Category: Inspiration

Sweet & Savory

11/12/2013

by Kat McD.
Our November meeting had some neat treats. Pictured are Linda's yummy corn bread muffins and my lemon tea cake. This Sweet and Savory combination came to mind the following weekend at this year's SCBWI LA's Art Directors Day aka Illustrator's Day. Isabel Warren-Lynch, Executive Art Director and fellow Jersey Girl spoke about the lasting impact of tender moments in the books of her childhood. She spoke about the subtle "sweetness" of Garth Williams work and Beatrix Potter. Then my reviewer, Cliff Cramp, http://www.cliffcramp.com/ , gave me words to "savor" regarding art. His advice was about using color temperature to guide the viewer's eye to the focal point of an illustration. This subtle use of color can take an illustration from "Oh" to "Wow!" That's the kind of art I want to make. Illustrations that are sweet and savory you keep with them after the book has been closed.

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Story vs STORY

8/28/2013

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by Gail Buschman

I recently had two portfolio reviews with two different art directors. They had very good things to say about my book, but there were two definite things that they both wanted to see more of: art and story.

The first one is pretty straight-forward: create more work! Even working like the Tortoise instead of the Hare, I can get a lot of work done as long as I remain slow and steady, avoiding panic attacks wherever possible. The fact that they're interested in seeing more work out of me is a very good sign and I should push my creative limits whenever possible on more complex pieces while continuing to break them up with smaller pieces that are still in my style.

The second one is more difficult. Story. I used to write creatively--when I was in high school. These days I don't consider myself a writer beyond my blog ramblings. I have stories in my head, but they sound incredibly silly on paper. Additionally, I keep trying to flesh out these long, complex, overly complicated ideas before giving up in frustration before I've really developed anything. Yet I felt that fleshing out a full story was the ONLY way to approach projects for my picture book portfolio. Create a STORY.

At the SCBWI Summer Conference I was able to talk more with one of the art directors about the subject of story. He indicated that while it was important to show you can develop characters and scenes and compositions for a full picture book STORY, it was just as important to create story in a single image. Not the grand idea of a story, but smaller moments of interest, emotion, and wonderment; to show that you don't only have technical skills as an artist, but that you have ideas.

I have ideas, I'm sure you have ideas. We wouldn't be on this path if we didn't have ideas. Between this discussion and the many art-related podcasts that I listen to, I have resolved to no longer consider myself an artist and I wasn't ever going for the writer's hat, but I am ready to move forward into a new role: visual storyteller. And that's story, lowercase. If STORY happens along the way, all the better.

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Creative Challenge: February Faces

1/30/2013

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by Gail Buschman

So I have one recurring complaint every year: November is the month filled with all the cool challenges like NaNoWriMo and PiBoIdMo, etc, etc. It is ALSO the height of rush season at work and the most likely time I have to put in overtime and cut back on artwork time. So I'm initiating an art challenge for myself and anyone who also wants to particpate can join in: February Faces! Draw one face every day for the entire month. Big faces, small faces, stick faces, ALL faces!

To get the creative juices flowing, here are some starter ideas:

Draw adults
draw children (and beef up your children's illustration portfolio)
draw animal faces
draw inanimate objects with faces
Look at people in a public place for 10 seconds then look away and draw them, making up the stuff you can't remember
Take a page from the previous post from Suzy Engleman Block and draw many cat faces
faces you see in clouds or other abstract patterns
faces built of simple shapes
for those commuters, look at the backs of the cars on the road and figure out what personalities these cars would have then create a character with that personality.

I will be posting my sketches on my personal blog every day and I hope other people join in and post their sketches on their blogs too!

UPDATE: I updated the logo because the pixelation was bothering me and I also forgot to put my hashtag for this event when I share on twitter: #FebruaryFaces

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My Morning Kitties

1/29/2013

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by Suzy Engelman Block

UGH!!
Getting down to work in the morning! Why is this such an issue for the artist? Well, there's the computer. The phone. The weather. The fate of the world. There is a lot on our minds!

My 'morning pages' a la Julia Cameron, used to do the trick, but fizzled out. What to we do in order to transition every morning from that huge overwhelming scary world to our funky little inner pea brains? Start and finish a small but stimulating project, of course!

I bought 4x4" canvases and dug right in ...painting up a hurricane... one little baby storm at a time. Pretty soon, one kitty turned into 3 and in a very short period of time, I was sitting on a massive glut of kitties!! I must say I woke up every morning raring to go, adding to my collection with glee. Eventually I became so motivated that I added other projects to my schedule.

So what did I learn? First of all, the act of doing anything is always better than doing nothing! Besides, when you do nothing, you never really know when you're finished! AND tangible action stimulates the creative process in ways we cannot imagine...It is only by 'doing' that we see what can actually be done.

We all hit a brick wall at some time or another... It is inevitable in our creative life!! BUT, It's important to remember that walls are made of itty bitty bricks. Always begin ... one brick at a time. Or in my case, one kitty to 2 kitties to 3 kitties to....

How do YOU kick-start your
creative day?

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Sweet & Savory

Story vs STORY

Creative Challenge: February Faces

My Morning Kitties

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