specific paint or line textures I’ll use paint, crayons or pencils and scan them in. Then comes roughing out each spread and lastly moving onto colour.

Were you artistic as a child? Where did the creativity all begin?

Art was always my favourite subject at school and I certainly spent tons of time drawing as a child. I loved cartoons and comic books growing up and drew my favourite characters. My bedroom had piles of printer paper with doodles all over them, I wish I’d kept them all, I’d love to look at them now!

What aspect of your job do you most enjoy?

I love being able to use my imagination each day. One of the best things is inventing characters and deciding how they look. It’s great to be able to experiment with different media and techniques, and just be creative.

How has being part of Bright impacted your career?

Bright has made a massive difference. I wouldn’t have the amazing opportunities I’ve had so far without Bright championing my work and the amazing team who make it all happen.

What are you currently working on? Can you tell us what to expect next?

I’m almost finished working on a super fun book about pirates at the moment, not sure I can say much more!

---

To view Matt Hunt’s portfolio, click here.

To work with Matt, please contact Arabella Stein.