Okay! Here’s M – O batch of Alphabook characters. I really liked how all three of these turned out, so I wanted to group the goodness all together in one happy post. :) Enjoy!And in case you don't know what Alphabooks is, here’s the lowdown: Alphabooks is a blog in which all artists are welcome to draw a book character corresponding to the letter of the week. For instance, A for Aslan, B for Bilbo Baggins, etc. Feel free to check it out and participate! :)M for Mercy ThompsonMoon Called by Patricia Briggs
So although I said I was keeping these characters in an unfinished state, I got to the point with this character and thought “I just HAVE to finish her!” My approach this time was—instead of a sketchy outline—to do clean outlines with a finished “inked” appearance. And when I got to that point, I wanted to add color, and when I added color, I wanted to add details. And a background. And if you give a mouse a cookie—well, you see where this went. :P But I’m really happy I decided to finish it, and in less than two weeks two! *laughs* I know I’m slow at creating pieces (darn perfectionism!), but that’s part of the goal with Alphabooks—the more art I create and the more frequent it is, the faster and better I’ll become. And if you don’t know who Mercy Thompson is, she’s a mechanic who owns her own auto shop, has werewolves for neighbors, and occasionally get tangled up in issues with vampires and lycanthropy. Oh, and did I mention that she can shapeshift into a coyote? ;) (8.75 hours)N is for Nancy DrewThe Secret of the Old Clock by Carolyn Keene
If you were to take a look at my bookshelf when I was a kid, there’d be one shelf that was jam packed with faded yellow bindings of the classic Nancy Drew mystery stories. And no, I’m not talking about the modern adaptions of the book, I’m speaking of the good, old-fashion faded books that are nearly falling apart with love and years. You know, the ones Nancy and her gang are clad in 1930s to post-war apparel and zip around in shiny blue roadsters. So in my young years I took after my mom and devoured these books and dreamed of solving mysteries like Nancy Drew (which I actually did write a story involving myself and my friend Danielle as sleuths, but that’s a story for another day. ;) ) So there was no doubt in my mind for who I’d do for the letter N. I present to you the fantastic NANCY DREW!Before I even started, I realized that it’s been too many years since I’ve read a Nancy Drew book, and in order to truly capture the essence of Miss Drew, I opened up The Secret of the Old clock (the first Nancy Drew book written) and plowed through the pages. Aaaaaand I’ll be honest--reading these books as an adult (with a better idea of what makes good, believable characters), it quickly became apparent to me that…well…Nancy and her chums were one-sided characters. Nancy was this incredible, miss perfect dream girl who was smart, resourceful, drop-dead gorgeous, “naturally athletic”, and “boasted many friends.” Hmmm…how many people do you know that have a description like that in real life? :P In stark contrast to Nancy, the villains of the story were impetuous, unintelligent jerks who couldn’t put two and two together and bumbled through scenes like complete idiots. :P Although it’s not J.K. Rowling caliber of writing, Nancy Drew mystery stories are still fun stories that you can easily read in a day (or in an hour if you’re faster than my dino-paced reading) and be amused.So, with that said, I wanted a break from the digital work I was doing and also wanted to depict Nancy in a way that seemed to be a part of her world. And what better way to do that than with ink? After all, the illustraions in the beginning of the books were all done in ink, and it was about time that I practiced a little good old fashioned inking myself. I used my trusty croquil pen, a sharpie, and touched it up in Photoshop. Hand inking was good practice to finish a piece quickly without being too concerned about detail (and if you make an accident, just go with it!) I also quickly learned that it wasn’t a good idea to drink a cup of coffee and then try and ink fine, sweeping lines with a jittery hand. Oops. :P But Nancy still turned out alright, and I’m happy with the 1940s feel that I gave her. I also really enjoyed the actually process of inking by hand—there’s something so natural and organic about applying ink to paper—very satisfying to see a finished piece appear before your eyes. Anyways, I’ve wrote far more than I should have about this piece—I hope you like it as much as I do! :) (2ish hours?)O is for OnuaWild Magic by Tamora Pierce
Alright, since I bored you to death with my Nancy Drew shpeal, I’ll try to keep this one short. If you know who this character is, you get bonus points (and a cookie!). Although Daine Sarrasri is the main character of Wild Magic, Onua is the first character mentioned in the series. In a nutshell, Onua Chamtong is a horse care tender that hires Daine on to help her drive ponies from the northern part of the realm to the capitol. She is known to be “horse-hearted” and has her own wild magic that enables her to have a special bond with horses and ponies. She was fun to draw because A.) I enjoy her character—she’s matter of fact, but a loyal friend to Daine, B.) she’s ethic, so it was fun to draw something different, and C.) it was fun to come up with a medieval fantasy costume. I also decided to use a texture to give the image more dimension while making it look more rugged and natural. I also got to practice drawing braids again (they’re tough to draw!) Overall, I’m very pleased with how she turned out. ^^ (3 hours)
J - L Alphabooks
And now for the third batch of Alphabook characters. I've decided to split up the 3rd and 4th batches (for brevity's sake.) In case you don't know what Alphabooks is, it is a blog in which all artists are welcome to draw a book character corresponding to the letter of the week. For instance, A for Aslan, B for Bilbo Baggins, etc. Feel free to check it out and participate! :)J is for JulieJulie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
I'll admit, I'm not very happy how Julie turned out (which is a shame, because I really like the book.) I honestly didn't have a lot of time to finish her (the night before the deadline), plus during the time I was drawing her, I was coming down with a 101 degree fever. All-around UGH. :/ I suppose I learned two things: A.) Understanding how Inuit faces are shaped differently from face from European-descent, and B.) Drawing when you're feverish and have the chills isn't fun. Lesson learned...next character! (.5 hour)K is for KaeldraDragon's Milk by Susan Fletcher
I'm a fan of Susan Fletcher's Dragon Chronicles, and decided that Kaeldra from Dragon's Milk needed some spotlight time. The story in a nutshell is about this girl who's younger sister catches vermillion fever, and the only way to cure it is with dragon's milk. When she does find a mother dragon, she agrees to watch the mother's dracling's while she hunts (in return for dragon's milk). However, when the mother dragon is killed by townsmen, the draclings are in danger, and therefore Kaeldra must journey to find a safe haven for the draclings (dun, dun, duuun!) Anyways, it was a nice change to use only flats (no shading) to color this piece. Sometimes flats just give a cleaner appearance while still possessing a more finished appearance than simply lines. Again, it was good practice to draw different shapes of faces; Kaeldra’s is a lot longer than my normal default face, and I always need experience drawing braids (and blonde hair for that matter). Plus, dragons are always fun to draw. :) (2.5 hours)L is for LauraLittle House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Have any of you ever read the “Little House” series? If so, I don’t know about you, but I’ve always been enchanted with the pioneer life. I absolutely love how Laura Ingalls Wilder describes in detail daily life as a pioneer and all the adventures she grew up having. So, for the letter L, I was thrilled to do Miss Laura when she was still quite young. And since I had been doing everything digital up to this point, I decided that it’d be a nice change to pull out my pencils and draw in a more organic style (plus, my tablet wasn’t working at the moment. :P) Unfortunately, my scanner butchered the image (as usual), so I resorted to a *shudder* point-and-shoot camera (yes, the point-and-shoot actually looked better than the scanned image. -__-) *sigh* Guess it’s time to buy a real scanner. But regardless, Laura prevailed, and waves her hat defiantly in the face of technology—take that, you fiendish tablet/scanner! :D (2ish hours?)
Another Milestone
Yesterday was a very special day for me. The kind of day where I had burst out from the doors of the post office singing, "I'm walking on sunshine--WOOOoooOOOOOOaaaahhh!!"Okay, not literally.But yesterday I was on cloud nine. Why? you may ask. Well, yesterday was the day that I finally mailed my submission for SCBWI's (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) Don Freeman Grant. In a small 11x14 package fit many months work of editing, drawing, and painting the pieces required for the submission. The results: a dummy suitable for submitting to publishing companies and two finished paintings from the book. It may not sound like a lot, but it is a huge step closer to finding a publisher for my little baby.Note: For those who don't know what's going on, I have been working on writing and illustrating my first picture book about a gardening cat who moves into the city. Fresh from the county, she initially finds herself lonely without a place to express her green thumb. However, she finds creative ways to overcome her challenges (and no, I can't tell you the entire story yet...that's a surprise! :))Here are the results of my submission!
And the two paintings...
The dummy itself is smaller than the size of the finished book and is printed on 80lb paper. I created the images as pencil sketches, which were then scanned and edited in photoshop. We glued the whole thing together with epoxy and the aid of a wooden bookbinding frame that my friend graciously made for me. In the end, I am very pleased with the results--it looks and feels like a good quality dummy.The paintings are each 11x13.75 on 300lb Arches watercolor paper. The black and white picture was done in inks, while I used watercolors and acrylics on the second. The color image was the best I could do for the submission, yet I can't say that I am completely satisfied about it. I'm not sure what it is that leaves me a little unsettled...perhaps it's that the cats look a little too stiff and posed (not as natural as they were in the sketch). Maybe flower frame seems out of place, or that there are too many objects in the composition. I don't know, but perhaps if I leave it be for a while and come back to it I'll figure out what it is.Regardless, I am just so happy to be done with the submission. I won't find out the winners until August, but I'll have a lot of art and craft projects to keep me busy until then. :)