Hogwash & Nonsense

Sketchbook Thursday

2012-02-09T14:15:00.000-05:00

Hey there blog readers.

It's been a while since I've done a sketchbook post, and it just so happens to be a lovely Thursday... so why not?

I've been playing around with a new manuscript, and as of Tuesday night, I have just finished my first thumbnail dummy and started character designs. While I like the images, the pacing, the compositions, and the page turns in the dummy, the manuscript (I am quickly realizing) needs a major overhaul. That being said, (as I dutifully open Word,) I'm still having a ton of good old fashioned sketchbook fun with a handful of new characters... and yes, one of them is an 8 ft tall alligator. Well... 8 ft tall when he doesn't slouch.

His name is Randall.

Tu BiShevat

2012-02-07T08:47:00.003-05:00

Hey there blog readers,

I recently did an illustration for a Jewish children's magazine about Tu B'Shevat. Tu B'Shevat marks the beginning of spring in Israel, and the New Year for trees; more or less, it's the Jewish equivalent of Arbor Day.

Usually around this time of year, New York is quite chilly, and we planned a playful winter illustration about the holiday. Trees feature prominently in the background, and the snowman's basket contains all kinds of traditional foods - barley, wheat, grapes, pomegranates, olives, dates, and figs.

Another Tu B'Shevat tradition includes planting trees, or if you live in a usually cold (though-currently-unseasonably-warm) place, donating to orgs that plant trees elsewhere.

Trees!
Jewish National Fund
Arbor Day Foundation

Paper cranes

2012-02-03T19:51:00.000-05:00

I've been back from visiting my sister for not quite a week yet, and it's already been a bit of a rocky homecoming. Two days after I arrived, I received some incredibly sad news. A college friend had passed away.

I have been struggling with how to process it. Between the cancer diagnosis late last year, her death earlier this week, and the funeral yesterday in D.C., I feel all wrung out. Words fail me as I try to write this.

She was an extraordinary person bent on saving the planet and helping anyone and everyone. She had a smile that could light up a room, and today the world is just a little bit darker.

Kirby Capen

(1983-2012)

Up, up, and away

2012-01-11T15:15:00.000-05:00

Hey there blog readers!

Today I'm headed out of Brooklyn, off into the wild blue yonder. My very talented, lovely sister is currently an art conservator at the Mauritshuis, and I'm off to pay her a long overdue visit.

And what better time than to post a recently-finished piece... it seems thematically appropriate, somehow. This piece is from a personal project I started a few weeks ago, and this particular painting is actually the third in the series. I have the other two images all sketched out and ready to paint, but I tackled this one first because it was my favorite. (More posts about the project when I return.)

Up, up, and away!

Next post from the Netherlands!

Gym inspired doodle

2012-01-10T09:03:00.000-05:00

2012

2012-01-05T12:31:00.000-05:00

New Years resolutions stress me out. I just don't like them. Whether it was trying to get organized, exercising more, or eliminating m&ms from my diet, January's well-intentioned resolution often became December's guilt trip. Rather than continuing to fall into an inevitable cycle of December angst, I decided not to make any more annual resolutions.

While I have stuck to my resolution against making resolutions, I do, however, think it's valuable to have goals and high hopes. So this year, I made a list of hopes for 2012. Rather than pressuring myself to be someone I'm not or do something that will make my stomach lurch with guilt come December, I did a little journal doodle about angst-free things for the new year.

And I can say with certainty that the year is looking like a happy and hope-filled one.

Auspicious beginnings

2012-01-03T18:32:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year blogville!

I hope everyone had lovely celebrations. I rang in 2012 in Brooklyn with champagne, fireworks, and some of the folks I care for most in this world. I have a good feeling about this one... good things ahead.

Taken in Prospect Park at midnight.

In the meantime, I just wanted to share the view outside my studio window on this lovely, chilly evening.

Chanukah birdies

2011-12-27T16:47:00.000-05:00

Hey there folks!

Another holiday process post about my promo piece. In that first post, I mentioned that I did two new pieces for my holiday promo this year. One was a small piece for the back - Christmas with Coco and Oscar - and the second, a new Chanukah related piece. I deliberately made the Chanukah piece slightly ambiguous. When you look closely, you might have an "aha" moment, but then again, you might not. You might just think it's a pretty spiffy winter-holiday-related painting of some penguins and a flamingo.

As mentioned in that first post, I came up with a vague idea for some holiday penguins, and I ran with them.

Here's a quick run through of the penguins and the beginning painting stages:
(Apologies for the crappy resolution/color balance. I'm having some trouble with my camera, and I neglected to scan the piece in-process. Oops.)

Penguins... check.

And we're done.

Sort of.

I actually ended up doing the entire piece over. First, I wasn't super happy with the flamingo. I thought he could be better. Second, I thought my Chanukah birds just might be tooooo ambiguous. Third, I wasn't thrilled about some of the color choices. So I adjusted the sketch and started the whole thing over. Success.

Happy eighth night folks!

Night number seven

2011-12-26T21:45:00.000-05:00

A little something sweet for the seventh night.

Christmas Process

2011-12-24T12:00:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas to everyone celebrating!

Today I'm going to share a bit of holiday process work.

For my holiday promo, I did two small new pieces - one Christmas themed and the other (if you're looking closely) Chanukah related. Rather than coming up with all new characters, I decided I wanted to play with two recent and familiar faces.

My first step is always visual brainstorming. This is my favorite part of the process. I try a whole bunch of ideas and see which fits best. My first idea for this little project was a Chanukah Coco & Oscar image.

Nothing really seemed quite right, and I almost abandoned Coco & Oscar in favor of a handful of penguins. (Fear not, I didn't abandon the penguins entirely. They'll make a reappearance in a post next week...)

Until finally I tried combining holidays and came up with this.

And this...

Bingo!

After all of the brainstorming, I prep the final piece. I take my final sketch and do a really loose version on good paper.

I use those loose guides to do a new sketch on the good paper. At this point, I make any necessary adjustments to the characters and composition.

Once I'm happy with the characters, I can start painting.

Until finally...

Merry Christmas!

If latkes weren't enough...

2011-12-23T14:41:00.000-05:00

Sufganiyot!

(Jelly donuts)

Freylechn Chanukah!

Yum...

2011-12-22T18:19:00.000-05:00

Guess what's for dinner...

Happy third night!

Chappy Chanukah!

2011-12-21T11:06:00.000-05:00

Happy 2nd night everyone!

Happy Chanukah!

2011-12-20T11:27:00.001-05:00

To all those lighting candles tonight, chag sameach!

Wordy Birdies

2011-12-19T09:53:00.000-05:00

Howdy everyone,

So the letter project continues! This time, I had two snazzy letters to send, one to N and a second to KE, a new SCBWI friend from this year's LA Conference.

I was feeling craftsy, so I decided to play around with some paper and fabric. For the card itself, I cut apart a couple of old brown postcards and then wove the strips together to make a nest. Then I added a couple of birds and a few eggs. When I finished, admittedly it looked pretty snazzy, but the eggs seemed rather naked. Since my nest was woven from a bunch of hacked up letters, I decided to add a few bird-inspired quotes - among others, the poetic, the irreverent, and the ridiculous. Finally, I glued the whole mess onto a card, making sure that all the parts and pieces were still mobile.

Wordy birdy -

"I realized that if I had to choose, I would rather have birds than airplanes."

~Charles Lindburgh

Two of them!

"Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines."

~John Benfield

Moving pieces!

"I rejoice that there are owls... they represent the stark twilight and unsatisfied thoughts which all have." ~Henry David Thoreau

"Alone and warming his five wits, the white owl in the belfry sits."

~Lord Alfred Tennyson

"When birds burp, it must taste like bugs."

~(Calvin) Bill Waterson

"My favorite weather is bird-chirping weather."

~Loire Hartwould

Birds of a Feather...

2011-12-16T23:13:00.001-05:00

Hey there, blog readers.

Not too long ago, I posted a whole bunch of fowl sketches. Though I put them up just in time for Thanksgiving, they were actually for an unrelated project - an illustration of a passage from Chicken Licken.

The story can get pretty repetitive:

"So they went along and went along until they met Turkey Lurkey
'Good morning, Goosey Loosey, Ducky Daddles, Cocky Locky, Henny Penny,
and Chicken Licken,' said Turkey Lurkey, 'where are you going?'
'Oh, Turkey Lurkey, the sky is falling and we are going to tell the King!'
'How do you know the sky is falling?' asked Turkey Lurkey.
'Ducky Daddles told me,' said Goosey Loosey.
'Cocky Locky told me,' said Ducky Daddles.
'Henny Penny told me,' said Cocky Locky.
'Chicken Licken told me,' said Henny Penny
'I saw it with my own eyes, I heard it with my own ears,
and a piece of it fell on my tail!' said Chicken Licken.
'Then I will go with you,' said Turkey Lurkey. 'And we will tell the King!' " ...

And on and on like that... Because the action of the text itself wasn't super interesting for me, I found my way into the illustration by playing with the characters of the individual birds.

You may remember the sketch...

And ta da! The finished piece...

Sketchbook Thursday

2011-12-08T13:34:00.004-05:00

Hey there blog readers.

On my desk right now is a painting - not quite done yet - and of late, I've been getting up and (following a necessary caffeine infusion) going straight into the studio to work on it. I don't know if you've ever tried writing first thing after you wake up, but just take a look at your handwriting. Seriously, are those even words?! Because my writing more often resembles hieroglyphics when I start early, I am loathe to dive into work on a finished piece. Recently I've been doing warm-up sketches to get my hands ready to work.

Today's theme: frogs. I've been toying with an amphibious project and figured why not warm-up with something I can later put to use.

For love of NY

2011-12-07T11:30:00.000-05:00

Central Park at twilight this week. It was pretty great.

Cards: Hearts

2011-11-30T09:47:00.004-05:00

Halloo all!

Last week, most of my masterpieces happened in the kitchen rather than on the drawing table. I did, however, have some time to get the third suit done for N's deck of cards. Hearts!

As with the diamond number cards, I already had a series of easy templates, so I quickly subbed the hearts for diamonds.

Again, I moved onto the Ace next, using both the Spade and Diamond motifs...

Next I tackled my Jack, who I imagined as rather proud, like Sparrow Jack, though a bit more mischievous.

I imagined the Queen to be a rather self-satisfied royal lady, and I modeled her with a series of decorative elements, like the Foxy Queen.

And finally the King, who like his Lady Hare would also be rather self-satisfied.

And last but not least, packaging and printing cards -

Thought Bubbles

2011-11-29T15:40:00.003-05:00

Hey there blog readers,

As part of my recent letter-project to N, this week I sent a normal sort of letter, but on thoughtful sorts of paper.

I had a silly idea, playing on the idea of "thought bubbles".

I packaged all of my Thought Bubbles in a little square envelope:

I wrote the letter itself on the backs of seven different bubbles... and I added a bunch of fishes for good measure.

Here are a few of the individual bubbles -

Sketchbook Thursday

2011-11-24T11:11:00.000-05:00

Halloo dear blog-readers!

I've been working on a project recently that has necessitated sketching all kinds of fowl. Chickens and turkeys and geese oh my! Considering the season, it seems rather timely, so I'll share a bunch of my sketches. Stay posted for the finished illustration in the next few weeks.

Fowl prep work -

Turkeys!

Chickens, chicks, hens, and roosters

Gooses

Ducks

A wee thumbnail -

And the final sketch -

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Culinary masterpieces

2011-11-23T17:35:00.000-05:00

Today was a rather busy work day. However, most of what I created was made in the kitchen. - chickpea and artichoke salad, heaps of pumpkin muffins, and salted caramel apple pie.

My kitchen smells incredible right now.

Sketchbook Thursday

2011-11-17T09:32:00.000-05:00

Hey there all!

Another Thursday, another sketchbook drop. Here's a bunch of this week's pickins.

A Coco-ish gal and a couple more chickens...

Henny (an old lady character from a new story) and oh yeah, another chicken...

Goofing around with text and such...

Emilou and Papa Fox - a couple of characters I've been playing with...

Penguins!

Cards: Diamonds

2011-11-14T10:32:00.000-05:00

Halloo all!

I've been hard at work on the other suits for my deck of cards. First, I spent a while just brainstorming for the additional three suits. I hadn't really thought about the others when I settled on sparrows for the spade cards. So I did some doodling and a handful of sketches and finally decided that I didn't want to draw birds for every suit. Instead I settled on two sets of birds and two sets of mammals. I've been doodling foxes in my sketchbook for a while now, so I thought, why not a foxy royal family?

This time around, I did all of the number cards first. I already had quick templates, so it was easy to sub in diamonds and flip around the colors.

Once I was done with the number cards, I moved on to the Ace, using the design for the Ace of Spades as a jumping off point.

Followed quickly by my Jack, who I imagined to be a wily, mischievous sort of character.

The Queen was a wistful, almost sad, lady fox.

And finally, the King, a concerned and regal sort of royal.

This time I also took a handful of photos of the actual printed cards -

I packaged them in a handy little case.

And finally, the full suit.

Sketchbook Thursday

2011-11-10T10:48:00.000-05:00

What better way to start a Thursday than with a big ole sketchbook dump?

I, for one, can't think of anything better.

An early sketch for the Book Cover Club project...

A warm-up sketch of working in the studio just post move... the studio is a liiiittle better now, though, admittedly there's still room for improvement...

A pre-Halloween warm-up sketch of Coco & Oscar...

Silly circus-ness...

And CHICKENS!

Cards: Spades

2011-11-07T22:47:00.000-05:00

Halloo all!

As part of my mail-project to N, I decided to start designing a deck of cards. I've always wanted to make a set, and it's a nice finite sort of project. For my deck, I decided that I wanted to play with the royal cards, and give each suit a different animal. I had been doing quite a few sketches and doodles of birds for an earlier project and arbitrarily assigned them to the spades.

The first thing I did was design the Ace. I needed to get a feel for the overall shape of the suit elements. Was the spade itself rounded, pointy, wide, skinny, elongated...?

After the ace, I did a bunch of the numbers just to play with layout.

And finally, it was time for the fun part, the royal cards -

The Jack, who I imagined to be a self-important, plump little bird.

The Queen, a regal but distant sort of lady bird.

The King, somewhat aloof and irritated, most often by his Jack.

Once I had all of the cards in the suit done, I had a basic sense of the color palette and the overall shapes and feel of the characters, and I was ready to design the back of my deck.

Stay tuned, dear readers. Next week, diamonds!

Belated Halloween

2011-11-02T10:47:00.000-04:00

Happy November blog-readers!

This is not exactly a timely post, as Halloween has come and gone, but I just finished uploading photos and wanted to share. This year I ended up carving not one, but seven pumpkins - one for myself and six for a friend's Halloween party. I must say, I'm rather proud of the silly lot.

First one carved at home... he's so happy!

Party pumpkins.

The big guy in action.

Bleeeeeh!

Two more party pumpkins, note Jack Skellington on the left.

Boo!

I also did a bunch of crafting to pull together my costume - a sort of masquerade style peacock.

And of course, one gratuitous cat photo...

Mail!

2011-10-31T23:37:00.000-04:00

I don't know about the rest of you out there in blog-land, but email just doesn't cut it for me. I like big yellow envelopes and brightly colored stamps and packages that arrive unexpectedly on your doorstep.

Recently an out-of-town friend and I agreed to start sending one another a piece of mail each week. I've been using my weekly letters as an excuse to do a little doodling and goofing around with my art. I started working on my first letter on the train and turned a subway doodle into a little four page book with a pop up letter. (Just a quick note... I didn't want to post any of the art from the letters until N had received my packages, so I made this particular piece about three weeks ago.)

Front page (note the purple tab at the top)

Interior pages (the purple tab is actually the letter!)

Back cover

Subway doodle

2011-10-19T14:29:00.001-04:00

Just a quick post of a recent silly subway scribble-doodle I sent my sister about my day -

The Book Cover Club - Murakami

2011-10-12T10:33:00.000-04:00

Hey there everyone.

I'm still trucking along on Coco & Oscar sketches, thumbnails, and preliminary book dummy, but in the meantime, I took on a few additional projects. (Do I smell a freelance job? Maaaybe! But I shall save that project for another day.) Today I wanted to share another book cover.

This month, Nowness.com hosted a competition for Murakami inspired artwork in honor of the release of his latest title, 1Q84. The Book Cover Club saw this as an excellent opportunity. Alas I missed the deadline, so my piece is not on the Nowness. It is, however, posted on the Book Cover Club blog. But do head over and check out all of the fab submissions (especially those by the inimitable Ryan Hartley, Philip Cheaney, Kristy Caldwell, and Jess Worby) and cast your vote.

In the meantime, here's a look at my cover for Haruki Murakami's The Wind-up Bird Chronicles.

Coco & Oscar

2011-10-04T09:14:00.000-04:00

Hey there blog-readers,

It's autumn in Brooklyn, and what better way to celebrate the best of all seasons than with a post full of new characters?

Meet Coco. She's cute and silly and in desperate need of a best friend, someone to be the Selma to her Louise, the Laurel to her Hardy, the Robin to her Batman.

And then there's Oscar. He just wants someone to appreciate his love of checkers, tango, and the fine art of muffin-making.

Hilarity ensues.

And a few final images. A preliminary spread for the book -

Finally, in honor of the changing season, a few autumn related images of Coco & Oscar fun.

Double Self-Portrait

2011-09-27T21:52:00.000-04:00

So this post requires a bit of pictorial explanation before I post the actual piece.

For those of you who I haven't seen in recent days, while I was out in Minneapolis visiting a friend, I chopped off all of my hair. (Do not despair, I donated it.)

Haircut:

I had a particularly inspired working day the other morning...

and yes, I work better in a silly hat

Gratuitous cat photo.

So pre-haircut, I had started a self-portrait project for a contest. The contest is being run by Tony DiTerlizzi's facebook fan page. The title is "Re-imagine Yourself", and the goal is to create a portrait of yourself within one of the many DiTerlizzi stories. There was no end to the possibilities, and the brainstorming itself was incredibly fun; I almost had too many choices.

In any case, I finally settled on a self-portrait as an imaginary monster in Tony's hilarious and ridiculous alphabet book, "G is for One Gzonk", using my crazy ginormous hair as a jumping off point. I created a monster not only entirely engulfed by the crazy ocean of red, but also whose hair becomes a character itself, creeping about and nabbing odds and ends and even other creatures from the original book.

But then I cut all of my hair off.

So I went back to the portrait, did a little revision, and voila double self-portrait, pre- and post-new-do.

The Rumprunkus

Double Self-Portrait

in the style of Tony DiTerlizzi's

"G is for One Gzonk: An Alpha-Number-Bet Book"

The rhyme in it's entirety:

The Rare and Red Rumprunkus

Is barely visible, you see.

Covered with a vibrant mane,

Her hair's as wild as can be.

That monstrous RED hides many things -

It hides baubles, bits, and bangles.

Even ribbons, rocks, and riches

Are caught up among the tangles.

But beware the creeping tendrils,

As they slither through the air.

With a strange life of their own,

They might drag you under there.

The Book Cover Club

2011-09-24T12:23:00.001-04:00

Hallooo everyone,

Recently, a few friends from SVA started a new blog, The Book Cover Club. The premise - read a book, design a cover. In short, awesome. After I saw the first three posts, I knew that I wanted to get involved. So for the fourth book, the Club chose "The Magic Mountain" by Thomas Mann. (For cliff notes.)

I've never designed a book cover before, so I took a stab. Not my favorite piece, but it was a good experience. I knew that I wanted something dark and moody - which hardly describes my usual work - so I decided to experiment a little with the medium. I actually rendered the art by entirely coating a piece of foam core with dark watercolor. Then using a paintbrush loaded with water, I began to slowly remove bits of the paint off of the board. It's a subtractive process, rather than additive, and allows you to start with a really dark background and get progressively lighter.

I'm okay with the final product; I like the overall image and the texture, but there are things I would reconsider, especially the type treatment (thanks ESup). It was my first attempt at a book cover, I'm glad I did it, and I will definitely try another. My cover is below, but you should absolutely click on over to the Book Cover blog and check out the amazing things the other SVA kids created.

SCBWI Thank You

2011-09-15T21:26:00.000-04:00

Hey there blog-readers,

I just realized that I never posted this. I set up a post about the conference back in August, started writing, and never posted it. Oops.

I don't know I can really do the entire experience justice. It was jaw-dropping, exciting, exhausting, inspiring, overwhelming, refreshing, satisfying, hope-inducing, doubt-banishing, jam-packed with people I absolutely adore and admire... I could continue adding adjectives to that list, but I still don't know that it would adequately capture the amazingness of the weekend. It was a very reaffirming sort of experience. I cannot imagine spending my life doing anything but this. And part of my love of children's publishing is absolutely the other people in the field; I have never met a group of folks more passionate about what they do. Just one example of dozens from the weekend - I went to a break-out workshop on picture books (an amazing soup-to-nuts overview from first manuscript to printed page), and the art director running it stepped up to the podium. Before even beginning her talk, she stopped and took a look around the packed room (and I do mean packed... wall-to-wall artists, writers and publishers).

"Who here loves picture books?" she asked. And before waiting for an answer, she raised her hand, "I do!"

Everyone I met at the conference loves what they do, loves the field, and loves books. That in and of itself was incredibly inspiring.

I was so grateful for the experience that I threw together a little thank you card for the staff, art directors, and editors who I met. (You may recognize part of the image. There's a reason I carry a sketchbook.)

And now just a couple of photos from the Illustrator Intensive Day. After the main conference weekend, there was a full day intensive, during which seven working professionals did a live demonstration of how they work. It was incredible. All seven artists are amazing, and I would absolutely recommend checking out their books.

Paul Zelinsky - Underpainting techniques

Marla Frazee - Stretching paper and gouache paint

Kadir Nelson - Portraiture in oil

(Note: the gentleman in the chair is the inimitable Dan Santat, also of picture book fame)

Denise Flemming - Paper Pulp Painting (SO messy and fun!!)

Richard Jesse Watson - egg tempera and applying gold leaf

David Small - Drawing of all sorts

Jerry Pinkney - Watercolor

And two bonus photos -

Judy Blume!!! (a surprise guest)

Me and a new friend (Kathy Ellen) at the 40 Winks Pajama Gala

Sketchbook Dump!

2011-08-25T13:34:00.000-04:00

Hallooo everyone!

I realize that it has been a most silent summer on my part, but autumn is fast approaching, bringing with it wonderful things like colored leaves, colder weather, cider donuts, and an entirely new schedule for me. With said new schedule - that of full time freelancer - there will be some designated update-blog-with-new-work time. Exciting I know.

In the meantime, I'm on vacation in Minneapolis, hanging out at the Book Arts Center on a slightly drizzly day, and figured it was the perfect moment to do a big ole sketchbook drop. These are all recent character sketches, some random doodles, others beginning character studies for a few new stories. Enjoy!

Good News Follow Up

2011-08-01T09:17:00.003-04:00

Turns out, I was also featured in this month's SCBWI bulletin!

Oh hey... that looks familiar...

SWEET!

Good News

2011-07-30T09:48:00.001-04:00

Halloo everyone,

A while back, I mentioned that I might have some good news. Life got so busy with the thesis show, graduation, and then internship that I completely forgot to update you all with an explanation. Every year the SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) hosts an international conference out in L.A., and for the first time ever, this year they offered student scholarships. Turns out, I won one of two student scholarships to this enormous and amazing conference. (!) The scholarship not only includes entry to the conference, but also covers fees for a special illustration master class, a one-on-one portfolio consultation with an art director, entry into the juried portfolio showcase (there are prizes!), and a year's membership to SCBWI. (There was much jumping up and down and squealing when I found out about it.) Exciting stuff.

The last couple of weeks have been a whirlwind of prepping materials, finishing a few new pieces, readying my portfolio, printing new promos, and going over the conference schedule with a fine-toothed comb. A little crazy, admittedly, but it's really exciting. What does a conference full of picture book people even look like? Well, let me give you an example. The theme of this year's annual gala is "40 Winks" - for their 40th anniversary - which means that appropriate dress is going to be pajamas. A fancy party in PAJAMAS!! Break out your best bunny slippers! I LOVE MY FIELD.

So, I'm heading out to L.A. bright and early on Thursday. In the meantime, I'll leave you with a new piece -

I'm using it for my L.A. promo. =)

Craftitude

2011-07-15T11:43:00.001-04:00

Halloo blog readers!

So in addition to the usual sorts of art-working things, I've been doing a bunch of crafty things - birthday related projects, in fact. I made a certain someone with a new job a "cube" decorating kit. When you work amongst a sea of cubicles, you need some fun stuff for your desk.

In addition to photos, a mug, tea, snacks, and random toys, I also personalized a couple of notebooks. I hate being a brand snob, but I love my Moleskines... love love love. Other than something handmade, they make my fave notebooks ever. If I'd had a bit more time, I probably would have hand bound something... but for lack of free time (in light of recent publishing internship), I bought a couple of moleskines and proceeded to personalize them. It's always helpful to have somewhere to organize your thoughts, soooo...

Work Thoughts:

and Creative Thoughts

In addition to thought-organizing and all of the other stuff I mentioned, it's also nice to have a little work buddy...

As of yet unnamed -

I've actually gotten a lot of good responses from my teeny weeny goldfish bowl, so I may be making more of them. (Hard to tell scale here, but it's made in a votive holder.)

Until next time!

Panthers and Flamingos

2011-07-12T08:51:00.000-04:00

I know it's been forever. The summer has been zipping by with a speed and ferocity only matched by my cat (who thinks he's a panther, but in fact much more closely resembles the Cowardly Lion).

Yes, this cat...

It has been eons since my last update. Eons. Yes, you heard me, eons. Since graduation, I've been interning at Penguin in an imprint of their Young Readers division. It has been an incredible learning experience; my projects have ranged from design based (book based merchandise for Christmas, end-paper design, picture book layouts, scanning and placing artwork) to daily support of the art department (archiving old work, mucking my way through the slush pile, packing up artwork (this is MUCH cooler than it sounds... the other day I got to - very carefully - handle original artwork by Dave Catrow, Sophie Blackall, Patricia Polacco, Tomie dePaola... I mean, Tomie dePaola!!!!)). Not to mention, the people I work with are fantastic - the art director is brilliant, the two designers are incredible at what they do, and the assistant to the department is always super helpful and is an artist/designer in her own right.

That being said, with the full-time gig and summer rolling in full tilt, there has been little time for much else... like updating the blog. That being said, I haven't stopped working on artsy things. So here's a little something for all of you fab blog readers out there.

I made a "Get Well Soon" card for a dear friend/mentor who just had knee surgery.

100th post project!

2011-05-23T02:31:00.000-04:00

Happy 100th blog post loyal blog-readers!

With the show down, graduation over, and summer on its way, I have some new projects in the works. One of the projects required an entire day of googling for owl reference. You'll be seeing more of these little guys in the coming months...

Graduation!

2011-05-13T12:56:00.000-04:00

The end of an adventure. Who knows what's next?

Thesis Show

2011-05-06T16:55:00.000-04:00

Many thanks to everyone who came out to the show yesterday. All of your support meant so much. Likewise, thank you dear readers from far away for messages and notes!

The show opening was amazing. I felt honored to have my things up on the well with so many incredibly talented people. Congratulations to everyone!

And finally, a couple of photos of my corner of the gallery:

Five books!

Loyal readers. ;)

Big Day!

2011-05-05T15:39:00.001-04:00

Thesis show day!

It's hard to believe that it's already May, the show is hung, and I graduate in a week. The last two years have been unbelievable, and tonight is the culmination of a year of work. I'm excited to the point of shaky hands. That said...

If you're around the NY area, I'll see you tonight at the SVA gallery - 601 West 26th Street, 15th floor - from 6-8pm.

Oh, and if it's any incentive at all, I'll have some sweet merch!

I made stamps, lickable and stickable.

And buttons... heaps of buttons.

And will be selling the first official run of Amelia Pepper.

Butterflies at the Museum

2011-05-02T17:28:00.000-04:00

For one of my last drawing classes, we went to the Museum of Natural History. Our assignment was (as always) draw loads, but in addition to the usual draw, draw, draw, we had to create a promotional postcard for the museum using one of our drawings.

I actually had a really great drawing day and came out with a bunch of things I liked, but halfway through a drawing of some ducks, a security guard came up to me and asked if I wanted to check out the butterfly conservatory. Apparently he'd found a ticket on the floor that needed to be used within the next fifteen minutes. I hastily agreed and headed to the conservatory.

For those of you who don't know, when I was a little girl, I had two "pet" butterflies; they made an appearance in our backyard every summer, and provided you were patient enough, they landed on any outstretched hand our arm.

It was an easy decision... I designed my postcard around the drawings I did at the conservatory.

Nearly there...

2011-04-27T23:57:00.003-04:00

I'm not going to post any pictures of the full display until after the opening, but for an early sneaky peak... hanging day...

(Bottom photo credit: one Mr. Gant Powell, extremely talented artist and SVA class of 2011)

Thesis Interlude

2011-04-15T20:27:00.001-04:00

Hallooo blog-readers. Thesis show prep is in full swing; we're actually starting to hang the show today. (Sneaky peaks to come.) But it's been a while since I posted any art, so I thought I'd interrupt the regularly scheduled thesis-related whatnot to post some images I did in my drawing on location class. Last Friday we went up to Kykuit, the old Rockefeller estate on the Hudson. It was beautiful and a much needed trip outside of the city. While I love New York, it was wonderful to take a break from thesis-crazy and abandon the concrete jungle for birds and flowers.

The estate is amazing, but my favorite bits were the details... lots of wrought iron and fountains and gargoyles...

Flamenguin

2011-04-14T20:47:00.000-04:00

Most of you out there in blogland are well aware that I am, by nature, a very silly person. Other than general goofballitude, word play has a tendency to invade all parts of my life, extending well into my work world.

A little background... In order to keep track of all of my projects, I always give them a one word name/title (for file-prepping, list-making, etc). At my least creative, I use the name of the main character. At best, it's a play on words, a pun, or a mash-up of other words in the title. One of the projects that I've been working on and talking about on the blog (here and here), as I've mentioned before, has two main characters, a penguin and a flamingo. I actually gave this project two different titles - "flamenguin" and "penguingo". Ridiculous, I know. But seriously, flamenguin! It was just too good to keep to myself. So if you can make it to the thesis show, you may find that it is actually prominently featured in another one of my books.

Got Mail?

2011-04-13T21:40:00.000-04:00

Halloo all.

Show day is fast approaching, and I'm in the process of wrapping up the books - working on a couple paintings, last minute edits, typography, text design, endpaper design - before I print and bind them. This part of the process is exciting, but I find much of this bit (from the finished painted product to output) exhausting.

However, in the process of working out the endpapers for one of the books, I actually ended up getting to do a little bit more painting. For the book I described in a previous post, I designed a set of endpapers made up of postage stamps (as the book prominently features two characters who send letters and postcards to one another.) At first, I thought that I would just do the stamps as line drawings, but after a bit of down time and some scrap watercolor paper, I ended up with thirteen painted stamps.

Eventually, I'm going to print them up as stickers to send out with my promotional materials.

Keep running!

2011-04-05T23:20:00.000-04:00

It's my current mantra... only three weeks until the show goes up, so...

just keep running...

Once upon a time...

2011-04-03T19:31:00.000-04:00

Gather round dear blog readers. It's story time.

Once upon a time, a flamingo (one, Aloysius T. Pinkerton) and a penguin (the indomitable Birgitta Le Blanc), conducted a most extraordinary correspondence. Penpals and best friends, the two sent letters between the Caribbean and the Antarctic. Their friendship resulted in unexpected travel, marvelous days in the snow, warm afternoons on the beach, fancy tropical cocktails, frozen feathers, unfortunate sunburns...

I could go on, but alas, there is work waiting for me on the drawing table.

If you want to find out the rest of the story, you'll just have to come to the thesis show. (I know, shameless plug... but seriously, thesis show! The opening is May 5th, 6-8pm. Additional dates and details to come.)

New art!

2011-03-29T11:57:00.000-04:00

Apologies my dear blog readers. I have been three weeks silent... but let me tell you, they've been a busy three weeks. Most of my time has been spent at my drawing table and only on the computer to do the cursory e-mail check and to hit play on the day's chosen playlist or podcast, so all e-whatnot has come to a screeching halt. However, in the hours that I've spent not on the computer, I finished putting together a total of five dummies and four new paintings. Chock full and all around exciting, but admittedly exhausting.

But this is a short update, as there is another painting waiting for me on the drawing table. In the meantime, however, I thought I'd give you a sneaky peek at one of the new ones.

From the balloon book (as of yet, untitled):

Subway doodle

2011-03-09T16:40:00.000-05:00

I had to go up to the upper East this morning - I know, it may as well have been another country. As such, I found myself with more time than usual on the subway. A handful of sketchy notes and this fellow were the product of my ride.

Dummy Number 3

2011-03-05T12:41:00.001-05:00

Halloo dear blog readers,

The past month has whooshed by with loads of drawing; during the past three weeks, I've put together three book dummies. One of my favorite parts about working on a book is really getting to know the characters. As you draw the character over and over, you begin to have a sense of how she/he moves, reacts, and expresses her/himself visually. I love feeling that each of the characters is a solid, three-dimensional (so to speak) person in the two-dimensional world that exists between the covers of a book.

This week, I was finishing the book dummy that goes with the art I posted a number weeks ago back in January. So you've already seen a couple of the finishes, but here are some of the sketch pages that I've been working on this week for dummy numero tres.

Which makes three down and perhaps two to go...

The Pom Pom Girls

2011-02-26T21:50:00.000-05:00

A friend needed some cheering up this week, so I took a break from thesising and dummying to draw a quick cartoon. I was going to make something along the lines of a get well soon card, but I ended up with this gaggle of gals instead.

So for all of your life-cheering needs, I present to you...

Clearly they're going to need their own story.

Thesis Dummies

2011-02-23T18:24:00.000-05:00

Halloo my dear blog readers,

First, thanks to everyone for the congrats and well wishes. The scholarship was a really exciting surprise this week.

But moving on... you've all been extremely patient. I keep dropping hints about my mysterious thesis, one book, two books, three, four, maybe six book project. Perhaps I should tell you what I'm doing. Originally, my thought was to make a dummy of two or three different ideas and then pick one to finish for the thesis. However, picture book publishing looks less kindly on finished work... an entirely fleshed-out book leaves no room for the excellent collaboration that happens between an author/illustrator and her editor/art director. Publishers do, in fact, prefer to see dummies in the sketch stage with two or three finished pieces thrown in to show how you would render the final artwork.

So why pick one book to finish? The upshot is I'm not. Rather than one book for thesis, I'm doing very finished dummies of three - six original books with two or three finished pieces of art per story. I have one 99% done, a second nearing that 99% mark, and then the third - sixth book... well, loads to do still. Depending on how satisfied I am with the work, I'll show three or six of the books. Though admittedly, a bit schizophrenic, it's been great to have more than one project to work on. When I get fed up with or sick of or stuck on one of them, I can shift gears, work on a second book, and then return to the previous project refreshed and ready to go.

You've already seen a couple of the finishes going into the books, but here are some of the sketch pages that I've been working on this week for book number two.

Be forewarned, the images are not for the faint of heart... here be monsters...

Good news

2011-02-22T20:29:00.000-05:00

Last semester, I submitted an application for an Alumni Scholarship to help fund my thesis project. It required a big 'ole proposal, budgets, thumbnails, image descriptions... it was a long process and a lot of work, but in the crazy of the New Year, I had mostly forgotten about it.

In any case, I had some pretty exciting news this past week...

It seems that I didn't just get an alumni grant but won the Illustration Department scholarship. Neat.

Thesis show!

2011-02-17T13:52:00.000-05:00

Mark your calendars folks! The opening reception for the MFA thesis show is going to be May 5th. It may seem early to start planning, but in addition to all of the actual art, there's printing, binding, designing promos, getting prints made... loads to do, as it were.

We've been working on the official promo card for the show as a class, so that our work is all equally represented. Each of us is doing the portrait of one of our classmates.

Philip!

Playing around

2011-02-15T18:08:00.000-05:00

Just doing some experimenting...

... Day!

2011-02-14T11:00:00.000-05:00

(If you're just arriving, you may want to backtrack to Saturday's post, and work your way forward for the full effect of the warm, fuzzy sentiments of this fine February day.)

...Valentine's...

2011-02-13T18:15:00.000-05:00

Happy...

2011-02-12T16:41:00.000-05:00

Snow!

2011-02-11T11:49:00.000-05:00

For those of you who aren't in New York, you may not know that we've had a snow storm pretty much on a weekly basis since the year started. All of the winter weather has meant a fantastic heap of snowy reference for a picture book that I'm working on about a flamingo and a penguin.

It's an absurdly silly and extremely satisfying project. What could be better!?

Issue One - Hey Girl Here: Sweet Gear For Salty Tarts

2011-02-07T00:47:00.001-05:00

Halloo dear readers!

Today marked the release of the first issue of "Hey Girl Here", a little homemade zine by my sassy and saucy lady classmates at SVA. It's fab, and we're hoping to do a whole bunch more issues.

It was an amazingly quick turn-around... less than a week from original idea to stapled zine.

Assembly line production:

Snazzy pink cover (hand-lettering, courtesy of the talented Mz. Supinski):

My piece:

Sneak Peak

2011-02-04T18:19:00.001-05:00

Shhhh!

I'm working on a super secret collaborative project with a bunch of friends from school... from what I've seen thus far, it's going to be awesome.

Sneaky peak:

Scratchboard Fun!

2011-02-02T17:16:00.000-05:00

Heya everyone,

Just a quick post of a piece I did a couple of weeks ago. In drawing class, we played around with scratchboard, and the assignment was for each of us to do a portrait of another student. I did a portrait of my friend Dasha, a firstyear in the program, a fellow aspiring picture book artist, and a super talented lady.

Dasha

I inverted the image just to see what would happen.

Calling All Mix Masters

2011-02-02T15:56:00.001-05:00

Some of you may have been following the whole art school saga and know that I'm currently finishing up my last semester. This is it! The final push! As such, I'm going to be sitting at my drawing board for the next couple of months finishing up my thesis. One of the best things about making art is that your mind is -for the most part - free... free to wander, free to listen to podcasts, free to daydream, or, more often, free to rock out.

Here's where you come in. I've been listening to the same few tired mixes for the past couple of weeks and realized that I'm bored. Totally, entirely and utterly bored of my predictable little mixy-poos. So, if you feel like procrastinating from you own work or have a moment to spare, I'm soliciting music and mixes to shake things up and help me pass the working hours.

If you're interested, in exchange for music, I will send a little note or cookie or sketch or something (as of yet to be determined) after thesis-crazy is over.

xo
L

SCBWI

2011-01-30T17:07:00.000-05:00

Hey there, folks!

It was a crazy, exciting, whirlwind of a weekend. It was SCBWI's (Society for Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) annual winter conference in NY, and I decided to check it out this year.

Read on for photos from the weekend, conference-inspired doodles, and more!

The weekend started out incredible and continued to astound me day after day, panel after panel. Friday was the illustrator intensive, featuring workshops all about digital media and the possibilities and potential new media holds for illustrators interested in children's publishing. It was an amazing series of panels organized by one of my favorite people in the universe, Pat Cummings (far right in the photo below... Pat is not only a widely published children's writer and illustrator, she's also my advisor) and by Cecilia Yung, a veritable force of nature in the publishing industry. Cecilia (far left in the photo below) is not only a board member at SCBWI, but also an Art Director and Vice President of G.P. Putnam & Sons and Philomel, imprints at Penguin.

Saturday was similarly action-packed. We started off with a keynote address by Lois Lowry. Lois Lowry!!

If you haven't read The Giver or Number the Stars or Anastasia Krupnik, you should head to the nearest book store or log onto Amazon RIGHT NOW. Your twelve-year-old-self will thank you. Not only was her address inspiring and interesting, but it was really funny. She shared a number of letters that kids have sent her over the years. A couple favorites:

After Lois Lowry, the day continued with a star-studded faculty list. The following panel, about creating and recreating the picture book, featured Jane Yolen, Mark Teague, and Patricia Lee Gauch. Again, if you have never of these folks, do fix that. Jane Yolen, a former Smithie, is a prolific children's writer; Mark Teague, a kids' book illustrator with a great sense of humor; and Patricia Lee Gauch, another force of nature in the publishing industry who has perspective from both sides of the editor's desk.

During the day there were a number of break-out workshop sessions with individual art directors, editors, and agents. Later, however, we heard from two more of the greats, R.L. Stein...

and Jules Feiffer.

Sunday was a shorter day, but still action packed, with a really thoughtful and honest keynote by Sara Zarr, a newer author of children's fiction.

"They say, write the book you want to read. I'm going to give the speech that I need to hear," she began. "The time between when you're no longer a beginner but have yet to break into the business is probably the hardest in your career. Your greatest creation is your creatie life. It's all in your hands. Rejection can't take it away; reviews can't take it away. The life you create for yourself as an artist may be the only thing that's really yours. Create a life you can center yourself in calmly as you wait for your work to grow." (vaguely paraphrased)

After a panel on humor with Mo Willems, Lenore Look, and Marvin Terban, Linda Sue Park was our final speaker for the day. She is also another new-ish author who I am not as familiar with, but after hearing her speak, I will definitely be checking out her books.

I came away from the weekend with pages of notes,

some really excellent advice from a talented group of people, a small head cold, a whole bunch of silly doodles (including but not limited to the following...),

and a whole bunch of inspiration.

And on that note, of to the studio I go!

New work!

2011-01-27T15:23:00.000-05:00

Happy snow day readers!

New York is under another foot of snow, and I'm off from school for the day. That being said, it's still a work day. I'm busy prepping for a conference this weekend. The Society for Children's Book Writers and Illustrators hosts an annual conference in New York, and I decided that I ought to check it out.

At the conference, I'll be participating in the illustrator showcase and showing a new piece of work - a painting from one of my books for thesis. (Yes, "one of"... I may actually end up doing a series of picture books for the thesis project...) But I digress. Since I'm showing this painting publicly tomorrow, I figured that it's high time I shared it with you.

The Family Anchin

2011-01-24T11:07:00.001-05:00

Halloo dear blog-readers.

I haven't ever posted anything about my family, but I come from a home of absurd and absurdly talented folks. I've always said that before dropping everything and going to art school, I never really thought about making art and illustration a career. That being said, when looking at the sorts of things my parents make, I can't help but feeling rather dense (in a how-could-I-not-consider-making-art sort of way). My folks are both teachers, and though they don't currently do art professionally, they are both exceptionally talented. One of these days, I'll post some actual samples of their work, not to mention my sister's work. Dina is talented, on a level that exceeds jaw-dropping.

For the moment however...

Yesterday my folks came into the city for an impromptu early dinner. We had fun with the brown paper on the table. And so I shall leave you with a few of our table doodles:

Landscape by Papa Anchin

Froggy by Mama Anchin

(My mom has been drawing this one for as long as I can remember... I have

postcards and notes dating back to the 80s with this little frog drawn on them.)

A Boy and His Chicken by Mama Anchin

A Girl and her Fish by Yours Truly

(In response to A Boy and His Chicken)

Scarecrow

2011-01-17T00:00:00.001-05:00

Just because...

This is just a quick character sketch... I've been letting some ideas percolate for the past few weeks, and this particular character may show up in an upcoming book dummy.

Thesis?

2011-01-16T23:26:00.001-05:00

Happy New Year dear blog readers!

It was a busy end to 2010 and a busy start to 2011. This bodes well for a productive final semester. After so many years of schooling, it's crazy to think that this is my last - LAST! - semester of school. It's both incredibly exciting and entirely terrifying.

That being said, perhaps in anticipation of an ever-nearing commencement date, I've been burning the candle at both ends, working both in the studio and at home on my thesis. For the thesis, I decided to work on not one, but three (soon to be four) picture books. I spent first semester writing, designing characters, sketching, thumbnailing, revising sketches, redrawing, rewriting, editing, and putting together three solid book dummies. All of the dummies are in pretty good shape, but even so, the revisions never end; after a four hour meeting with my advisor yesterday, I have major work to do on all of them.

Dummies are great, and I love having an excuse to do tons of sketches and the opportunity to really get to know my characters... however, it came to my attention that it is nearly the end of January, leaving me with only a couple of months to pull together all of the final art. The last three or four weeks have passed in a flurry of painting and experimenting with color.

I still haven't decided which book I'm going to work on yet, but I've really been enjoying playing with this particular character in paint. A couple of sneak peaks:

Grand Central Extended

2010-12-18T17:14:00.000-05:00

For my drawing on location class, we had an extended project to pick a city block and do a series of nine drawings - three drawings in each of three locations on the block. I had originally chosen to draw uptown in my old neighborhood, but I had a really hard time in all of the locations and ended up despising all of the work that I did.

I had so much fun drawing at Grand Central a couple of weeks ago that I decided to go back and use it as my location. I divided up the station into three separate parts - the main terminal, the dining concourse, and the holiday market. While there, I did a bit of experimenting playing with different pens, but I'm pretty satisfied with the pieces I came out with.

Main Terminal

Dining Concourse

Holiday Market

It came from the mold...

2010-12-16T18:33:00.001-05:00

Stop motion today was super exciting. We started to take the puppets out of our molds. They're a platinum-based silicon that we injected into our plaster molds last week. Because the silicon is so goopy, it tends to overflow the actual puppet shape and ooze into the flange (the flat bits) of the plaster mold, which ultimately results in creepy see-through style bat wigs.

So creeeeeeepy!

Grand Central Drawings

2010-12-12T14:34:00.000-05:00

On Friday, we went to the main terminal of Grand Central station for my on location drawing class. The in-process drawings were featured on GCT's facebook page! Woot!

conte crayon:

marker

I really like...

2010-12-06T18:03:00.001-05:00

...hot air balloons.

Drawing Class

2010-11-27T14:49:00.000-05:00

Hope everyone out there had a good Thanksgiving.

November has sped by in a haze of sneezing and coughing. I spent about half of the month sick and the remainder in front of the computer working on actionscript for the digital version of my thesis. More about that another day...

Today, however, I wanted to post a couple of images from my drawing class. Every Friday, I have five hours of drawing, either on location around the city or in the studio with live models. It's a great class, and it's been an opportunity for loads of experimentation.

Our on location days have included trips to Governor's Island, 50 stories up in a building overlooking the World Trade Center site, the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, Gleason's Boxing Gym... it's been amazing. Here are some highlights:

My classmates looking down out over the city -

Drawing the Woolworth building -

Skyline (looking North) -

Word Trade Center site -

Drawing from the South side of the building -

After such a detailed drawing, I wanted to do something looser... quick ink drawing of my classmates and the interior of the space -

Unfinished drawing, Woolworth building -

Patrick Dougherty sculptures at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden (If you haven't seen them yet, check them out! They're amazing... he also did an installation at Smith during my first year.) -

Erin drawing

Left-handed drawing to warm up... my pen ran out of ink halfway through -

Drawings of the sculpture -

Detail page from the cactus room in the greenhouse -

Back in the studio with three models. Warming up with charcoal -

Playing around with ink (unfinished) -

Tighter pencil drawing -

The Storyteller, now in 3D!

2010-11-03T18:20:00.001-04:00

Hey there folks!

It has been a busy fall with loads of work on my thesis, digital projects, side projects, Halloween crafting, and, oddly enough, sculpting.

I've always loved stop motion animation, and throughout high school and into college, I used to sculpt little figurines out of polymer clay. Towards the end of my sculptural dabblings, I began to add armatures, trying to figure out how to animate the characters. Alas, much of my experimentation failed with a whole bunch of broken dolls and models; baked polymer clay does not bend.

In any case, as I was browsing the course catalogue for an audit class this term, I came across a class on character design/building for stop motion animation!! Many exclamation points!!!

I signed up right away.

Thus far, the hardest part of the class was deciding which character to bring to life. After spending so much time on the Amelia Pepper comic over the summer, I ultimately decided on the Storyteller character. I decided on him rather than the Peddler because I realized that I could easily build his squat sidekick with polymer clay head/hands/legs/feet on a wire armature hidden beneath a sewn coat.

A refresher, The Storyteller and the Peddler:

Making the figures first involves sculpting the bodies onto a wire armature. (The heads are made separately because the materials differ.) Once the models are built, we're going to make plaster molds for the bodies and silicone molds for the heads and finally cast the puppets.

So I started sculpting the Storyteller with his clothes on, figuring I'd paint the clothing and sew him a coat and a hat. I stylized him a bunch, made him rather slim, and gave him some pretty big hands and feet.

Front view:

Back view:

Side view:

Shirt detail:

If you look closely, however, you'll notice that my carefully sculpted little fellow has scratches and bite marks on him. When I brought him home to work on, my kitten - by which I do mean deadly ferocious panther - decided that the Storyteller was a fun new chew toy.

He wasn't terribly mangled, but enough so that I reconsidered my original plan of painting the clothing on my character. Ultimately, I decided that actually sewing/handbuilding him clothing would make for a much more exciting figure... so I scrapped the whole thing and stripped him down to his skivvies.

Front view:

Side view:

Feet detail:

You also might be wondering why the little guy's hand has three fingers. Apparently, getting a decent amount of mobility in the hands and fingers is difficult if they're overcrowded... so for beginners, the teacher folks tell you to sculpt only three fingers and a thumb.

And finally, as I mentioned before, the head of the character gets sculpted and cast separately. Again, I added a bunch of detail because the character drawings are pretty simple and exaggerated his features - big ears, pointy chin, etc.

Front view:

Side view:

Three-quarter view:

I spent much of today finishing up, read re-doing, his head. (The original, like his body, also had some odd little toothmarks and black hairs sticking out of it.) Tomorrow, I'll be building and pouring the mold.

It moves!

2010-10-20T17:56:00.000-04:00

Hey there loyal blog-readers,

October is speeding by, and it finally feels like autumn in NY. With Halloween less than two weeks away and the semester nearly two months over, things are getting pretty busy.

Second year at SVA is considerably different than first year. First year was very assignment oriented, with lots of little projects. This year, however, we're all hard at work on our thesis projects, which are designed to be much more self-motivated. This week we each had to give a presentation explaining our thoughts and ideas about our projects, so I have a long post about my thesis nearly ready for you. Soon to come, scouts honor.

In the meantime, however, I thought I would show you what I've been doing in the world of digital illustration. This year, we engineered a new class on the "digital book", all about how digital media can serve the book format, how books can be adapted for digital media, and how something entirely new can be created. I don't believe that we will ever lose the book as an object and a format (I hope, I hope), and as an avid reader, I do prefer holding a physical book rather than using an e-reader. That being said, new technology like the ipad, tablets, and iphones can be adapted for really exciting, interactive reading experiences, especially for kids.

In the class, we've been learning how to create interactive animations that could serve as illustrations for a digital book. Each of us chose an already existing story to play around with, and I've been working with the Wizard of Oz.

I've been playing with a scene of the scarecrow in the field and have just (huzzah!) gotten my scarecrow to swing his arms and legs. The crow perched on the scarecrow's post now flaps his wings and nods his head, and each time you click on him, another crow appears in the air. The clouds in the background are also interactive; if you click on them, they scuttle across the sky. I'm not yet sure how to post an interactive animation, so for the moment, you'll have to make do with a couple of stills. It's really exciting and suuuuper nerdy because the animation is all done with code in flash. It's a bit like learning a foreign language but with a bunch of logic and math thrown in. But, I digress... so on to the project:

Main scene:

Clicking the crow to add more crows:

Clicking the clouds to make them move:

Book Show: Hanging to Opening

2010-10-15T00:50:00.000-04:00

Hey there folks!

Many thanks to everyone who came out for the opening reception of the Book Show. It was a marvelous evening filled with lovely people and fantastic artwork. Half of the show has already come down; my book comes down on Monday. Things are wrapping up, and as usual, photos from the last couple of weeks are long overdue.

Hanging day was super exciting. As a class, we've been watching the books grow from a tiny nugget of an idea. It was amazing to finally see all of the work finished and framed and the books printed and bound.

Decisions, decisions...

Placing and measuring...

Watching things start to go up...

Could it be a show?

It's up!

The book:

Opening reception...

Thanks again to everyone for coming out.

For those of you in the NY area who still want to catch a bit of the show, you can still do so this weekend. The gallery is located in SVA's main building at 209 E 23rd Street. And for those of you who expressed interest, I'll be selling full and half size prints of all of the spreads in the book. Drop me a line for sizes and prices.

Cheers!

Inspiration: Tony DiTerlizzi

2010-09-22T21:16:00.000-04:00

A while ago I did an "inspiration" post about Giselle Potter, and I got a lot of good feedback from folks about showing sneak peaks of my illustration and art faves. So, I've decided to do a post like this once a month in order to spotlight some of my major influences.

And who better to start with than Tony DiTerlizzi? He is in a nutshell one of the reasons I went to art school. One of my all time favorite kids' book illustrators, he imbues his work with imagination and heart, referencing greats like Arthur Rackham and Norman Rockwell (some of my favorites).

I first discovered Tony's work when I was in college. In Northampton, MA, there's an outstanding art gallery, the R. Michelson Gallery, on Main Street. On a whim, I stopped in to look around. The gallery featured some great work, but when I saw that it had an entire section devoted to children's book art, I was hooked. On that first visit, I discovered paintings from Tony's book Jimmy Zangwow's Out of this World Moon Pie Adventure hanging in the back room. Just the title! Awesome, non?

The illustrations were richly colored and imaginative. Each one was a masterpiece in gouache.

Of course, I rushed to the library to check out his others books. He had also illustrated a gorgeous black and white adaptation of The Spider and the Fly.

And Ted, a loony and endearing picture book about a boy and his imaginary friend.

Later Tony teemed up with author Holly Black (Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale among others) on The Spiderwick Chronicles. Here his work shifted from full color gouache paintings to watercolor paintings - cover and frontispiece - and ink spot illustrations. I fell in love with the line quality of this work...

...and with his use of watercolor and a muted palette.

Rather versatile this Mr. DiTerlizzi.

Tony's work is beautiful, but the elements that I believe are truly key are both his imagination and his understanding of character. Every character in his illustrations has a personality and a life. Each one says something in his/her posture, gesture, facial expression, clothing... it's all in these careful details.

Honestly, I only have good things to say about him... even how nice he is. Yes! Dear readers, one of the reasons behind this post is that I actually met Tony today. Tonight there was an event at Books of Wonder to promote his new book, The Search for WondLa. (Note about the bookstore... it is an AMAZING children's bookstore in NY, and it's attached to a cupcake bakery. What could be better?! Seriously, get off of your computer and go!) But back to the book... I haven't yet read it, as it came out today, but I do have a signed copy waiting for me on my night table. The illustrations are similarly excellent and in a style that reflects the genre. It's a new departure - ink and digital coloring - but from what I've seen thus far, they're beautiful.

So, lovely readers, I urge you to check out Tony's work. As most of us in illustration-land do, he has both a blog and a website. And as I mentioned earlier, not only is Tony an amazing artist, but I can also state with certainty, he is super nice...

Comic Feature!

2010-09-21T13:54:00.000-04:00

Hey there everyone!

I've been so intensely immersed in prepping for the book show, the comic class already feels ages ago. Regardless, Jessica Abel (one of the professors of my summer comic class and author of the graphic novel La Perdida and the how-to book Drawing Words, Writing Pictures) wrote a feature on her blog about the work I did this summer. Woah!

Take a looksee!

Drawing Words Writing Pictures

Special thanks to Jessica for the great spotlight article and of course to her, Tom and Keith for an incredible summer class.

DONE!

2010-09-19T16:01:00.001-04:00

It's done!!!

Believe it or not, but it's done. It's sewn, it's glued, it's end-papered, it's trimmed, and it's bound! The pictures are matted and framed and all ready for hanging on Tuesday, and the business cards and promotional postcards are all designed, ordered, and on their way.

Alas, no images of the book yet. It may be done, but the glue is still on the wet side... pictures to come.

But! In the meantime, some more shameless self-promotion.

Could it be...

2010-09-06T21:19:00.000-04:00

Could it possibly be...?

It would seem, dear readers, that my book may very well be coming together. It's been a harried few days. I've been at the studio every day this week doing final corrections to the art, reworking the text, hand-lettering, scanning, photoshopping, and laying everything out in InDesign. Whew. Just listing all of it is exhausting. Despite one slight mishap, everything is going rather well.

As for the "slight" mishap... I spent 6 hours scanning all of the artwork on Saturday only to make a horrifying discovery early Sunday morning. Since I had all of the raw files on my hard drive, I decided to work from home. Alas, when I opened the files, I discovered that each and every image had horrible lines and banding. ACK! I wrote a hasty, stress-induced email to the ever amazing P - computer-guru and studio-tech guy - who came into the studio and took all of the scanners apart and cleaned the scanner heads. Amazing, no? Anywho, after the heads were cleaned, I re-scanned everything and tada! No banding! Admittedly the loss of the 6 hours of work was traumatic, but it all worked out in the end. (Thank you P!)

The layout for the book is 90% done. All that remains is to format the title page, actually come up with a title, letter the title page, design the cover, and finally print and bind the book.

Because all of this layout business isn't really exciting, image-wise... I shall leave with you a new piece from the book.

The Carousel

And again, for the NYers, I hope you'll consider coming to the opening. If you can't come to the opening, let me know. The exhibit will be up for a bunch of weeks, so provided I have some free time, I'd be happy to arrange a private tour and show you around.

Until next time!

Book Show!

2010-09-01T16:44:00.000-04:00

Hey there everyone!

The school year is just around the corner, as is the book show!

It has been a busy couple of weeks. After wrapping up the comic class and launching the snazzy new website, I dove right back into the book project, and finally FINALLY last week I moved into a bright shiny brand spanking new space at the studio. It's marvelous. Pictures to come.

So these past bunch of weeks have been work, work, and some more hard work; I finished two new spreads, doctored two old spreads, scrapped and rewrote the manuscript yet again (for the third, fourth, eighth, twenty-fifth time), played with some text treatment, scrapped a finished spread, redrew a new one, and am currently finishing up what I hope (fingers crossed) is the last spread in the book. I only have about half of it painted, but here's a sneak peak. (Pardon the low quality... my crappy little camera seems to be on the fritz.)

With this last spread nearly done, the book finally feels like it's coming together. Next steps: cover design, scanning, formatting, text-placement, printing, and binding! It's certainly going to be a busy September.

That being said, the book show is going to be amazing, and I hope that those of you who live nearby will consider coming!

Websuccess!

2010-08-13T14:41:00.000-04:00

And it's done!

(Well nearly... bells and whistles to come, but for the moment, we have lift-off!)

Check it out!

Redesign!

2010-08-04T18:29:00.000-04:00

Yes, my fabulously astute readers, Hogwash & Nonsense looks a bit different. Quite observant of you!

Since finishing the comics class, I have not yet taken a (much-needed) break, but have spent the past nine hours or so working on redesigning my website (read: alternately staring at the computer screen until my eyeballs glaze over and smashing my head against the keyboard).

Sigh.

But, in anticipation of the redesign (and in order to once again feel like a competent human being) I made some changes to the ole blog.

So sit tight and hold onto your hats... it's going to be exciting!

August and Everything

2010-08-03T21:26:00.000-04:00

And it's August.

Dear readers, I have been entirely delinquent with my summer updates, but the comic class has kept me so busy that there has been time for little else. Excuses, excuses... I know. But to give you an idea, since class last Tuesday, I worked seven days this past week, putting in 12 hours on Wednesday, 10 on Thursday, 6 on Friday, 6 on Saturday, 8 on Sunday, and - for the final push - 12+ yesterday.

And now it's over.

For the final critique today, we had to have our projects, not only finished, but printed and bound into mini-comics. I'm not even going to go into the craziness that was yesterday, which involved Milton Glaser, not one but two defunct Staples, two small copy shops (one closed, one nearly closed), $8 worth of 11x17 paper that I couldn't even use, and finally a heroic rescue by my dear roommate's wonderful little (albeit oddly calibrated) printer. But as I said, it's over, and as such, I figured time for a long overdue post. (I'm giving you fair warning, this is a long post, but it is image-heavy... so consider yourselves thusly prepared...)

In my last post, I talked a bit about process and page 1 (now 3) of my comic, and I have the final version of that page to show you. When we last left off, I talked about inking and reworking my style to better fit the story. To recap... I redid my first page entirely. The first inking looked something like this:

And then the entire page was revised to better advance the story. The sketch for the revised page:

And... drum roll pleeeeease... the final inked version of this page:

Clearly I didn't just go from straight pencils to 4,209,302,125 inked in bricks. There was definitely a stage of very simple outlines followed by a second stage with some hesitant, very tentative gray hatched lines... One of my greatest weaknesses has always been adding enough darks into a black and white piece - both solid black and darker grey tones. I struggled with this during the course of the class and through the inking process... but Jessica, Tom, and Keith were an amazing help. Each week we brought in photocopies to pass out to our classmates for workshopping. Tom suggested that I take the left over photocopies and use them for experimenting. I took his advice and - for a bunch of the pages - scribbled in loads of ink and pencil, trying to find where best to add spots of dark before ever touching the final piece.

For example:

On (actual) page 1, I first started playing just with thicker outlines around some of the faces to try to pop them out of the page. I realized, however, that I wanted a much darker feeling to the piece. A darker outline wasn't going to cut it.

So I took a pencil and scribbled away...

Much better. So with a little bit of courage and a somewhat shaky hand to start out, I grabbed a pen and my good paper...

Another process set... on page four, here's a brief progression from pencils:

To the first inking:

To the final page:

I can't say it enough... the class was an unbelievable learning experience, and my drawings improved by leaps and bounds over the past eight weeks. And so I shall leave you with a few more images and a handful of lessons learned:

1. No drawing is precious. Many a panel will be sacrificed to the gods of storytelling (even if it means - very sadly - cutting a choice scene of your main character pole vaulting ninja-style over a bunch of bear traps and another that you might love for no good reason at all, except maybe that it reminds you of an old school Alice in Wonderland illustration)...

If they don't help the story, out they go.

2. Don't be afraid of the dark...

3. Or the grays...

The end.

Craft Interlude: Challah

2010-07-16T15:55:00.000-04:00

I woke up this morning wanting to make something with my hands...

so I did...