Clear

I love a dark pond. Especially the way a pond looks in the autumn. The water has cleared of the summer muck and is now dark and still. Mysterious. This is my entry for this week's Illustration Friday.



This is the inspiration for a new story I’m writing titled, Shellless. It’s the story of a boy who is always ignored. His only friends are the imaginary shellless that live in a city park pond. But more on that later...

This painting is also a blatant Monet rip off. I saw the Monet exhibit at the NC Museum of Art last week. How can I do a pond without including Monet?



Sketches: I’m starting with a much larger sheet of paper than I normally use (approx 4’ X 2’ ½). It’s also dark, like the pond. So this is all new for me.



First layer: My biggest struggle at this point is style. Getting past Monet, getting past Pollock, and finding Ian. I know it’s in there somewhere. I just have to keep looking.

Last Thoughts: The final(see above) isn’t finished but it is as far as I’m going to take this painting. The new materials gave me some grief. The colored pencils wore down incredibly quick on the rough textured paper. They also didn’t write on the acrylic paint. I like the large sized paper but might need to switch to pastels to create the affect I’m looking for.

Pen & Palette Fall Issue

The Fall issue of the Pen & Palette, which is the newsletter for the Carolina’s Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators, came out today. Complete with my cover art. How very exciting!

The Aquarium

It was cold at the beach. Don’t believe me? Check out the video.



click here

That’s ok. We went to the aquarium. I took my sketchbook.

Fish move a lot faster than I thought. At first I tried to draw them regular like. Then I realized that by the time I looked at my paper, the fish had swammed away. So I decided to go with blind contour line.





Blind contour is when you draw looking at the object but not at the paper. It’s great for really studying the object, in this case, moving fish. But it sort of looks silly. Try it sometime.



I thought maybe the jellyfish might swim slower. Silly me. Those little things are pretty quick!

The Pond

The weasels and I went fishing today down at the pond. It looked so pretty cause the leave are just starting to change colors. I had to snap a few photos.




Not only is autumn my favorite time of year but being around a lake at autumn is my favorite place to be. I love the calmness of the water in fall. It’s dark and calm and sort of mysterious.





My friend the snapping turtle came by to say hello. I think this is the most interesting creature. I could watch her all day long. The neat thing about this photo is you can see my reflection in the water. I’m not sure this is the same one we caught last time we were here (see this post)




Here is one of the fish. This thing was huge. I would say three inches. At least! :P

One of the projects from my Art 1 class found its way to my house this weekend. This project was a lesson in proportion. The students wrapped each other in clear tape then cut the tape away and reassembled the parts. The results were these life sized, see-through tape people.

This one is sitting on my front steps, a nice Halloween decoration.

You can read more about the project on the Apex Art Blog…

http://apexart.blogspot.com



I need a haircut!

Pen & Palette / IF Trouble

I was offered to illustrate the cover of the Pen & Palette, which is the newsletter for the Carolina’s Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators. How very exciting!

Also, I think this makes a pretty good entry for this week’s Illustration Friday word, Trouble.




click on the image to view larger version

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I decided on a fox dragging a kite in its mouth. The fox cause I thought autumn colors would be nice for a Fall issue, the kite because it’s like a logo thing for the SCBWI. Sort of like a donkey represents the Democrats or the elephant represents the Republicans.



I had a few other ideas like a sleeping beer with a kite in its paws. I also thought about doing a moose with the kite tangled in its antlers but… I like the fox.



This is the second stag; the sloppy painting part. This is a hard part to get past cause the work always looks trashed at this point. I think, "Oh no! What have I done to my sketch??"



Here I have gone over the pencil drawing with black paint. With this step and the step before, I try to be loose. But I still feel I'm not loose enough. Like maybe I'm not brave enough to let the original sketch go.

click to view larger

The other day the kids found the most biggest caterpillar in the world! So we googled it and turns out it was an Imperial Moth caterpillar. Those are those really big brown moths that cling to the size of the house and your thinking, that’s Mothra, when’s Godzilla gonna show up?

It was a little scary looking at first so I thought I could enter it in this week’s Illustration Friday word, “Phobia”.

After a while, I warmed up to it. It was sort of cute in a really ugly kinda way.




This is the real thing crawling across my hand. This little guy stretched across my palm, which is about 4 inches long.

You can preview Pony Wombat and the Second Ark for free! (aren't I nice!) or you could buy a copy! (aren't you nice!)

Last night we played the championship game against the number one ranked Renegades.. and won. I even got a t-shirt. Good for us.

I have been working on some spot art for the beginning of every chapter in the Pony Wombat and the Second Ark book.

I'm trying to Match each title with a decent spot illustration. Plus I think the frogs Match and so do the cookies, so its a good fit for this weeks Illustration Friday word.




This is a sample of what I'm trying to accomplish. The title artwork for chapter 7.



Here are two more chapter spot illustrations. Do those look like cookies to you?



This is what it looks like in the book. This is chapter 9. The puppy got his head stuck in the tuba. Does it look like a stuck puppy to you? or am I spinning my wheels?




You can preview the book for free! (aren't I nice!) or you could buy a copy (aren't you nice!)