Walter Wick

When I was young I was a reluctant reader. It was hard for me to sit still and read a book. I preferred activities that got me moving, like neighborhood ball games, bike riding, skiing, sledding, skating, climbing trees, and exploring the woods in Connecticut where I grew up.

I also taught myself to draw. I became fascinated with shapes, shading, and trying to make the objects in my drawings appear to pop out in 3-D. Later I became interested in photography. I took pictures in the woods with my camera, tinkered with equipment in the darkroom, and experimented with artistic effects.

Much later I became the photographer of the I SPY books, in collaboration with writer Jean Marzollo. I did more than take the pictures. I thought of and sketched ideas, collected and made props, built sets, arranged and hid objects, adjusted lights, and then took the picture. I rearranged objects and took another picture -- sometimes over and over again.

I write as well as illustrate my own books now. In A DROP OF WATER, I combine simple text with clear photographs to explain science secrets of the everyday world. In WALTER WICK'S OPTICAL TRICKS, the world is turned upside down with impossible objects, phantom images, and other perplexing illusions. With the CAN YOU SEE WHAT I SEE? series, I continue the picture-puzzle tradition, taking readers on amazing journeys of the imagination in their quest for hidden objects. With my latest, HEY, SEYMOUR! you can join Seymour and his new friend Buttons on their adventures. Discover different worlds and the objects hidden in them with fold out flaps in this ever expanding search-and-find.

Happy reading!

Walter Wick