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In April I was contacted by Jessica Yu, the graphics director for Wall Street Journal Asia, to work on a map of Hong Kong for their monthly "City Walks" column. Jessica gave me a written itinerary of the walk and a number of photographs of landmarks that would be visited along the way. Jessica was drawn to the woodblock work I have displayed on my web site, so although we agreed that I wouldn't have the time to do the entire map in woodblock I promised to use moku hanga at least for the background.
First I made a tight sketch and got it approved. Then I scanned my sketch and cut a block for the streets.
I printed the block in a color close to the color I thought I would want on the final, knowing that I could adjust the color later when I composed the illustration on the computer.
The map would also have small icons marking the locations of various tourist sites, so I decided to try doing a white line woodcut for those small illustrations. I carved the simple lines and then printed the block all in one color. This way I would have the lines and the woodblock texture and I could adjust the colors digitally.
And here's a closeup of the icons after I changed the colors with Photoshop. To finish the piece I scanned and added hand lettering and the walking route. All in all, I liked how it turned out, and I especially like the hint of wood texture that's visible in the background.