Yet another attempt to restart this thing.

I've come to the conclusion that I am not a blogger. I think this is one of the reasons I find the FB feed so appealing - it doesn't feel like a blog to me. I can just post random stuff there instead. But I like the idea of having a blog. It's sort of this romantic notion that comes up in conversation and makes you seem cooler than you are. "Why yes, I have a blog ... " Blargh.

Anyway, less talk, more art. Here's what I'm working on this year for the Western Washington SCBWI's Illustrator's Master Class:

More on that later, though. 

Also, in case you missed it, I interviewed Jon Schindehette for ArtOrder here:  The ArtOrder Spotlight
And there's more interviews coming! 

OK. That's it for the moment. Obligatory comment about attempting to make this a consistent part of my online life. *headdesk*

Reviving the Drawing Board

After coming back from the Western Washington SCBWI conference in Redmond this past weekend I've decided to relaunch this blog with a focus on Children's Illustration.

The best thing about the conferences, aside from the fantastic classes they provide, and getting to meet incredible people like Dan Santat and Anne Moore of Candlewick Press and hearing inspiring key note speeches from celebrities like Holy Black (Dan's rocked as well) is getting to see some of my favorite people, like Richard and Jesse Watson and their families, but also running into old friends like Kathryn Ault Noble and getting to meet new favorite peoples like Kim Flemming, a talented artist who came all the way from Australia for the conference! I was fortunate enough to sit next to her in the master class taught by Dan Santat and Anne Moore. Her tree was so much better than mine! D:

So, the focus is on children's books -- picture books through young adult fiction covers. The plan is to have at least one contract by year's end. That means a lot of promotion and sending out tons of post cards and portfolio samples, and a getting a lot of rejections. First batch of post cards went out three weeks ago, and a direct submission to Candlewick press was made last week. I don't expect to hear back from most of the places I send stuff to, because the process can be a long one, and they may not have a project that my style would fit with right away even if they do like my stuff. So it's a waiting game. And that's where the blog comes in: Sanity keeper.

With that said, here's some art:

Cover for "If the Shoe Fits ... "
picture book I'm working on.  

Closetfound #1.
What's in your closet? Skeletons?
Bug Eyed Monsters?  Alternate dimensions? Aliens?
Closetfound :: A bestiary of things found in the closet.

The bad guys from another picture book. 

Whale Wall

Dragon Totem

More to come. 

~S

Unfinished business

It's been a couple of days since my last update - still trying to catch up and get back on track.

Below are the Western Washington SCBWI Master Illustrator class assignments I did - both revisionings of current books. The class, taught by Tim Gillner and Peter Brown, was a blast and I learned a lot. A big thanks goes out to Jaime Temairik for coordinating the whole thing.

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Entry for Art Order's Mutation Nation, which I did not submit for a couple of reasons - mostly because I felt that even though my inspiration pieces were a gorrilla, an eagle, and a brightly colored green/red/blue/yellow frog, I thought it ended up looking like a gryphon instead of some genetically modified monstrosity. Both unexpected and annoying.

SCBWI WWA Master Class Assignment from Tim Gillner

So, the other day, I received in my email a pdf and assignment from Tim Gillner for the SCBWI Illustrator's Master Class - our mission, should we choose to accept it (like we'd refuse) was to select one of the five stories included in the pdf to design and illustrate a cover for. What fun!

I ended up choosing It Feels Like Snow by Nancy Cote because I related to the main character, Alice, who feels the impending snows in various places on her body - her big toe, her nose, her elbow. Having what I call "barometer back" I felt a certain sympathy for her ;)

So, this is the first stage - sketch out the characters and cover, and ship it off for crits. Will post whatever feedback I receive when it comes in!


Also, if you have not had a chance, or didn't know about it, stop over at CGHUB.com and check out the bi-weekly activities they have there. Creature Planet(s), an activity centered on creature design, hosted by Mike Corriero is a lot of fun, and so is Story Tellers, an activity for cover art of various types hosted by yours' truly. This round we're doing a mock cover for the Hobbit!

SCBWI, wonderful peoples, and working digitally

This past weekend I was at the Western Washington SCBWI conference in Redmond, near Seattle. I had a great time, and got some very good notes from Grace Lin's breakout session on being a full time children's book illustrator.

Had a chance to meet some old friends and make some new ones: Deb Lund, Richard Jesse Watson, Dana Sullivan, Jim Di Bartolo, Michael Stearns, and Kevan Atteberry to name just a few of the wonderful people that I was able to talk to and hang out with.

From an illustrator's perspective, one of things that I was surprised by about the conference was the number of people that I spoke to who are interested in working digitally, or are working digitally, but are having challenges working in Adobe Photoshop, or are working only with a mouse. This is a bit of a multifaceted issue, in that many people (including some of the presenters) were only vaguely aware of Corel's Painter program. I don't want this to get into one is better than the other, but more of a "here's another option" post. I've been working in Adobe Photoshop since version 2, but for me, I find Painter to be far more intuitive and easy to use when painting digitally. Also, Painter is much less expensive than Photoshop.

The other thing that I was struck by was how many people are attempting to work digitally with a mouse. You *need* to get a Wacom Tablet at the very least. Corel and Wacom occaisionally do promotions where you can get Painter with a tablet. It makes life *so* much easier.

Ok, that's it for now. Time to go draw!