CBCA Tasmania blog: Discovering Digger Digs Down

This week we welcome author Johanna Bell and illustrator Huni Melissa Bollinger to talk about their publication, Digger Digs Down published by University of Queensland Press. Recently settling in Tasmania, this dynamic duo have produced a delightful and exuberant story about how a dog, left alone for the day, entertains himself by … digging!

“Digger digs deep, deep into the ground. Down, down, down goes Digger until …”

(Digger Digs Down)

Jennie Bales speaks with Johanna Bell and Huni Bolliger

Johanna, how did the idea for this book come about?

When my daughter, Amara, was little, we used to make up stories and poems to pass the time. One morning she said ‘Digger digs’ and when I asked ‘Where does Digger digs?’ she said ‘Digger digs Down. Digger digs deep, deep into the ground.’ I loved the alliteration and the rhyming so I wrote it down on the back of a receipt and stuck it to the fridge. It was quickly covered by bills and school newsletters and forgotten. It was only when the fridge broke, five years later, that I rediscovered her words. I remember thinking ‘This would make a great picture book’ and not long after, I was at the computer finishing off the story. In short, this book wouldn’t exist if she hadn’t imagined the first lines.

How has place influenced this book and how has your time in Tassie shaped the story?

We both lived on Larrakia country (Darwin) before moving to Tasmania. Darwin is built on porcelanite, a sedimentary stone that has layers of pinks, purples, oranges and whites. Living somewhere where the rocks are so multicoloured certainly made it easier to dream up a colourful underground world. And Darwin, like other places, has a lot of bored dogs who are left in backyards while they’re owners are at school or work so there was no shortage of real life scenes to draw on.

Some of the illustrations were done after moving to nipaluna / Hobart and this is where the inspiration for the rainbow came from. There’s so many rainbows in Hobart!

Can you tell us about the relationship between Digger and his human?

The bond between a child and their dog is incomparable and we wanted to be able to show this early in the book. Together with our publisher, Cathy Vallance, we made a decision to use the title page to show Digger’s sadness at the departure of his human. We both have dogs and we know this moment when you head off to work and leave the dog in the backyard. The sad puppy eyes! Later in the book, when Digger hears his owner calling him from the surface, we see his entire disposition change. Even though he’s in the middle of an adventure, he lifts his ear and turns towards his owner’s voice. It’s almost as if he’s smiling. From that moment on, Digger is unstoppable. He’s set on finding his way back up to where he knows his human is waiting for him. He’s in such a rush he almost looks like a little orange whirlwind barrelling up and down, round and round. And when they’re reunited there’s such energy and joy and of course, a mutual love of digging.

Johanna, how do you you’re your work? And were you influenced or inspired by other authors?

When I first started writing picture books, I made the mistake that lots of new writers make: I tried to tell the reader everything that was happening. I hadn’t yet realised that the illustrations would do most of the showing and telling. Now I trust the illustrator and their work which means I don’t need to use so many words. Digger Digs Down was a longer manuscript initially but when we laid it out with the illustrations we agreed that some of the lines could go. It felt as if we were telling the reader what to think rather than allowing them to come to their own conclusions. That’s a classic red flag for me. If you get any whiff that you’re being didactic, it’s got to go!

I read a lot of poetry and I tend to gravitate towards poets and authors that use language sparingly. A couple who spring to mind (although they’re not children’s authors) are Max Porter, Ilya Kaminsky and Ellen van Neerven. Their writing inspires me in lots of ways. My greatest picture book hero is Margaret Wild because she writes across such a broad range of styles and forms. Her quiet, contemplative stories are just as engaging as her funny, playful work. When I grow up, I want to be just like her :)

Huni, how would you describe your illustrative style in Digger Digs Down? What media and process have you used?

I think I would describe my illustrative style as ‘painterly’. I have used an Apple pencil with Procreate software on my iPad Pro to create all the illustrations. Because I come from more of a traditional art practice of painting and drawing, I tend to use digital tools in the same way that I would use real paint and pencils. Firstly, in Procreate I sketch the image with a digital led pencil, and then I use the various digital paint brushes and smudge tools to layer paints on top of each other to create the colours and textures. One of the delights of using digital tools instead of traditional materials, is the ability to create different lighting effects. I’m a big fan of using blend modes in Procreate to layer up different coloured lights to reflect the mood of the story.

One of the remarkable things about this book is the sense of motion. Huni, how have you created movement in the illustrations?

Animation is all about creating movement through incremental changes in images from one frame to the next, so I suppose I’ve spent many years studying the way things move in order to learn how to animate them. My own dog, Rufus, is quite a frantic digger, and a joyful playful dog with lots of golden fluffy hair. I watch him everyday as he gambols his way through life and at first I tried to break down his movements in my sketches to create the character of Digger. I found this very difficult and through the process I came to realise that a puppy is mostly a blur of flying hair and swinging ears and floppy tongue. When I stopped trying to be accurate in my drawings and just focus on the feeling and energy of a puppy, I was able to channel Rufus’s movement through frantic line work and messy paint.

Huni, the book is set largely underground but it’s actually very bright. How have you used light to achieve this?

Light and colour are very important themes throughout the book, especially because Digger is following a rainbow. I wanted the illustrations to reflect the sort of luminescence and magical feeling that a rainbow emits. One challenge of illustrating a book that is predominantly set underground, is how to make it colourful and light. The idea that Digger is following a rainbow really helped me with this. It gave me the freedom to use my imagination and think about how the light and colours of the rainbow would look if they were funneled into a tunnel and mixed up underground. Suddenly the rocks don’t have to be brown, they can be multicoloured like a rainbow. I was also able to use the natural daylight streaming through a fissure in the rock to allude to the idea that Digger’s owner has come home and is calling him back to the surface.

Huni, this is your first picture book. How did you arrive here?

I was always a mad keen artist as a child, constantly drawing and painting after school and on the weekends. What started as a hobby, then grew into a profession as I went on to study Fine Arts at university and then become a secondary school art teacher. I then went on to study multimedia and eventually complete a Masters of Film Television and Animation.

I wrote and animated my own short films for many years. A highlight for me was having one of my films selected for the Hiroshima International Animation Festival which is one of the top animation festivals in the world. I couldn’t believe it! I met so many of my animation heroes in Hiroshima and I was completely thrilled to win the Special Jury Prize.

One of my career ambitions had always been to work on a cinema released feature film, so I was very excited by having the opportunity to make the artwork and 2D animation for an Australian/New Zealand feature anthology called We Are Still Here. This film opened the Sydney Film Festival in 2022. On opening night, I snuck onto the red carpet and did a little happy dance - another career highlight.

I’ve been working my way down the career bucket list and next thing was to illustrate a children’s book. I couldn’t think of anyone better to do this with than the very talented Johanna Bell!

Johanna, which of Huni’s illustrations best captures the essence of Digger for you? Why?

Oh gosh, that’s a really hard question to answer because I love all the Diggers! I’d have to say the spread that reads ‘Up, down, up, down, round and round until …’ because in it Huni has captured Digger’s goofy enthusiasm and dig-before-he-thinks personality. I love the big Digger on the right-hand side; the way his ears are flapping and his fair looks like it’s moving. I still have no idea how Huni managed to make Digger look as if he’s actually digging. It’s rare in picture books to have such a strong sense of motion. That’s one of my favourite things about the book - the feeling that Digger is actually moving!

Spread from Digger Digs Down by Johanna Bell & Huni Melissa Bolliger ©

The text in your book is laid out all over the place and really helps to emphasise a sense of movement. Was that intentional?

We’re pleased to hear you say this because there was a LOT of to-ing and fro-ing when it came to text placement. It’s incredible how moving a word even a few millimeters can make a big difference. We wanted to create a sense of Digger digging deep, deep down and because this wasn’t possible using landscape spreads we decided to flip the book every now and again to create a skinny vertical panel. It was really important to both of us that the text be placed in a way so as to emphasise the actions in the book. One example of this is the spread where Digger runs into the wombat. In this illustration the words are stacked and descending to create a sense of descent. On the spread where the Octopus helps Digger reach the surface the text goes up, emphasising the lifting motion. It’s always a risk to interrupt the conventions of text but in this case, the meaning in the story helps the reader navigate the sometimes unusual text placement.

One of my favourite spreads is the one with the Octopus. It’s such a surprise to end up in an aquatic space. How did you get there?

The first draft of the story featured an underwater lake. Digger accidentally dug through the wall of the lake creating a water spout that shot him back to the surface. Clair Hume, (who was the publisher at UQP when the book was signed), wasn’t sure about this and challenged us to think about other things that might draw Digger back to the surface. We did a lot of brainstorming and at some stage we thought an underground whale might swallow Digger and then eject him through his spout. Yes, things got silly. But through all the weird ideas, we kept coming back to water; the idea of an underground aquifer. It’s not unfeasible but also open to lots of imaginative play. Originally the Octopus was a danger that Digger only narrowly escaped but then our new publisher, Cathy Vallance, encouraged us to think about a friendlier creature who could help Digger return to the surface. And so Huni’s gorgeous Octopus was born. There’s something about the large bodies of water that’s similar to underground worlds. They’re both vast and home to hidden worlds and creatures. Perhaps that’s why we couldn’t let go of the idea of an underground body of water.

Huni, you dedicated the book to your husband. Can you tell us about that?

My dedication is actually a little ironic and a bit of a gentle stir towards my husband. I have always been a huge ‘dog person’ but when I finally met my life partner, to my horror, he didn’t like dogs! He sort of hated them actually. When we got married, I had accepted that I would probably never own a dog again but as a joke I would often say to him “when we get a dog …” He would just roll his eyes at me and look uncomfortable. Then one Christmas, to my absolute surprise, he gave me a card with a tiny Cavoodle puppy on the front and inside it said “I love you darling, let’s get a dog”. Of course he fell instantly and deeply in love with our little puppy. He’s a changed man and now he loves dogs!

Do you two have another project in the pipeline?

We do! It’s set somewhere very, very cold but that’s all we can say at the moment.