Illustration Friday: communication

This was just another test with Corel Painter and my Wacom. I downloaded a trial version of Painter X and like the pens and markers, but the watercolors still need work. I just used my Corel Painter 3 essentials to do the painting on this. The sketch took less than 5 minutes with my Wacom tablet. The color...about 30 but that includes interruptions from my 3 year old and 8 year old giving tips. I like the giraffe, not thrilled with the monkey. Don't ask me what made me think to illustrate this topic in this way...I don't know. I drew the giraffe first and then thought about an animal that seems to chatter...like they are spreading gossip or something. So, out this came. But hey, I'm proud of myself for finally doing something original again for illustration friday.

School Visits anyone?

I've been doing some school visits and parent night presentations (more and more just recently). Over the last few years, I've always just carted my grandma's old old slide projector around and showed my slides through it's dirty lens. But it finally died on me. The last time I did a little 50 minute presentation at a young writer's conference a week ago, I borrowed my brother's digital projector (thanks Eric). IT WAS SO MUCH BETTER! Since I already have 2 more visits scheduled in the next 2 weeks, I figured it was time to pony up and buy my own. I didn't want to lug a laptop every time along WITH the projector so I thought of my options. I could use a video ipod but those are a few hundred dollars. OR...I could use a USB Thumbdrive.

I found that some digital projectors have a USB 2.0 port and will read jpg images or mpg4 videos. The one I bought is the HITACHI CPX1. It is VERY lightweight and has a high number of lumens and all sorts of great functions for computerless presentations. TheNERDS.net was the cheapest place I found it (that was reputable) and they were GREAT. The projector arrived and I LOVE IT! It's much brighter than my brother's was for those school rooms that don't darken well, and the USB reader worked beautifully. All I have to take to schools now is this little 3 lb projector and a thumbdrive. I can't wait to try it out next week! Wish me luck.

Thumbnails for new book

Here are thumbnails for a book I'm working on. Just thought I'd share a stage or two of the process. The girl is trying to vie for the attention of her visiting Great Aunt. The photo is my son posing for me to sketch from.

Illustration Friday: Gravity

This particular piece was done recently and just appeared in Highlights Magazine's February Issue. Hopefully gravity won't cause more than her hair to fall down. The editors were worried about this in an earlier sketch I sent shown here as well. I thought it was a little more fun in this position...but they were afraid of gravity. No potential accidents in the children's illustration world. It's like those warnings on a box of matches that says FLAMMABLE! Duh! It's all just so no one has an accident and then sues whoever they can instead of taking responsibility for their own actions. I love all the disclaimers before TV shows now as well. Anyway, here's my disclaimer...

Do NOT attempt to hang upside down from anything or GRAVITY may cause you to fall. Should you not heed this warning and an injury occurs, SUE GRAVITY, not me. I will not be held liable for your actions. Have a great day!

Illustration Friday: Crash

I thought I'd FINALLY post something for illustration friday since it's been FOREVER since I've done so. This isn't a crazy crash or anything, but is a childlike crash. But as long as he catches the ball, he won't care.

A Little Sabbatical

So I've been gone for a while, a sort of sabbatical from Blog Posting. I apologize if there are or were any faithful readers out there. I couldn't keep up with it all so had to let go of some. But Hey, I'm back. After a very relaxing 10th Wedding Anniversary trip to Mexico with my husband...I'm back.

While there laying on the beach, by the pool, and roaming about, I kept a sketch journal. These are just 3 sketches from it. One is looking down our beach, the other is of a palm tree by the pool and the other is a view of Xel-Ha (a great ecological park we visited). You can see the actual photos my husband and I took HERE and artistic photos taken with a holga HERE.