I have pets, but they're the really ordinary sort - yellow Labrador, tabby cat, white rabbit, a few goldfish - that kind of stuff. Nothing very... extravagant or unusual or exotic, but I find, in terms of inspiration, Mother Nature is just it.
I hope that there's a difference between being childish and childlike and that I'm the latter, if you take my meaning. I often sort of wonder. I don't think I'm a terribly good grown-up; I don't take responsibility easily or well in many areas of life. Finance and stuff like that, I'm absolutely appalling.
Being an artist, it's all a journey, and you learn where the subtle patterns lie.
I was always interested in art at school, and after year twelve, senior year, I spent three years studying graphic design at college. I worked in advertising for two years but didn't like it much, then began doing a bit of illustration work for various publishers.
Ever since I was a kid, I might have been eleven or twelve. I'd be telling anyone who would listen that when I grew up, I wanted to be an artist.
I was eight when we came to Australia. It was five amazing weeks onboard this ship - it was the Northern Star.
It's not even my job to educate, but what I do is try to facilitate by creating a book that works on different levels. I do want to entertain and bring some joy to the reading experience. If it holds a little kernel of knowledge that readers choose to explore, well, that's great.
The English probably do that wordplay kind of humour and whimsy better than anyone, and I've always felt that my writing goes more to that than what I did when I came to Australia.
There's a book called 'Where The Wild Things Are,' by American writer Maurice Sendak... it really is the most sublime book. It's a picture book, but it works at so many levels, and it's fantastic.
I've had an absolutely charmed life in every aspect of it. I do for my job what I would do for a hobby if it wasn't my job. Half the secret of happiness, I'm ecstatically happily married with three great kids, you know. It's been a blessed life.
Whether one likes it or not, the screen is a profoundly important source of imagery and storytelling for this generation. For me, books remain a stunning place to tell stories, but the screen has a place.
It was always that detail that drove me. Ever since I was a little kid, I used to get into the nitty gritty... when I was drawing army tanks or monsters, I'd do every nut and rivet, and I'd do every scale on the dragon's back. It was just the way I was built.
You know I'm a bit of a dag because I listen to classical music. I recently bought myself an iPod and downloaded every piece of classical music that I had access to onto that.
I was born in Amersham, England on 6/4/58. My family moved to Australia when I was eight, and I went to Box Hill High School and then Melbourne High School. I liked to draw and write at school, and I liked books by J.R.R. Tolkien, A.A. Milne and Kenneth Grahame.
I began illustrating children's books because of a growing disillusionment with the sort of work I was doing in the advertising industry. Book publishing offered me the chance to be far more creative.
My only real hobby is playing music. I write a lot of music on guitar and keyboards and hope one day to make a record or maybe even write the score for a film.
I guess I don't come to the work without baggage. I have an idea of what I want my pictures to look like in my head, and if they don't match up, I find it frustrating.
I'm a relentlessly optimistic person, and I think 'The Waterhole' is a story of hope and that even though nature goes through cycles, we prevail in the end.
People kept asking, 'What's your market?' I've got no idea at all other than me, an eleven year old kid in a 56-year-old body. But there are a lot of us out there.
Whilst I love still hiding... games and puzzles to play, I'm not as imprisoned by that need to fill every corner with detail.
