another page of my book...

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)

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?

(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.

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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

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

...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...

...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...

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)!