horror vacui

Progress, a micromovement at a time....

2011-05-23T22:43:00.000-04:00

Yes, I have managed to make some progress...somewhat slowly and painfully, but progress nonetheless. I've drawn the beginnings of several pencils for the book dummy...these ARE only beginnings- there are many improvements and additions to be made (some of my post-it remarks and suggestions to myself are still visible on the scans)(which I've darkened a bit, since they are only pencil).

(ha, new reminder to self- fix the headphones! Those don't look like headphones, it looks as though she's wearing deflated earmuffs. Or figs, although that makes no sense)

(note to self-fix hand holding book, way too small proportionately)

(this one is still quite rough, just in the sketchbook, not yet on the 'official' paper)

I'm not yet sure that I'm going to use all of these- in fact, it is unlikely. And as you can clearly see, they're just beginnings- I have yet to add any pattern, any background elements (although in keeping with the pages that I've already done, and my general stylistic vision- ho ho- background elements/details will likely be kept to a minimum).

However, this bit-by-bit approach, although slow, seems to be the one that works best for me. I have SEVERAL pieces at once on the go, so I can complete a little bit of one whilst thinking of the others. I find this easier than working on one piece to completion, because when I don't know what to do/things don't seem to be working, I don't continue to fiddle and fuss (with possible disastrous results), I just move on to another aspect of another piece that I DO know what to do with (hopefully). This project in particular lends itself to this approach...I'm still not really sure to what degree I should 'finish' the pencils. I have the impression that it isn't good to 'complete' too many pages for a publisher (it might give the idea that you would be unwilling to make changes)- so I'm not sure whether it might also be possible to make pencilled pages 'too good', too.... In any case, my current plan is to draw them up to the point at which I would begin to paint them (although I plan only to PARTIALLY complete the patterned areas- no point in killing myself- also, if anything would give the impression that I might not be willing to make changes...!)

And finally, for your amusement, something completely pointless:

Accusatory spoons!

Behold! The amazing powers of procrastination, unleashed!

2011-05-07T23:32:00.000-04:00

...well, what I have really discovered is that the very act of deciding that now is the time to do certain things that I am, for whatever reason, either putting off or hesitant to begin (i.e. dummy pencils) may actually result in my instead completing OTHER things that have long languished unfinished (i.e. yet ANOTHER page of my picture book that has been awaiting completion for some time now):

Hmm, the colours are a bit off...the table is actually a light turquoise colour...I'm going to have to fiddle around with the scanner's colour settings one of these days...(I'll probably do it when I'm avoiding some other task!) Come to think of it, I had noticed some greens being a little 'off' a couple of times...this is probably related.

...and I actually DID begin work on the dummy sketches after all... organizing previous notes and sketches, followed by further thinking, image research,and yes, even some sketching has so far been begun! It is actually turning out to be a fairly productive few days off. More soon.

Another page (finally!) completed...

2011-05-06T22:12:00.000-04:00

....not that it was completely executed in its entirety since the last post...I've been extremely busy with my job recently (which is, by the way, sadly, completely unrelated to art and/or illustration, but happily, related to another of my interests). Although nearly completed months (?how many?) ago, I somehow managed to put off finishing it (partially due to a fear of ruining all of my so-far-satisfactory work with an unsatisfactory final touch?). Enough was enough- in my zeal to update my site with newer work, I decided that it had to be finished. You may remember having seen this at some point:

This is the first page of my book. The rungs of the crib are cut off by this scan, but I didn't feel like paying to have a scan done at the local copy place (until I need a high-res version to send out, that is). I'll get back to working on the dummy drawings tomorrow. I'm hoping to get at least a few good pencil drawings done for the dummy over the next week; maybe Illustration Friday if I have time (and find the theme inspiring).

I'm planning another postcard mailing- I've had quite a good response to the 'Spring' image; that may be the one to go with, although that won't be suitable for mailing to the children's market- I'll have to come up with something else for that (cue ongoing inner dialogue of doubt as to suitability of work for that market, etc.).

Autumn & feather boas

2011-04-25T00:18:00.001-04:00

Here it is, finally, for your viewing pleasure, the painted-in-colour sketch for 'Autumn'. (So, in my mind, apparently, autumn is blood-red and wine coloured [and pomegranates look rather like beets], while summer is black and orange and spring is bright yellow and green.) Still, on the whole I'm mostly pleased with these...I'll get to making 'good' drawings of summer at the very least (a bit of a mess) and perhaps others too (I used cheapo paper and it is quite buckled...not the best for a high-res scan even if I decide that the sketch IS acceptable- that's a big IF-) sometime soon. 'Winter' I might redo. I quite like the pose but the pseudo-crystalline formation? Ugh...not quite what I had in mind. Surely something better can be done with the idea. Well, in any case you'll see updates on this at some point in the near future.

What else? Well, I went to another burlesque-themed drawing session yesterday; here are a few sketches that are okay- no more, no less. Not a spectacular session for me but fun nonetheless...:

No, she did not have (or wear) wings....this was for one of the contests, which involves adding something to the drawing, usually. This one was- give her wings. Hence the wings.

Again, no...although props might not be out of the question, there was no giant bottle- it was another contest; this time the assignment was to give the drawing the appearance of a (presumably Art Nouveau!) poster or label. I didn't really give it much thought until the last few minutes and gave up on the idea quickly...I decided that this was NOT on its way to looking Art Nouveau in the least...

Here, more use of the ubiquitous BOA. Yes, I've officially had enough feather boa....I know, I know, I suppose that it's to be expected at these sessions, it's one of THE burlesque accoutrements, it's coy and flirty and sexy and all that....but I have found it very annoying the last couple of times I've encountered it. Here, and in the previous sketch, it isn't bad...but there always seem to be a couple of poses in which there seems to be very little to draw BUT the boa- which I don't find to be either terribly amusing or otherwise helpful to me drawing-practice-wise (I, for one, don't feel the urge to incorporate feather boas into my work very frequently). Ok, ok, enough about that. I'm sure that I'll see them again if I continue attending these drawing sessions, so I'll try to think positively about the whole thing. Perhaps drawing feather boas will turn out to be a highly useful skill at some point, for some reason that I am now unable to foresee.

I'll be back with further news and remarks soon.

Autumn- sketch in black & white

2011-04-17T22:48:00.001-04:00

This is just a quick update, a tiny little post before I go away for a couple of days. Here is a sketch for 'autumn', the final season- I'm not yet sure whether I'm satisfied with this idea. Something about the woman's expression, combined with a certain other something about the way she's holding the glass reminds me of Aubrey Beardsley- this pleases and amuses me (although I hope that I'm not copying one of his drawings without realizing it!). I'll finish painting it when I return; in the meantime some sketching may transpire, and I'll consider a colour scheme- but I'm not bringing my paints, not for three (likely very busy) days away. I'll be back soon enough...!

IF: bottled

2011-04-13T22:33:00.000-04:00

Here is my entry for IF this week; the theme was 'bottled'. This is obviously just a quick sketch, nothing more than silliness and the first thing that came to my mind (they're not even in a BOTTLE, it's clearly more of a JAR). This fast and associative idea-generation seems to be the best way for me to get something done for Illustration Friday these days instead of agonizing over it- I mean, it's really just for fun- if I do indeed come up with something that I like- e.g. 'cultivate' a couple of weeks ago (which prompted me to rename it 'summer' and do a 'seasons' series), all the better. Back with more soon- the final season still to come.

Winter

2011-04-09T20:52:00.000-04:00

Well, here I am, fully a week later, and yes, once more I have completed a rough drawing for another season and little else besides- general busy-ness being once again the excuse. Ah well. By this time next week I want to have finished not only the final season (several sketches/ideas for it, at least, if not a reasonably completed drawing-sketch) as well as an entry for this week's Illustration Friday.

This week's season is Winter. I'm reasonably pleased with it- particularly because the 'annoying' sketches that I mentioned last week were 'winter'. (They are still too annoying to post- but I will mention that I was thinking more along the lines of a woman curled up, rather than stretched out.) I'm still not sure about my attempts at a 'crystalline' formation around her- this could be better executed.

Well, that leaves Autumn....I have some thoughts.

Spring

2011-04-02T20:46:00.000-04:00

I always intend to post more frequently. I recently realized that one of the factors in my failing to do so is my tendency to put it off until I have 'more' or 'enough' material- be it news, sketches or interesting thoughts. The past couple of weeks have been extremely busy, and I haven't had a lot of time to work on projects, alas. I did do some more sketches, though, developing the idea of depicting the four seasons symbolically (inspired by the IF drawing in the last post, which suggested to me an interesting embodiment of 'summer'). I completed a sketch of 'spring' that I'm quite happy with, and did a few for 'winter' that I'm completely annoyed with. Typically, I am tempted to wait to post an entry until I have that elusive 'more'- in this case, another sketch that I like. I am not, however, going to wait as I so often do- in spite of the nagging inner voice that says 'that's not enough, only one drawing? that's not very interesting' etc., I'm going to post the one thing that I'm willing to show. Here it is, 'spring':

Winter and autumn soon to come (perhaps one at a time, even)!

IF: cultivate

2011-03-21T13:20:00.000-04:00

I quite like this idea that I came up with for this week's IF; it's very quickly executed in my terribly swollen (and quite difficult to make scans from) sketchbook, but I'm thinking of doing a better version of it. It might not be a bad idea to make this into a series of four seasons- this being the summer. I like the strangeness of it.
Speaking of strangeness...sometimes I wonder whether I'm just kidding myself. Is there really a place in kiddie lit for me? Is that, in any case, what I'd really like to do? Ideally, I know that I'd rather illustrate picture books for teenagers and adults...yeah, that's a lucrative market- lots of THAT kind of stuff around... I often feel as though my style is unfortunately between markets- too weird/creepy/non kiddie for the kiddie market, too naive,not slick (or sophisticated or collage-y or urbane or whatever, depends on the moment) for the editorial market. It seems as though I'm just missing the mark everywhere... but what to do? What I do is what I do...and it seems to me that to be myself is the only way to proceed. Some people will like it- it's just a matter of finding those people.

My focus for the next little while is going to be developing new pieces for my portfolio. I feel as though I haven't changed things around for a while- not that I haven't been doing anything, it's just that so few things have, shall we say, 'made the cut'. I'm pretty happy with a number of the ideas that I've come up with recently just playing around and sketching (this IF being a good example). Here is another recent sketch:

...which I developed further into:

(not sure that I'm happy with this, though...)

Another that I'm considering doing a 'good' version of:

Well, that's all the news of note for the moment. I am continuing my valiant (if insufficient) attempts to augment my online presence- I'm considering joining either lunarize (their winter 'publisher' gallery was sold out) or hire an illustrator (in order to further the aforementioned presence online). I must follow up on mailings. Oh, and do some more DRAWING, too... further sketching for client, pencils for dummy, pieces for portfolio. Bonne semaine!

IF 'warning', new commission, a few 'yuks'

2011-03-06T18:53:00.001-05:00

...And so I have returned from a short trip to Florida, rested, relaxed and more ready than ever for spring. My 'perruche' postcards have arrived, and I'm very pleased...tomorrow, the mailing will commence...

I haven't participated in Illustration Friday for a while now, much to my chagrin. Yesterday, though, I began to make amends. Here is my take on 'warning':

I'm also starting work on a new private commission that seems as though it will be fun- I've just done several VERY rough sketches (really to rough to show, sorry, although I may change my mind later), too rough to show the client at this point. I'm going to do some more passable sketches to email to her tonight. I'm really looking forward to this project- she seems very open to ANYTHING, but has given a few guidelines ('anything' without ANY guidelines can be hard). I will be posting more on this at a later date... and work continues on completing my book in book-dummy form. Lots to do...

Oh yes, I'm still doodling pointlessly for my own amusement. For your perusal:

Perruche perdu 'poster'; further doodling for yuks

2011-02-15T22:15:00.000-05:00

Well, I've completed the second side of my new promotional piece:

However, I'm not completely satisfied with my handpainted contact information...it's a little irregular...Luckily, I scanned this before painting in the contact information, and added in the same information using photoshop- I'll use that for my cards. (Here, once again, is the other side:)

I'm somewhat annoyed with myself, though, for not having checked the 'oversized' postcard template (vistaprint) before- it's a little more vertical than the standard, alas. I'm unwilling to crop either image, but I'm not sure that the standard side will show the contact information sufficiently (it can't be too small; we don't ALL have eyes like microscopes!). I'll have to do a test; if it's not clear enough, I'll consider either a) adding the contact information to the 'girl' side (just superimposing on the image) or b) painstaking photoshop additions. This will not be easy on the 'girl' side (for this side, a 'frame' of another colour might make more sense), but fairly easy on the 'poster' side. We shall see. (And that'll learn me to check sizing details ahead of time!)

Finally, some more doodling. Argumentative rival teas! Once again with the floating heads! Accusatory coffee!

Doodling for yuks and another attempt at 'perruche perdu'

2011-02-02T20:43:00.000-05:00

As I promised myself that I would, I've been taking it easy and drawing more for FUN and with less self-imposed pressure- it's been good. I can feel my mental muscles loosening... Here are a couple of the....um, things... that I drew over the last several days:

the above faces the next:

(curse this non-spiral sketchbook, though!)

I did also finish another drawing that is a possible 'front' for the 'perruche perdu' card- I've painted a tiny version of the poster here; I plan to do the full-size version of the poster itself next. I used the same background pattern here as I used in the piece with the two women...I may incorporate the pattern into the poster somehow, too- perhaps something similar to what I did here- just a simple black outline. I'm working on NOT overindulging in detail overkill...

(hmmm...perhaps the pattern could stand to be a bit darker? )

As part of my recent campaign to relax and enjoy what I'm doing more, I indulged myself in a leisurely visit to the Grande Bibliothèque, where I found a beautiful and inspiring collection of the work of the early 20th century French collective, 'Le Pou qui Grimpe'(link en français only-sorry, didn't find such a thing in English)...here are a few pages:

More to come...

Various various

2011-01-27T19:14:00.000-05:00

I finished the 'perruche perdu' piece that I was working on...s'alright; I'm not thrilled but perhaps am just not receptive to a work-based thrill at the moment. I plan to continue with my idea of a 'series' for the next promotion- 'pieces' rather than a single image- soon.

I've been particularly frustrated recently (as mentioned in the post previous to this one) with setbacks on the 'flying' book project, and decided to NOT continue working on it in that particular state. Instead, I've been working on... whatever comes to mind, just for fun. Here is one such thing:

What is it? What does it mean? What is it for? I don't know...but it was enjoyable.

..Here is the 'perruche perdu' piece:

I'm planning to work next on the 'flying' pages that I've ALMOST completed, which will give me more to add to my online portfolio (one point on which I feel a nagging self-induced pressure/anxiety). I'll also work on a purely pencil dummy- Diane Dawson Hearn suggested on the PBdummy chat that doing more than TWO finished pieces in a book dummy would give the editor(s) the impression that you would be resistant to change. (Thanks Diane! I wouldn't have thought of that myself!)

Ok...that 's all for the moment. Back soon.

Setbacks and revelations

2011-01-21T00:37:00.000-05:00

Hello all.... I've been working but have little satisfactory finished work to show for it. Yes, yes.... I will tell you my tale of woe...which comes, incidentally, complete with what I am trying to see as a positive outcome. (Oh, it is, it is....it's just hard for me not to want things to work out perfectly, every time, and for everything that I do to be the BEST THING I've ever done, etc....).

So...I've been working on a page for my book...rather desperate to complete ten pages for the SCBWI grant contest as mentioned in the last post. ( I'd really wanted to have completed two new ones already! ) I have long had in mind what I wanted to do.... here are a couple of sketches:

...and here is the pencil drawing before I began to paint:

Well, it turned out...not well. And it wasn't that I made any particular errors....it was difficult for me to put my finger on exactly what I was not pleased with. This led to a fairly miserable mood in which I thought of other pieces that I've worked on recently that I had also been less than pleased with....and they had something in common. But what was it? And then I realized... that sometimes, my penchant for DETAIL is sometimes too much.... too much detail, on too similar a scale, is not as successful as if I were to use it sparingly or in greatly differing scale, if that makes sense. I realized that that I had made that very error recently in the pieces that I consider to have been less successful. My "Heidi" piece, while not terrible, used allover detail (sky and 'grass/flowers') on about the same scale, and the figures were detailed on a similar scale. Same with the cover that I did for Crow Toes... Hmmmmm....

So, I decided to minimize colour... in this version, I planned to 'grey/blue' out the buildings and just keep them lightly outlined...and to do a black outline of a pattern in the sky (didn't get to that point here):

...somewhat better, yes? But then I was able to pinpoint a final criticism of the earlier pieces... again, related to scale. I really am more effective at tight scenes, not crowd scenes, not 'pulled back' scenes. A wide perspective isn't what I do best... particularly since I have the aforementioned tendency to detail everything. Of course, these are things that I can work on... but another consideration is that I have already completed several pages of the book, and want to continue it with the same consistent 'look'...not that I am not already planning to change several pages... so I began another version of this page:

with the woman's figure in larger scale. This was difficult to convince myself to do- I'd really envisioned it containing her figure. I may continue with both. This one I plan to execute with the more minimal colour scheme also. So, positive outcome (realization re. strengths/weaknesses as well as things that don't work so well that I will endeavor to reign in) follows despondent mood.

What else? I started working on the 'perruche perdu' promotional piece; will post that soon. Was planning to post that tonight but alas, a setback in that piece will delay me until tomorrow or the next. I'm not terribly upset about this one...just something that needs to be done.

In older news, I went to another 'Dr. Sketchy' drawing session...liked the model a bit less (too much wig, too much feather boa-maybe I was just sitting in an unfortunate location)- but had fun nonetheless and did a few decent drawings. Here's one:

Ok...that's it for the moment. Be seeing you!

Perruche perdu and book dummies; oh my, yes!

2011-01-02T21:34:00.000-05:00

It's about time for me to plan, execute and send out another promotional mailing. In the past, this has taken the form of postcards- colour image on the front with b&w printed contact info/email address on the back. However, for this next one, I may spend a little more money and print both sides in colour- in fact, I'm considering the possibility of doing two or more versions and sending them out as a series. It won't cost TOO much, I'm sure...the magic and wonder of Vistaprint never cease to amaze.

The idea is to make the 'info' side look like a poster- a poster for a lost bird; my contact information will appear where the contact information for the bird's owners would be. The poster/info side will remain constant even if I do several variations on the front. The front will feature various people whose connection to the lost bird are vague and open to interpretation- a story of sorts, but one that is lacking a certain amount of information and so is prime for speculation. I saw such a sign in my neighborhood and found it fascinating! (I also kept thinking about how I might improve the poster- how I would do it if it were MY lost perruche!)

Here are some of the sketches- please keep in mind that these are REALLY VERY SKETCHY- I don't think that I've ever posted anything quite so sketchy before- to be honest, I feel a little strange about it- as though I were posting some kind of lurid and probably undesirable tell-all confessional.

These first two images were my first impression- I hadn't developed the idea in any particular way yet. I imagined a woman passing the sign appearing very emotional, and I just quickly sketched the sign so as to remember what it looked like, more or less:

I developed the idea a little bit more (i.e. at all!) here:

Here are a few sketches of other possibilities- much less developed:

(I'm kind of partial to this one, though!)

(alas, it is not clear that the patinaed man is supposed to be a statue. He is.)

And here is my sketch for the 'poster' side (still much work to do, obviously!):

Clearly, I'm still in the 'thinking' stage. I'll be working on this project in the near future; will keep you posted on progress. However, there's a couple of other things that I'll be working on...

First, I'm going to finish TEN pages of my 'flying' book (the wordless book) to my satisfaction (this, unfortunately for me, is not as easy as I would like!) in order to enter it for the SCBWI's Don Freeman Grant , one of the SCBWI's work-in-progress grants. I have quite a few pages done...but, as I said, 'to my satisfaction'. This must be sent in- i.e. postmarked- no later than the 2nd of February- therefore, it's something of a priority. I love a deadline! I do, I do.

I'm also going to work on the dummy for this project as part of #kidlitart's 'dummy' challenge. The entire online group will be sharing their progress on their respective dummies from 6 January until June. I plan not only to work on the dummy for 'flying', but also for 'Otto', another idea I've had for quite some time now. It will be good to have a group- virtual or not- to help to keep me moving ahead and not...ahem... re-doing and THINKING about things endlessly as I am wont to do. Until next time then....

'A Trailer Park X-mas' sketches

2011-01-02T12:18:00.000-05:00

Hello all! Hope that you all had a wonderful holiday. This will be my first of two posts covering my art-related activities over the last couple of weeks. First, Dr. Sketchy! I had long been aware of the existence of a Dr. Sketchy's group en vigeur here in Montreal, but for one reason or another (that reason usually being work), I had never been able to attend. (For those of you who have not heard of Dr. Sketchy, it is, in short, an essentially burlesque-themed drawing session held in numerous cities around the world. For more information, here is the main site. )

Finally, a couple of weeks ago, I went to a Dr. Sketchy session for the first time (and this was my first life drawing class of any kind for many many years, too!). The theme was 'A trailer park X-mas' and the model was costumed and adorned with much dollar-store and liquor-store paraphernalia, and surrounded by the likes of a tiny plastic x-mas tree festooned with crushed beer cans. Campy psychobilly 'redneck-ized' versions of various Christmas songs were played throughout the session. I enjoyed myself immensely. I am definitely going to go to the next session next Saturday (January 8th). I think that I need to buy some markers for quick colouring in these kinds of situations- paint not so convenient.

Here are a few of my drawings:

Ok, that will be all for the moment. I will be back with another post later today. Stay tuned for exciting revelations concerning sketches for my next self-promotion endeavor! Another SCBWI contest! And my upcoming participation in a book dummy creation challenge! More later today.

Tomie de Paola award entry, update and previously hidden sketch revealed!

2010-12-14T16:29:00.000-05:00

Oh, the intrigue! The drama!
I have completed my piece for the T. de P. award.... well, in any case, I'm done with it. I had been considering the possibility of re-doing it completely with a different colour scheme, about doing it again in a different style... but in the end, I wound up fussing with it so much, I couldn't tell whether it was good, trite, dull, a mess, abysmal, an insult, what have you... but I really wanted to move on to something else. I went to the SCBWI site to check out the entry process...reread the passage selected...and realized, to my horror, that, although I HAD read the passage, I had rather inconvienently forgotten one of the few indications of any kind of specific colours to be used in the composition. I had made her scarf blue, when it was specifically noted in the passage that it was red. I had made one of her dresses red. And so, work continued... and I have learned a valuable lesson. Do not trust that you 'know what it says'...even if it IS something that you have read more than once or twice...print it out. Sigh. Repainting over gouache is not the best thing...but think that this colour scheme is perhaps better than the original- it's not actually much different, although the blue of her dress is brighter than the original blue of her scarf; I like it more.
And so... for your amusement-
First, a cropped scan of the pencil drawing. (As you will see, I am still not sure where to 'cut' this piece)- looking at this crop again, maybe this would be the best? Hm...

And first the WHOLE page, and then a few different crops of the final painted piece (original colour scheme) (sorry, didn't make any scans in the interim!):

...and now, after the colour adjustment:

That last one is the closest to the cropped version in pencil above...I'm definitely leaning towards it or the second-last one; definitely not the full page. I like the increase in verticality in the last crop (I've always been partial to the tall and thin picture- one of my Asian influences, I suppose) and the minimization of the adult figure. In all of the versions, the perspective is somewhat unusual (you don't usually see a cut-off figure) and I think/hope that it emphasizes the child's perspective- and also the arbitrariness of her experience (led by invisible adult forces who knows where). As I've said though, I've lost all perspective/objectivity when it comes to this one...what do you think? (Here I am talking to actual readers, not the internet robots who spam me mercilessly with pseudo-information about any number of drugs that I could buy online!).
I have been thinking about- and the next post will feature some experimentation along these lines- doing some work in a slightly different style; a style more like the way that I sketch (what my first-year university prof Tony Doctor referred to as my 'El Greco' style).
More to come!

Tomie de Paola award entry, progress

2010-11-28T22:28:00.001-05:00

I am somewhat hesitant to post all of my work in progress for my entry- can't decide whether this is reasonable or paranoid. A little of both, mayhaps? I really got down to work this week, believing the deadline to be the 5th of December, not the 15th- which, as I discovered today, is the actual deadline. Deadlines really work for me... when I have a deadline, I make decisions, I get things done- not that I don't without a deadline, but I somehow find a way to prolong things...not through any lack of motivation or effort. My book, for example- I fuss and fiddle and put things aside so that I can 'think' about them and ostensibly find the 'perfect' solution...and I never, ever manage to just bang out a page within a day, or two days the way I can if I HAVE to. I don't really know how to make my self-imposed deadlines as REAL to me as an externally imposed deadline, I really don't... Anyone else have this problem? Any suggestions would be muchly appreciated!
In any case, I am quite pleased with my progress thus far. I am going to incorporate a pattern, surprise surprise... I envisioned what I realize are actually quite eastern european flavoured floral-botanical patterns, although Heidi is set in the Swiss Alps, I still think that it works...here are some of my pattern experiments:

I tried turning this into a regular repeat; this attempt shows just the framework and no petals, leaves, etc.:

However, I realized that this was too 'regular', not quite what I had envisioned. I want to use this pattern ON the mountain they are ascending, so I wanted it to look a little more like actual plant life... something more like:

That was more like it... but finally I decided to go with this one:

I've since transferred it to the drawing...which no, sorry, I've decided I'll wait to show you in its various stages only after it's all finished and sent in. That will be soon enough; I'm ready to make with the gouache. I'm going to (try to) pretend that I don't realize that the deadline is actually the 15th. I'm having fun with this; it's going well.

The brilliance of Otto Dix, beautiful architecture, general discouragement, new and ongoing projects

2010-11-23T08:35:00.000-05:00

So...as you can see, I'm posting once again on my OLD blog... it doesn't seem as though I'm getting quite the same traffic on my new blog attached to my website...but if you want to read the posts that you've missed AND subscribe to/bookmark my 'new' blog, here is the link: NEW BLOG (and I will be unspeakably pleased as well!)

What has been going on? Well, I’ll start where I left off- I was anticipating my visit to the Otto Dix exhibit now up at the Montréal Museum of Fine Arts. This is a show that I have been waiting and hoping to see for twenty years, and it was as good as I was hoping it would be. I was happy to see several luminous and beautifully detailed not-quite caricature portraits that I had never seen in reproduction, and I was particularly impressed by a striking series of etchings inspired by Francisco de Goya’s Los desastres de la guerra (and, more importantly, by own experiences during WWI). VERY good show; I will certainly go back for another look. I have always loved Dix, I admire his astonishing talent too much to even be able to be envious of it.
Then… I was off to Windsor and Detroit to run the Detroit Marathon (no, no, du calme…I did NOT win)…however, it was a great experience and I’ll certainly do it again. Besides the run, though, I had a great time as a tourist in Detroit- the day before the race I was able to go on a tour of my very favourite building in the world, the Union Trust Guardian:

…and here I am with the enthusiastic, witty, charming and knowledgeable head concierce of the Guardian Building, Mr. Christopher Roddy:

Have I mentioned how much I love Detroit? We stayed in the recently restored Book Cadillac Hotel (now the Westin Book Cadillac); the exterior has been beautifully restored; the interior, while not restored to its former state, is chic and modern and tasteful- it’s fine. We also went on a tour of Hitsville U.S.A., the Motown Museum (something that I’d meant to do for years and years while I LIVED in Windsor, but you know how it is when you COULD go to see something ANYTIME!), which was also animated by a tour guide who was, well, ANIMATED. Love Motown. Finally, a bus tour of the course covered a large swath of the city….a great, great day.
Since my triumphant return I’ve been continuing to work on sending out packages to publishers- I’ve been doing research on some smaller publishers, which might be a better fit (and more likely to pay attention to/consider me). I’ve been continuing to work on my Montréal card/print project, with somewhat disappointing-to-me results. I’ve become quite discouraged over it, in fact… I’ve been feeling recently that I haven’t done anything that I really think is good in a while (sigh). So, I’ll put that aside for the moment. I’m beginning work on an entry for the Tomie dePaola award given by SCBWI- the gist is that you produce one illustration for a passage chosen by the illustrious Mr. dePaola. This year’s passage is the opening passage of Joanna Spyri’s classic, Heidi. So, I’m now percolating ideas for that- the deadline is the 15th of December. After that, I’ll continue working on the book dummy. As a matter of fact, SCBWI has another annual competition- this one for a grant- for an unpublished book dummy (or series of 10 completed illustrations). The deadline for that one is in February. Plenty to keep me busy for the next little while. Must also get back into diligently ‘building my web presence’ and recommence my pestering of various people via email in earnest. Wish that I had an agent to do all of this self-promotion stuff… it’s a grind. Alas.
Stay tuned for sketches for my Heidi submission!

...a couple more sketches for Montréal project

2010-07-20T23:20:00.000-04:00

The past couple of weeks have been busy, busy, busy...have started a new (day) job whilst still employed at the old one; seems pleasant enough so far but am suffering a bit of mental overload due to lack of time available to devote to illustration projects, i.e. my REAL work. Nonetheless, I am finally posting another couple of sketches that I managed to execute:

This is the old Orange Crush factory on avenue du Parc, between Van Horne and Bernard. This is the kind of detail that I love the most- this was a factory, a no-nonsense building with a purpose and no practical need for ornament- and yet here it is. Beautiful. I'm definitely going to include this.

This one is an okay sketch but an unsatisfactory scan- apologies! But I'll describe what is lacking- the sky actually extends quite a bit (vertically) beyond my scanner's capability, shading into a deep blue. Not sure about this one yet. We shall see. Tomorrow will be the last day of a ten-day stretch of working at the day jobs; Thursday, finally, I will be able to get back to some serious work. I want to complete a project that I'm working on for a friend for the 31st (I'm planning to enter it into a contest; the deadline is the 31st), so that will be a priority. After that, it will be all Montréal images for August- to be completed in time to order prints and cards for an art fair at the end of September. Must confirm turnaround times, too, of course... much to do! Bed now, though.

Montréal cards project, progress so far...

2010-07-02T17:05:00.000-04:00

Hi all! It's been a hectic couple of weeks, what with moving preparations. Happily, our stuff is now in our new (brighter!) apartment, but we've had to vacate for a few more days while our floors are sanded and varnished. So work has been on some kind of hold for a bit...still, I did manage to make a few sketches for my "Montréal card' project...

This is just a quick one of the warehouse water tower at the Van Horne underpass.... but I still want to fiddle with it a bit...I want the water tower featured prominently, but also the 'La Maison de l'Aspirateur' sign which is one of my favourite signs in the city...

...more like this, though this is even sketchier, complete with notes and sketch-within-a-sketch etc... I think that I'll wind up placing the water tower farther over to the left and making it smaller, leaving a larger sky area (which I'll pattern somehow interestingly).

This one is a winner- I think that I'll do this, the 'minaret'/bell tower of St. Michel's church, almost exactly this way. I'll position it so that there is more sky area- and again, sky patterned interestingly. I did another sketch of this church, from the other side...I like this version more (more interesting, unusual vantage point) but I'll show the other because I used it to work out a possible leaf/ivy pattern that I will likely use on this one:

... a few more ivy and leaf sketches...:

And another that I like, but will adjust somewhat- an example of the beautiful cornices that are to be seen in great variety throughout Montréal:

I think that this one could be adjusted to be more compositionally interesting... again, I'd like to increase the 'sky' area- perhaps reduce the scale of the cornice so as to include a greater length.
I have several more ideas that I will pursue as soon as I return to Montréal! I want to complete this project within the next few weeks. My aim is to produce scenes of some of the features of Montréal that I know and appreciate, unusual sights and details, not the tourist-postcard images. This is why I'm depicting St-Michel's as the tower from the north side of St-Urbain rather than an image of the facade (much as I love the facade!), for example. More to come!

new blog, new site, new projects! More to come....

2010-06-20T15:30:00.002-04:00

Hi everyone!

So sorry about my rather protracted absence. First, a little news...My new site is now up and running, and I have a new blog there. I've transferred all of my extant posts from this blog to the new blog's archives. As I have some followers here who may not immediately be aware of the switch (and also because it will take me a while to change over my 'networked blogs' etc., I'm going to simultaneously post on both blogs for a little while....To all of my lovely followers! Please come and look at the new site. (I would invite you to subscribe to my rss feed on my new blog, but I've not yet succeeded in placing the 'feed' button satisfactorally. ) (arrrrgggh!) (It is registered on feedburner, though, as AmandaCrawfordIllustration!) The new blog is here!

So-this post is the essentially the same post as the first post to appear on my brand-new blog which is now part of my website, which I won’t say is finished yet…but all of the general components are there. Oh, it has been quite a new experience, to say the least. I’m getting tired of fussing with it, but the closer I get to ‘completing’ it, the more things I find I would like to change just a bit…if only these little things were as easily done as said! Maybe for some, but not for me- not yet, anyway. It’s quite like working on a drawing or painting- the last 20% is really 80%, if that makes any sense. I have yet to add analytics codes to all of my pages, add (in a way that seems pleasing and harmonious, no white boxes please!!!!!argggghh) social media icons and an rss feed icon to my sidebars, move my tagline over just a little bit (the urgency of this diminishes by the minute, though!), adjust my gallery of thumbnails so that I can add individual url links to each image (this may necessitate re-doing the gallery AGAIN!, so I’m making it a low priority!)…oh, there’s more. I just can’t think of the rest right now. Add to that list the task of looking up how to do all of those individual things….computer programming genius, I am not that. I’m pretty pleased with the site, though- I have ‘contact me’ forms now, the lack of which is what started me thinking that a more customizable site might be necessary, and the design is nice and simple and clean. I’ll continue to play with it but for now I’ve had just about enough…

I’m finally starting work on a project that I’ve wanted to begin for quite some time now- my ‘Montréal cards’ project. In fact, in the plan that I wrote for an earlier week of the 12-week challenge, I’d planned to have it done by now. (Unfortunately, I did not factor into my plans completing the various tasks of the 12-week challenge!) So, I’ve taken some photos, and I’m starting drawing this very evening. I’m quite excited about this project, and have come up with some other, similar ideas that I’d like to do…please let me know what you think of these ideas! The first is a series of prints/cards depicting my favourite overpasses of the 401. The other is a series depicting Windsor scenes. Like the Montréal series, these have a fairly ‘local’ appeal…but more so, I think… Anyhow. I will post sketches of the Montréal series very soon.

Website overhaul in progress! 12WC weeks 7 & 8...

2010-06-06T21:21:00.000-04:00

...and oh, such a taxing of my brain! I'm beginning to 'get it'...I think. CSS code is even starting to make some kind of sense... not that I can make it do what I want most of the time, but....even so. Still, progress has been made: Here is a new logo that I made for my new site (I'm thinking that it will work well too on the reverse side of my new business cards!):

I've put it on my new site, which you can see here.

It's far from being finished, but I've made great progress over the last couple of days. I won't bore you with the details of my agonizing struggles, but I've found that what I would have assumed to be the simplest things to do are actually quite complicated to make happen. For example, I've spent a LOT of time trying to centre my image gallery on the home page. I've followed several pieces of coding advice to the letter, only to wind up with a left-justified column of thumbnails. I've put them back in a table, but I'll keep working on finding the solution. At least the column is gone! (I was somewhat relieved to see that many people in the Headway forum had the same problems!) Arrrgh.... enough with slaving over a hot computer, already. Back with more progress soon!

Finished! The girl who spoke lilies and jasmine

2010-05-31T00:28:00.001-04:00

click to enlarge!

The 3 Policemen by William Pène du Bois

2010-05-20T00:30:00.001-04:00

click here!

12WC week 6, part two

2010-05-13T23:09:00.001-04:00

This is the second illustration for the Arab folk tale I described earlier. Again, this is just the pencil stage; I haven't quite finalized things yet- for example, the flower-like scribbles will actually become flowerlike flowers. I'm not quite sure yet about the position of the eyes- but I like the way in which they appear to be looking past us, past the boy, off to the distance (towards the wronged fiancee?)...I may return the solid wall (which I will texture when I paint it to look as though it is worn stucco) to the way I had originally sketched it, ending a bit past the shutters- this would necessitate another colour/background behind the boy and the eyes- but another colour might be good. The inside of the room will be a darkened colour (still thinking about the colours for this one) with a small pattern on the wall. I was thinking mustardy-ochry yellows/browns for the wall. More progress soon to follow!

12WC, week 6, part one

2010-05-12T12:50:00.001-04:00

Ok, so I'm giving up on pretending that it is still week 5, 'part two'... I could have posted the first very very rough pencil sketches of my Arab fairy/folk tale as week 5, but find that I am still unwilling to let anyone else see them... so on I go to week 6, which is this week, so that works out quite well.

First, a quick synopsis of the story for which I am going to be executing two illustrations; the title is "The girl who spoke jasmine and lilies".

There were once three sisters. The youngest replied to a question posed by their father with a rather self-righteous and contrarian response, which I assume is supposed to be interpreted as indicative of her goodness and piety.... her father casts her out, and she wanders out and marries the first poor labourer she encounters. They have a daughter. It is this daughter who is the focus of the story. She is beautiful and good, and miraculous, too- when she washes her face in a basin of water, the water that has touched her skin turns to gold coins. When she opens her lips, jasmine flowers and lilies tumble out. News of her beauty, goodness and other special qualities spreads, and she is soon engaged to marry a prince in a nearby kingdom.

Her aunts hear of her good fortune, of course, and are jealous. It seems wrong to them that the daughter of a poor labourer and their outcast sister should be so fortunate. So they scheme.... they arrange it so that one of the aunts and her cousin (the aunt's daughter) should accompany her on the trip to the kingdom to be married. On the way, the aunt deprives her of food and water, insisting that her cousin needs it. She finally allows her a few drops of water in return for first one, and then the other, of the girl's eyes (which she cuts out, literally!). Now that she has been blinded, the aunt turns her out of the carriage to wander alone, while they continue on. The cousin pretends that she is the prince's fiancee, but he wonders about the lack of jasmine and lilies and the fact that she looks different, etc. The cousin gives some inane excuses. He remains suspicious.
In the meantime, the blind girl obtains some employment and disguises herself. She fills a basket with jasmine and lilies and asks a flower seller to go into the kingdom and call out that he is offering jasmine and lilies for sale. The wicked aunt hears this, and is eager to obtain them in order to allay the prince's suspicions. The seller will only accept one eye as payment for the flowers. What else is to be done? The aunt cuts out her daughter's one eye and gives it as payment. When the prince comes home, she shows him the basket and says, "look at the flowers that tumbled from my lips when you were away." (keeping her bandaged eye turned away from him.) The next day, same thing.... The seller brings the eyes back to the blind girl and she puts them into her eye sockets and she can see again... The prince follows ? the flower seller and discovers the girl, quickly realizes who she is, and all is put right. The aunts and the cousin are not particularly punished, as far as I know, although the cousin does remain blind, apparently.

So: here is the first pencil drawing, depicting the general state of things in the first part of the story- the loveliness of the girl, the scheming of her aunts and sisters:

The details of the drawing are not yet finished; I will elaborate the jewellery etc., also I will either draw the jasmine and lily flowers directly on the page or will do them separately to be added later...not sure yet. The 'evildoers' corner' will be a darker blue, and the foreground will be a brighter, lighter colour- deep yellow perhaps? Lilies and jasmine white, girl's garment bright pink. I will add a background pattern but I will keep it simple; I do want to finish this someday soon....

The second illustration depicts the flower seller trading the flowers to the wicked aunt for the eyes. I will post this soon.

12WC: week 5, part ONE

2010-05-09T23:55:00.001-04:00

Finished this page, hurrah! I'm fairly pleased with it. I'm still considering changing either the leaves or the grass to a darker, brighter green- they are too close in colour. However, I really like the contrast of the yellowish green against the blue sky; more likely that the grass will change. For the moment, though, I'm leaving it alone and have started work on something else. That 'something else' is the next two pieces, which will be illustrations for an Arab fairy tale. I'll post the first (first presentable!) drawings for that within the next couple of days (who knows, I may even post some of the 'unpresentable' sketches- we'll see).

12WC, week 4

2010-05-05T00:13:00.001-04:00

Oh..... this past week was hectic and I did not have a lot of time to work... the task was to complete 2 pieces. I work so slowly as it is, what with the fussing and all... but I did manage to get a good amount of work done on one piece, and a sketch for another. The first piece was another version of the page that I posted last (goldfinches flying over little girl). Here are my drawings for the new version, first:

I used different (more interesting, I thought) poses for the birds, added berries to the leaves, and, at the suggestion of Justin on the 12WC forum, added some foliage to 'encircle' the girl... I took another piece of Justin's advice (thanks muchly, Justin!), and adjusted the position of the lead bird's head, thusly:

(now, it appears that he is looking at the berries, which are undoubtedly tasty and not poisonous!)

I've painted the birds and the leaves; that just leaves me the girl and a wash for the lawn:

(the girl is not visible here; she is still in pencil. Just a reminder, she looks like this):

I am much, much happier with the birds in this version. I love gouache! I'm able to get such great detail with it, and the colours are extremely vibrant and I can mix any colour or variation thereof that I require. Paint! Coloured pencils are great, but I love paint...

...the next step once the girl & grass are finished (which won't take long) is the pattern. The pattern must be transferred onto rice paper, painted, and then pasted on to the page. Luckily, it seems as though it won't be a huge space that I will be covering...also, I'm considering the possibility of using the pattern itself as a 'cloud' motif- that is, leaving a certain amount of space as a solid 'sky'. Work reduction, hurrah! Once again, this is the pattern- remember that I will be painting it in colours; it will not be b &w as it is here:

I did change my mind after all about the second piece- I decided to nix the Hans Christian Andersen and go with an Arab fairy tale. I'll post the pencil drawings of that soon, very very soon, along with a description on all the gruesome details of the story. (Sorry, my sketches right now are not only very rough, I also cut a couple of them into pieces to try the different elements together- not very suitable for scanning!)
...back soon!

A post on Tara Books on my other blog:

2010-04-27T11:23:00.000-04:00

I promise not to do this too frequently, but for those of you who haven't checked out my new blog, I did a recent post on Tara Books, a fantastic and unique Indian publisher. See! Further beautiful images! Read! My superfluous gushing! Discover! A link to their website! Click the photo to go to the post directly!

12-week challenge, week 3!

2010-04-27T11:14:00.001-04:00

This past week, the challenge was twofold- first, to research and create a list of potential clients to whom you would send your work. Second, to plan six new pieces to include in said mailing/enquiry. This I have already done, to some degree- but new research is always good, and I am now focusing (at least for the purposes of this exercise, & for the time being) on the children's market. I got a little overly wound up trying to find the absolutely ideal dream clients (I do have a couple of those!), but eventually relaxed. I can add to and change the list as I go along. The six new pieces I've only loosely planned. I'll do two or three more pages of my book, and the other three or four will be images from some kind of classic fairy tale. I had Andersen in mind- he's still a possibility, but he's so melancholy (don't get me wrong, I love his Tales, but some of the stories...it's no wonder that the adaptations for children have been so heavily modified!). I personally would love to do his very dark "The Shadow", but... I have doubts as to its usefulness in showcasing my ability to draw 'children's' art. Grimms', too is a possibility... I like several of these... but what's really whetting my interest is arabic fairy tales. A little exotic, with great creatures- djinns and ghouls! Also would provide a nice excuse for elaborate costumes and allover patterns (as though I need an excuse for those!)

I don't like to write a post without an image, so here is the first of my book pages that I will do for the challenge- that is to say, I am dissatisfied with this piece, and am going to re-do it as part of the challenge. The girl is quite good, but the birds have to be better- also, I did them in coloured pencil, and I've since changed the rest of the book pages to gouache- a different look:

further progress on that most recent page...

2010-04-18T20:14:00.001-04:00

So...as you may recall, this was the page in pencil:

(I heightened the contrast when I scanned it; I DON'T actually draw in black pencil!)

Then, I painted it:

(from now on this is new- promise!)
Next I drew a background pattern:

(heightened contrast again, of course...)

I painted the pattern:

...and finally:

I'm still not finished with the 'crib'- it needs some shading, and I'm still not sure about the background. I do like the combination of colours, I'm just not sure that they're in the right places. My predilection for green makes me want to put the light green as the main background colour, but I'm also trying to include a variety of colours and not use the same colours too many times on too many pages... Still, might do the background again... We'll see.... Oh, and must add the strings to make sure that it's clear that this is a mobile...

Zero2Illo 12-week challenge: Week two!

2010-04-17T22:32:00.004-04:00

This week, the task was to formulate an OGSM, or summary of goals, necessary actions/strategies, and means of measure- essentially, a sort of business plan. Here is mine as I posted it on the zero2illo discussion forum:

I want to say first of all that although I thought at first that this was going to be somehow stressful, and that I was going to feel bad, or overwhelmed somehow by the evidence on paper of all the work before me, but in fact the opposite happened. I found it inspiring, invigorating and even comforting to organize all of the thoughts that have been swirling around in my head in a somewhat disorganized form...

Objective: To earn a good living through my work in the (general) field of children's illustration.

ULTIMATE objectives: To be a highly successful, in-demand book author-illustrator of many of my own books, represented by an (great!) agent and pretty much able to pick and choose what I would like to do.

Goals: -By end 2010, earn at least 500$/month from my illustration work and/or print/card sales.
-Earn enough by summer 2011 (1200$/month +) to quit my part-time job.
-Establish myself/obtain work regularly illustrating for children's magazines
-Establish myself/obtain work regularly illustrating books/book covers
-Have my picture book (the one on which I am currently working) published.
-Sell prints and cards online and in various boutiques, bookstores, toy stores.
-be represented by an agent (this one may be a 'later').

Strategy/Action: -Develop well-researched, detailed mailing lists for both the children's magazine and the publishing fields. Send samples, letters and follow up with mailings every 2-3 months.
-Further develop online presence/promotional tools (facebook, blogs, linkedin, bkiznik, at least three free portfolio sites, scbwi, my own website).
-Set up 'sign up' buttons on as many of these sites as possible to establish a mailing list for a monthly newsletter.
-Make a 'dummy' of my picture book to send out to publishers for consideration. I don't intend to begin sending it out until fully half of the pages are complete, though... (and as I complete more pages for this project, I will have more 'book' type work to show publishers I am approaching for consideration as an illustrator.)
-Contribute diligently to online forums. Submit news articles, etc.
-Update my blogs 2x/week, minimum.

-sell prints online through print-on-demand galleries such as thumbtack press et al.
-print my own cards and prints and sell online (through etsy and my own site?) and in various bookstores, toy stores, boutiques (research needed here).
-participate in local craft/art fairs (research needed...)

-some success in the above undertakings will serve to make me more attractive to an agent- I will do some research into representation and decide when/who to approach....

Measures: -Quit p/t job by summer 2011. (At 1200$/month mark- no, at this point I won't be rich-yet! But it will be just enough. And I badly want to be a full-time illustrator, and the free time will enable me to take on more work, yes?!)
-20 new subscribers to monthly newsletter/month
-100 followers on both blogs by end summer.
-complete book dummy by July/10
-send out first mailings to children's publishers/magazines by end May/10.
-design a set of 'holiday' cards, to be finished by June/10.
-choose images for 'general' cards/prints (print on demand) and design/choose new on ongoing basis.
-set up Etsy store July/10
-10 sales/month etsy
-place cards in minimum ten stores by December/10.

Whew! I actually DID write this out in the prescribed 'chart' format- but I did it on a piece of paper too big for me to scan! I hope that it's comprehensible enough.

Please to check out my new blog!

2010-04-12T14:46:00.000-04:00

Here it is:

http://wondrouswonder.blogspot.com/2010/04/magic-of-nm-bodecker.html

I hope that you like it! Let me know what you think.

new version of another page (first couple of stages)

2010-04-08T21:51:00.002-04:00

I'll post more over the next several days... I may remove the blue bird as his angle is a little off (he doesn't look like he's seen from below like the others). Also 'crib' may go. We'll see. Next I'll do the background pattern....

I've been working away at online promotional stuff. Not only am I working my way (slowly, arrggghh) (I am so impatient with myself! But I deserve it, dammit! Get to work!) through Alex Mathers' ' 10 steps to powerful online promotion...' , I am also participating in zero2illo's '12 week challenge', which will be a series of activities/exercises intended to turn fledgling freelancers into veritable self-promotion machines! Cyborgs, perhaps! Should be good. More about that later. So that gives me another reason to park myself in front of the computer. Amongst the things that I have done as suggested by Mr. Mathers is create another blog! To which I will provide a link after I do another post, a better one. That first one was just an introduction. The next will be much more interesting! I have also finally set up my facebook 'fan page'. Still, so much to do... I have the feeling that somehow, there is an ever-increasing number of things that I must accomplish before I am 'ready' to do the next thing that I must do. These preliminary things just appear, rise up, like dust bunnies. The next thing that I'll do is install a 'sign-up' box on my blogs so as to accumulate an email list for 'news updates' and the like. It's not currently possible for me to install html code on my actual website (something of a problem, but which can be worked around right at this very moment), so I'm looking around to change hosts. (You see? Dust bunny right there!) Anyhow. I think that that's all for now, y'all.....

Breaking into Freelance Illustration

2010-03-18T00:18:00.004-04:00

Oh, that reminds me... I do believe that I mentioned here that I was going to review Holly DeWolf's book, Breaking Into Freelance Illustration for the wonderful site Escape From Illustration Island? I'm sure of it, in fact. Well, I did. A month and a half ago, almost! I plumb forgot to post a link to it here. So, without further ado, a link to it here.

Powerful self promotion!

2010-03-17T23:35:00.004-04:00

...is the newly released e-book by Alex Mathers, founder of the most excellent site the Red Lemon Club (and also of the equally great contemporary illustration blog, Ape on the Moon).

I have not yet finished the book, but am mightily impressed with how the individual steps he outlines REALLY and TRULY are step-by-step. I need that. For me, for whom the very word 'networking' produces a sense of horror and fear, such things do not come easily, nor is it in any way obvious what is the most effective way to go about it. It's intimidating! (Surely I am not alone here...!) But Alex Mathers has broken it down into concise, bite-sized pieces that don't seem quite so...overwhelming. So...I am impressed thus far. I have begun implementing his suggestions, starting with.... the facebook. (I won't go into the reasons for which, for years, I have turned my nose up at facebook.... now, at long last, I have seen the light, apparently.) I will be installing 'sign up' boxes for mailing lists on all of my various sites, which will help me in sending out newsletters (which I've been meaning to do for a while!)

But wait... there's more!

I will also be starting a new blog in addition to this one (which I will keep as my 'process diary'/general progress record). The new blog will focus on various aspects of book illustration, old and new. I have a number of ideas for posts already... I am hoping to make an inaugural post this weekend! I will let you know when. It will be here! (don't look NOW, there's nothing!)

This past week was busy; I worked on another page overhaul but haven't gotten very far. Why can't I be triplets? Oh, I would hate that... anyhow. Back with more soon!

yes, I'm re-doing some pages...

2010-03-08T23:00:00.003-05:00

Work, work, work on the book project. Working right now on finishing a few pages that I started a while ago; I have also gone back and started new versions of pages that I was not satisfied with. It took me a little while to get the style right, and now some of the pages that I finished earlier are less than satisfactory. To be honest, some of them were never satisfactory- I knew even as I was finishing a couple of them that I would be back sooner or later to do it again. This is the first of these most recent overhauls that I have completed- I am much happier with it. I increased the scale of the girl/window and also made the 'sky' pattern larger. I also put a pattern behind the girl that looks fine even if the pattern doesn't line up in square with the window frames. Many more to come! I have been urged just to move on and start more pages, but I just wasn't happy knowing that these existed in such an unsatisfactory state. I want all of the pages to be good, dammit! No, just good isn't good enough!

I recently received a request for a quote for a series of illustrations for a children's cookbook- which would have been a fun project, I think- but I had to write back asking for further information before I could give a quote (they had given me no indication of size, colour or not, time frame, etc.). They never responded. It might well be for the best; I may have been wrong, but I had a strange feeling about the correspondence. Alas nonetheless!

I'm working on many things- besides the book, I'm also making a new postcard for my next series of mailings and writing emails to potential client after potential client. SOON I will also, finally, begin my 'Montreal' card series! Cookbook or no cookbook, I am always busy...

People I've never met and conversations I've never had...

2010-02-15T14:30:00.005-05:00

Another contest entry, selected candidates to be (possibly?) collected into an upcoming book. It's been a couple of weeks since my last post... what else has been going on? Well, I wrote a review of Holly DeWolf's book Breaking into freelance illustration that you can read on the Escape from Illustration Island website here (it's at the bottom of the page, scroll down!)
Now, back to my book! I'm going to begin a series of architectural drawings to sell as cards and prints.

'mail me art' entry

2010-01-30T18:54:00.005-05:00

So, here is my entry for the 'mail me art' contest in the u.k. I'm reasonably pleased with it, although I had to put packing tape on the edges to hold it closed. I made my own envelope out of bristol (because I wanted to paint on it and wanted to be sure that it would hold up), and did all of the painting/pasting etc. BEFORE gluing the envelope closed. It wouldn't stay closed, due to the thickness, multiple layers of thick paper and slight warping (BECAUSE of painting)...alas. Next time I'll know better! It looked even better after the guy at the post office put the postage sticker on and postmarked it. Perhaps I'll get to see what it looks like after its travels?!?! I hope...!

oh, and the final version of that OTHER page...

2010-01-21T21:04:00.003-05:00

...ta daaaaah! Also to be entered as part of the series. I have not finished the facing page yet; have yet to make final decisions on which birds to put where, and am re-doing one bird right now.... ah, perfectionism, you are a cruel and yet often ultimately very satisfying mistress....

another book page

2010-01-21T20:45:00.003-05:00

So, here it is, another page from this book I keep going on about... This time I have done a more thorough job of documenting its progress from start to finish (I did scan the origami birds before I cut them out, but can't seem to locate the scan- humf...). It's all done by hand, of course, including all of the patterns... I have just entered this (as a part of a series, all taken from the book) into the Communication Arts illustration contest. This year, I will participate in more contests- within the next month, not including this one, there are two more that I plan to enter. But wait! There's more! Not only will I enter contests, I plan to diligently post AS NEWS on various forums that I have finished this and that, that I have updated my site, etc. In a former life, I would not have accepted this as suitable for 'news'- but it seems to be the thing to do. Ah well. It's one of those things... it's hard to get over the vague sense that drawing attention to yourself is somehow distasteful, or not nice, or something... but truly, waiting for people to notice you seems not to be terribly productive, either. I've become familiar with several illustrator's names and work solely through their repeated appearance ON said news sections of various forums.... Shameless self-promotion full steam ahead! I've been reading Holly DeWolf's book, too, which emphasizes without any question the necessity of continuous, ongoing, creative self-promotion. I'm going to write a review of her book for Escape From Illustration Island this weekend. I'll post it here, also....

2 pages of my book pre-final assembly

2010-01-07T22:18:00.002-05:00

The two top (red) images are the pages themselves- they are to be facing pages. The red pattern is hand-drawn and painted in gouache on rice paper. The following several bird images I drew separately and painted in gouache; they will be cut out and pasted onto the two pages in something like a composition. Almost finished with these, finally, hurrrrah! This page (pages) has been particularly painstaking. I redrew the girl and her grandfather twice (the first time I was dissatisfied with the colours I chose for the clothing- made background pattern colour choice difficile); also I drew and painted- I just looked at this- four different background patterns before deciding on this one. I am quite pleased with the result though..... I will be sure to post the pages once I place the birds.

The past month has been busy with the usual holiday-type busy-ness. Back to work, goddammit! I am planning to enter two illustration contests towards the end of this month ( I want to enter several pages of my book) and want to complete another page to enter as part of the series (I will also post this one in progress!). I also want to write a review of Holly DeWolf's book (which I received a few weeks ago) and I have to continue with research, research, researching possible clients. I also plan in the near future to utilize a print-on-demand site to make prints of my work available. Ok, that's all for now. More soon!

Ernie Zelinski, proponent of the good life and wearer of many t-shirts

2009-12-08T23:41:00.003-05:00

This book appeared to me quite by chance, unbidden, and completely fortuitously, a couple of years ago. I was, at the time, working at a to-be-unspecified job for a very small chain of independent Canadian bookstores that shall remain nameless. It SHOULD have, been a good job, it COULD have been a good job; working for someone else, it might have been. But it wasn't. It made me miserable, completely miserable. Not only was I not left with sufficient TIME for any of my various art projects, I was so completely consumed by how much I hated my job that I was hardly even inclined.

I had been thinking that I would like to pursue illustration. All of my interests and predilections seemed to point to it. But I didn't know how, and all of my time/mental energy seemed caught up in work. I had no time to work on a portfolio. I wanted to do it, but how? I would think about it longingly , but week after week after month slipped by. And then Ernie Zelinski appeared.

Real Success Without a Real Job arrived at the warehouse as a 'freebie'- it was accidentally sent to us, unordered. Since it was not sent in PLACE of anything, it wasn't sent back in return for another item. I saw it on the shelf where such things wind up, and snatched it up. It seemed clear that that book was FOR ME!!!

His main points: many, even most people, are unhappy and unfulfilled working for someone else, and most likely wish that they were doing something that they cared about. That real success is what you make it, not living up to the traditional view of success, and that real success is living life in your own way, pursuing things that have meaning to you. That working at an 'unreal job' (something, ideally, that you would want to do even if you weren't getting paid) will give you a sense of freedom, satisfaction and fulfillment that a 'real' job can't.

He tells his own story, which is not a tale of miraculous luck but rather of dogged perseverance and dedication to pursuing his dream. He is not, as he readily admits, a particularly 'good' writer in terms of style or elegance, but he IS a good writer in that he writes clearly, expresses his own unique point of view and his inimitable personality. As he so succinctly put it, " I may not be able to write a book by Shakespeare, but I can write a book by me." Oh, did I mention? He is FUNNY.

Clearly, I had long ago joined the choir. The book served for me more to confirm and elaborate what I already knew or intuited. It is more inspiration and pep talk than a step-by-step guide to achieving your particular objective (although he does suggest numerous other books to consult to help you figure out your path). But WHAT a pep talk... I have re-read it countless times, and it has joined the ranks of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Hothead Paisan, Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist, and A Confederacy of Dunces as a reliable remedy for times of discouragement or depressedness.

He has also written books entitled The Joy of Not Working, How to retire Happy, Wild and Free, and The Lazy Person's Guide to Happiness.
His official website: http://www.erniezelinski.com/

p.s. it seems that the edition that I have is no longer available; I suspect that the new book Career Success without a Real Job is probably the same book, essentially.

another page of my book...

2009-12-08T21:25:00.004-05:00

Another page of my book-in-progress. I'm thinking of adding some more leaves on the bottom right instead of the sort of strange continuation of the pattern on the house... but for now, I've had enough of fussing with this and will do it later! LATER! I have a lot of work to do; no doubt I'll want to start some pages over again completely by the time I'm finished (in fact, there are already a couple that I have in mind, sigh...).

CRUNCHY .... (illustration friday)

2009-12-06T01:07:00.004-05:00

Yes, this is something that I posted a little while ago... but I thought that it fit the IF theme for this week, 'crunchy'. 'Crunchy' seems like one of those words that simply MUST be used to describe breakfast cereal. Although I would imagine that this bowl of larvae is mostly soft, I imagine that the legs are fairly 'crunchy' (as is certainly the case with those huge tiger shrimp!) Bon appetit!

new thing, promotional piece perhaps?

2009-11-26T18:34:00.008-05:00

(added 7 december)...It occurs to me that this also fits the Illustration Friday theme for this week- (4 December) (that snowflake is going to be a little crunchier than she was expecting, perhaps!?!?), so I'm adding a link to this one, too.

***************************************************************************

So, here's another piece that I did over this past week- I was thinking of using it as a Christmas card, perhaps of making a series of cards for next year. We shall see.

I've been working on several pages of my book, although I took a bit of a break this week and worked on a few other things. I was getting a little too 'close' and hypercritical. Some of the criticism deserved, of course, some just a result of lack of perspective... Some of the pages I will almost undoubtedly wind up re-doing. By the time I am finished, I will probably want to redo all of what I first did! I've been working on, rejecting, and re-starting background patterns.

I listened this a.m. to one of Escape from Illustration Island's earlier podcasts that I had not already heard, the interview with Penelope Dullaghan. It was good; I appreciated her honesty. It's helpful to me to hear 'how others did it' and also, of course, it is always good to hear that those successful others didn't start out having all of the answers (as I think a part of me always worries is the case!). I wouldn't call it Schadenfreude, as I'm not delighting in their past lack of know-how; it's more the idea that well, they didn't know it all and look at them now, so perhaps there is hope for me also...

Ok, back to work. I WILL write the Ernie Zelinsky Adoration post later today (did I say today? I mean...soon!)... very very soon.

'music'; illustration friday

2009-11-26T09:28:00.003-05:00

Ok, so not quite finished yet- I have yet to put the guitar strings on the guitars, and, more noticeably, I am going to replace some (all?) of the 'squares' on the lower half with some kind of patterned paper.

More soon!

Further aimless doodling

2009-11-22T11:29:00.004-05:00

...a few more aimless doodles that I've done over the last few days. Not all that I've been up to, but...the rest I will post soon! Other things soon to come: I am going to attempt to document some pieces 'from beginning to end'; that is, from sketches all the way to 'finished'. Also, a post of praise for Mr. Ernie Zelinsky (of The Joy of Not Working and Real Success Without a Real Job fame.

unbalanced...

2009-11-18T00:31:00.008-05:00

...is what I have been feeling. I've been concentrating on work on my book to such a degree that...it was as if I couldn't even SEE it, if you know what I mean... Hypercriticality (is that a word?), comparing myself unfavorably to others, doubt that I've EVER done ANYTHING good are among the results... So I've been taking time over the last few days to just do some aimless sketches in the a.m., something that I don't care about at all... the above are a couple. (And yes, I did take down that last book page- I've decided that it's not finished.)

One more thing- and I've been meaning to report this for a couple of weeks now (I am such a delinquent blog-ger!)- I am the lucky winner of a signed copy of Holly De Wolf's book, Breaking Into Freelance Illustration, courtesy of Escape from Illustration Island and Holly De Wolf! Thanks to both Thomas James and Holly De Wolf. I will indeed post a review when I receive it!

What I've been doing...

2009-11-02T13:52:00.003-05:00

I've been working on various pages of my book. Here's one that is almost finished, more to come (although I think that I'll start taking them down before there are too many up- I want you to buy the book)!

The greatness of Jonathan Woodward

2009-11-02T13:44:00.002-05:00

The second interview/podcast that I listened to on Escape From Illustration Island
was with Jonathan Woodward, who is not only an incredibly talented collage-based illustrator- look at his work here!- but who is also documenting his ongoing progress in his quest to transition to a full-time freelance illustrator on this blog, zero 2 illo. He also seems like a genuine, generous nice guy. Good luck, and thanks, Jonathan Woodward!

great site, great podcast, thank you Thomas James!

2009-11-02T13:20:00.003-05:00

It would simply be wrong for me NOT to mention the great site that I recently came across, Escape From Illustration Island.
Experienced illustrator Thomas James has posted an exhaustive list of resources of all kinds that I have no doubt will be of great use to me and to many others starting out. He also hosts a weekly podcast (of which I have only- so far- listened to two episodes, both excellent) in which he interviews various personalities of the illustration world.

As I may or may not have mentioned (whined about?) before, I am occasionally seized by the unpleasant suspicion that 'everyone else' knows something about the illustration game that I don't- that there is something obvious, perhaps, that I am missing, that is THE ANSWER! THE KEY! (to success) etc. etc. A site such as this helps in practical ways ( to point me in directions that it might otherwise have taken me much longer to discover!) as well as psychological. I am grateful to its helpful and generous author.

His most recent interview/podcast featured Holly DeWolf , a successful illustrator who has written a book that I will be ordering, Breaking into Freelance Illustration.
She describes it as 'all of the things that she wished she had learned in school, but had to learn in the real world'. Perfect! Again, for both practical reasons and reasons of reassurance- I wouldn't call it schadenfreude, exactly, but I DO find it comforting to know that I'm not the only one who didn't leave school (I didn't do an illustration programme, rather a 'fine arts' programme with no practical reference to the real world whatsoever) knowing everything that I needed to know. I'll let you know what I think once I've read it.

je suis toujours vivante!

2009-10-07T00:15:00.003-04:00

Yes, I'm still alive. I've been working on my book, and on sending out more mailings. This is a finished page from my book; I will soon post another page (almost done) (the page, not the book...). I finally finished that 'meatball story' commission; I haven't posted it though as it was too large to scan. I'll see if I can do something about that soon.

I've just joined some entrepeneurial 'networking' sites and will endeavor to update my online portfolio sites. Must keep up on the 'business' side of things; that is hard but must be done, unless someone would like to volunteer to do it for me? Anyone? I thought not...

I recently did a sketch for a sports team's logo (sports team/sport to remain anonymous) that may or may not be used. Nonetheless, I am pleased to have made a new contact (web designer); hoping that he may think of me again whether he gets the contract or not. I'm hoping that I was agreeable, helpful, easy to get along with, etc. (Stop laughing!)

Anyhow... back to work. I will attempt to post a new drawing soon.

...new thing, new promotional piece perhaps...

2009-08-20T22:49:00.001-04:00

holy blog neglect...

2009-08-08T21:19:00.004-04:00

...but I've been working, really I have... I recently completed (quickly quickly!) the above three images for a magazine recently- the second was not to their liking, so I did the third which was more to their liking. I've been working (oh so slowly but still) on my book... I've also started making character sketches for the book for the little kiddies that I'm working on w/my friend BM (she's the writer), and I am at long last finishing that 'Greek meatball' drawing (sketches posted some time ago)... Now, too, I'm working on a piece that I am hoping will turn out well enough to be my next promotional piece/postcard (though I'm thinking that perhaps the 'meatball' may turn out to be a good choice too)... Anyhow. Will post more soon!

A few pieces-in-progress from my BOOK...

2009-06-09T18:07:00.003-04:00

...In case you thought I'd been doing nothing. I wouldn't want you to think that I'd been doing nothing.

Crow Toes Quarterly No. 10!

2009-06-09T17:57:00.003-04:00

A couple of weeks late; I've been meaning to post this- well, for a couple of weeks. It's the new issue of Crow Toes Quarterly, of course, and it contains another illustration by me!, as well as several other Very Interesting art and story-type items. Subscribe to Crow Toes HERE.

pigeons are so influential...

2009-05-26T21:22:00.001-04:00

...you see what I am saying?

better like this, or better like that?

2009-05-25T09:32:00.003-04:00

I added some 'candy' shapes to my larvae-eater. Which is better? I can't decide. I need to decide soon though, since I'm going to postcard this one- one version of it, anyhow...

LARVA BOY! New promotional piece!

2009-05-18T22:18:00.005-04:00

...I had started this one before leaving for St. Catharines, but finished it there. I'm pretty happy with it! I still may add something though. I'm on the hunt for candy wrappers, red preferably, or some other kind of red-patterny element that I can add. Hmmm. I'll know it when I see it! And I still need to colour in the spoon, I see.... This one I'll definitely do as a postcard and/or copy. Too bad I had not done this when I sent out images to Boys' Life! Well, can send them one of the postcards as part of my pestering- oh, I mean promotional- campaign.

I've been neglecting Illustration Friday for a few weeks now; I have been relatively busy (although still, as always, berating myself for not working at every! available! moment! on something) but also not inspired by any of the one-word topics. This coming week, though- I forget the exact word- contagious? pestilence? plague? something like 'spread of disease'- seems right up my alley. Maybe tomorrow or the next day, something quick, if inspiration strikes.

why? I don't know why...

2009-05-18T22:10:00.002-04:00

Just something quick & pointless drawn in St. Catharine's, where the squirrels have grown to gigantic proportions!

botanical drawing-asian lily

2009-05-18T22:04:00.004-04:00

Something else drawn in St. Catharine's- an asian lily from Red's beautiful garden. Not terrible, but should be 'lighter'- more watercolour and less coloured pencil. Still, not bad... I plan to do some drawing at the Botanical Garden soon.

What have I been doing all this time?

2009-05-18T21:54:00.008-04:00

Long time no write! Ah, I think I've realized why the red (here, in 'create post' it appears as underlining)- it's because I'm writing ABOVE an image, and this must therefore be a title! right! Well, I finished that piece for Crow Toes... It turned out fairly well, I thought. It will appear in the next number- I will surely mention it's impending release! Next, I (finally! arrggh!) sent out another several packages to magazines/publishers. Must keep on that. Wasn't my goal ten per WEEK? I try, I try...

Soon afterwards, I left for St. Catharine's to visit my boyfriend's family. I did SOME work... see the above...

..I try not to be too disappointed...

2009-04-24T17:00:00.003-04:00

ok...so I (finally!) actually finished a page for my picture book. (I don't know that I've actually mentioned here that I am working on a book. Well, what do you know...?) And I am not happy with it, to be honest. I fussed and fussed, and I find it to be sort of too much of a muchness..... I should have left out the near-allover leaf cover, and I overworked the birds (mostly the top one), and don't know why I didn't just have her standing on the ground instead of in a sandbox, which turned out to be a pain in the ass anyhow and... just another additional element too many. On the upside, I am very happy with my depiction of the girl- her expression is exactly what I wanted. So. So... I am going to do it again. As a matter of fact, I think that I'll do two more versions of it- that is, I'll pencil out two versions and complete them as I like, incorporating the changes I've considered. Good colour combination overall but must simplify. I AM disappointed- I wanted to get this one done in time to send it out with the next bunch of publisher/mag mailings- but now I'm not sufficiently pleased with it to do so. Oh well... next time. Speaking of the book, I am determined to get back to work on it in a real way- that is, in such a fashion that I will actually complete it within something like a time frame. My determination has been renewed! No IF this week. I doubt that I'll do it for next week either- I have to finish another piece/pieces for Crow Toes Quarterly (woohoo!). Their assignments are always fun. Ugh. I'm a little overly disappointed with myself vis a vis this piece though, as I always am when I have spent time doing something for which I had high hopes and it did not turn out as well as hoped for...must not lament so....ok that's enough moaning for the moment, yes?

IF: fleeting

2009-04-17T01:12:00.000-04:00

...it is late, perhaps I'll add some clever commentary/quips tomorrow. Sleep now.

IF: talisman

2009-04-08T16:41:00.000-04:00

Illustration Friday: 'talisman'

a tale of greek meatballs

2009-04-06T22:36:00.000-04:00

I am away this week but still at work... so here, as mentioned previously and semi-promised, are the sketches for the commissioned piece that I am currrently working on. It is based on a true story about a young man making meatballs in his mother's kitchen in Greece, hoping then to transport them on a flight home to Toronto for a party. I am executing it using the 'meatball recipe' sketch for the left-hand side of the drawing; the right-hand side will be the second sketch (in which it is clear that he is LEAVING the meatball-making kitchen). So far so good. Hopefully I will have time to take it to be scanned before it is delivered! (It is too large for my scanner at home.)

I met with a new friend (BM) before I left to discuss a children's book(s) collaboration! This could be exciting. She is interested in a style rather unlike what I typically do- this will be good for me, though- it would be good to develop another style. Will report as things develop!

What else? Well, I think that I will do IF this week- 3-hour restriction will apply. Will post, certainly. I sent off a few more packages to publishers today. I'm doing well! Must keep on keeping on etc. Ok, that will be all for now. Will return within a couple of days with Illustration Friday post.

Illustration Friday: Poise

2009-04-01T19:21:00.000-04:00

With this week's Illustration Friday I seem to have done something that would seem to be rather difficult; I have created an image that turned out to be both a) somewhat cliched (tomboy girl, with frog!) and b) somewhat inappropriate for children (got a little carried away with the cleavage of the woman on the right!). Ah well... Still working on commissioned piece, perhaps will post sketches of this within the next couple of days.

life is short, filled with stuff

2009-03-27T17:27:00.000-04:00

I have no idea whatsoever why this must be in bold. Anyhow, in the absence of any IF this week with which to entertain those eagerly awaiting my blog postings, and in celebration of the acquisition of a (good!) scanner, I present to you various stuff that I had laying around from here and there. First, one sheet of the pinup girl tattoo designs I did about a year ago for a tattoo artist: (seemingly mandatory 'bold' gone! why?!)

This week I spent working hard on the business/promotional side of things! (Finally!) I received the postcards that I ordered from vistaprint.ca, and I was pleased beyond pleased. Really, I can't recommend vistaprint enough! The postcards themselves were free; I just paid a download fee (because I was using my own image), which was about 5$ per design (i.e. 10$) plus shipping. And the quality was far superior to the ones I first got (at unnamed print shop near me). All you have to do to be BOMBARDED continuously with offers for free this and free that is sign up for an account with them. (How can they afford to do this?)

Anyhow, so I mailed out a number of packages to several publishers and children's magazines, including CRICKET, my favourite of all magazines for kids. They use an impressive variety of illustration styles, not just all that goofy super-cartoony kiddy stuff that seems endemic...oh, I know what I mean. I now have a decent 'template' letter for both magazines and publishers that can easily be added to or adjusted for the individual recipient. I also sent a follow-up card/letter to several magazines that I've contacted already. So, good!

Here is a stream-of-consciousness ink-watercolour crayon thing I did last summer:
Also this week, I got paid for the piece that I did for Briarpatch. Very good indeed!
Here, another ink/watercolour crayon sketch. This one I like.
And I played bridge! For the first time in nearly five years. I was in 'instinctive mode' mostly- my card-counting skills are gone. Luckily I played the hand only a couple of times (and made it!) I did not disgrace myself terribly. I miss playing cards! Next week I'll continue with more publisher research (have to do some research into the maisons d'editions en francais here in Quebec, too!), but mostly I'll be working on a commissioned piece. Maybe I'll have time for Illustration Friday, maybe not.
One more ink/watercolour thing:

IF: sorry about the lack of image!

2009-03-20T01:17:00.000-04:00

Curse my stupidity! I edited the IF post and didn't realize that I had to attach the image again!
Well, here it is now...

illustration friday: Legendary

2009-03-19T10:56:00.001-04:00

I've linked my IF entry for the first time to my blog rather than to my website. First, not too many visits to my blog. Second, I don't necessarily want everything that I do for IF to be posted on my blog (seeing as how I only intend to spend a couple of hours on each IF theme). If I like it, great- to the website it goes. This week I only spend a couple of hours and think that it is just ok- nothing spectacular. Yes, Hank Williams. My #1 'if-I-could-see-anyone-play-in-any-era' choice.

Illustration Friday: Intricate

2009-03-12T23:23:00.001-04:00

Another installation in the series of one-word themes that is illustration friday.

another possible candidate for contest entry... the deadline for which is tomorrow!

2009-03-12T23:15:00.000-04:00

I am quite pleased with this one, actually. It is a promotional piece that I am definitely going to include in my submissions to the children's/YA book & magazine market. Which are going to go out SOON! I wanted the 'graffiti' in the background to look real- so I cut a stencil, just like the real graffitos do, although it was more to achieve the 'spray' effect than to look as though it was stencilled. I think it turned out well! All in all, I spent a ridiculous amount of time on this brick wall.

possible candidates for contest entry...

2009-03-07T12:00:00.000-05:00

The first one is the second of two drawings that I did for an imaginary book review for a dark Japanese novel of murder, dismemberment and fatalistic hopelessness (quite a good book, actually...). I quite like it, but solicited opinions are split on this one... apparently it LOOKS a little too bloody and depressing. The second is one of the three that appeared in Crow Toes Quarterly (see earlier post); this one was included in their 'art interludes' section. I think that it's pretty but perhaps a bit 'fluffy'... The third and fourth also appeared in Crow Toes; these two were commissioned specifically for a story. I am really only considering submitting the one with the yellow grid background; I just wanted to include the companion piece because I had not yet posted it. I think that this one turned out quite well. I don't know which to choose! I will only enter one (costs money to enter, or I'd enter more). There will also be the one I've not yet finished but I will hopefully finish this weekend and scan... If anyone has any opinions, please let me know. There appears not to be a category for 'children's' illustration specifically- the contest seems to be divided according to industry sectors (i.e. advertising, book, poster, etc...) Hmm.

communication arts illustration contest etc.

2009-03-06T17:32:00.001-05:00

So, I did not do the Illustration Friday topic suggested last week, for a number of reasons. Reason the first: I was away visiting family and friends and was thus unable to think properly. Reason the second: What time I did have I spent working on and thinking about the (mentioned a week ago I think?) promotional piece that I was considering entering into the Communication arts illustration contest (mostly thinking about, only a little working, sigh.). Reason the third: I didn't like the topic/word this week so much anyway. It was 'breezy'. I can't put my finger on why particularly this word/topic irked me, but it did... maybe I was just looking for an excuse not to do it. And would it kill them to add a second word occasionally?!?! Never mind.....

Anyhow, so I was concerned with completing this piece for Friday, the deadline for the contest, i.e. TODAY. Having only returned home on Wednesday night, and having had to work yesterday, I wasn't sure that I would finish it, so was considering (had been, anyhow- who knows how well something is going to turn out?) other options- i.e. pieces already completed. I checked the contest deadline again (to find out when exactly the 'last minute' would be) and what do you know, there has been an extension until next friday, leaving me more time to think. So, having no illustration friday BREEZINESS with which to regale you, I will instead post my 'shortlist' of possible entries, excepting the as-yet unfinished piece. Soon I must buy a scanner! Then you will be submitted to ALL of my half-developed sketches and other stuff that nobody should probably ever see.... I will post the images above, provided 'blogger' lets me add images (it isn't allowing me to add images to this post, perhaps because I added and then removed? ah, mysteries of the tinternets!)

IF: Instinct

2009-02-26T16:58:00.001-05:00

A quick job for IF this week; kept to my proposed time limit of no more than 3 hours for this one! Like the idea. Am away on vacation this week visiting family. When I get back- next week- I must finally, FINALLY (!) put together a package of images to submit to various publishers and magazines. I've been meaning to do this for a while, but find myself torn between wanting to do more, better work and wanting to get to it and just submit, submit, submit... Seeing as how the 'business' side of things is harder for me, doing more work wins out... but no more! I brought along a piece that I will complete over the next few days and I want to finish a couple of pages of my book and... and... that will be it. I have to get going. I suppose that waiting until I had enough stuff that I really wanted to show isn't a bad thing (and realistically, it is true that a lot of the work that I had was NOT really suitable or appealing to the children's market), but enough already. OK, enough of the tiresome lecture to myself. Back next week with a new IF and another promotional piece!

Illustration friday: celebrate!

2009-02-19T13:34:00.000-05:00

I missed illustration friday last week; I had the assignment (see previous post) to finish and then various other factors including houseguests conspired against even semi-prolonged periods of work on anything. The assignment went well; all in all it was a good experience. Good for many reasons; first, the subject matter was not something I would have chosen myself, so that in itself was good practice for the 'real world'. It was also good to have to respond to feedback on the sketches and requests for adjustments. It turned out fairly well, although again, not something I would have come up with myself. I will post it on my website after it has surely appeared in print (rights issue).

new assignment

2009-02-06T17:22:00.000-05:00

The big news this week is that I got a new assignment! And it's something of a rush job. The truth is that I love deadlines... It's not that I'm not able to work without them; it's more that the fact that the thing has to get done, period, provides me with the ability to make decisions quickly and not agonize so. I find that I am always confident that I will find the solution, I will do it, and do it well... because I have to. The end. There is a sense of fluidity and smoothness. So, I've already come up with and suggested a few concepts, now I'm preparing some rough sketches that I will scan and send tomorrow. The whole thing has to be done by Wednesday.
I also joined SCBWI this week. It seems quite worthwhile. There are numerous forums (including critiques and manuscript/illustration exchange) and regional conferences (including a big one in Bologna). It can only be helpful to me to connect to other artists in the field.

This weekend I will be busy working on the assignment, the new theme for IF, and I must update various of the sites and forums I've joined. I've been meaning for some time to put together submission packages for various childrens' magazines/publishers but also to remind various mags that I'd queried earlier of my existence. I am torn (as always) between wanting to do it now (the sooner the better, you've waited too long already!) and waiting until I have just a few more work samples to replace those that I previously liked but that seem to have fallen out of favour... whine, whine, complain. that's all for now. In any case nothing will be done before next week.

Crow Toes Quarterly!

2009-02-04T23:42:00.000-05:00

Hay, I have three illustrations featured in the brand-new, just-out-this-week edition of the darkly quirky and beautiful B.C.-based children's literature magazine Crow Toes Quarterly. I have not yet received my copies (I am excited to see it!) but it should be available in stores near you! Ask for it if you don't see it. Clamour very loudly! Or better yet, click here to visit their site for a subscription!

Illustration friday for this week (Feb. 6: 'flawed'

2009-02-03T14:42:00.000-05:00

This is my second posting on Illustration Friday. So far I've received about 40 hits total from the posting last week; most were on the Friday itself... So this week I've posted it earlier, so that it will appear on the home/opening page of Illustration Friday for a few more days.
I decided this week to spend three hours in total on the illustration friday drawing and just use it as a tool or opportunity for practice, a pretend assignment (good, as I'm not getting any real ones). I think that I will adopt this approach in a more general way, giving myself 'assignments' that will hopefully add to my portfolio if they turn out well, and not take too much time if they don't.

Hay, check out my website, why not?

Illustration friday for last week, January 30th. "Climbing".

2009-02-03T14:27:00.001-05:00

This was my first posting on Illustration friday! (This is also my first 'blog' entry!)