This is the kind of relaxation I wish I had

Our fat black feline, Moses, spends more time on his back than on his feet.

A few days ago I pondered the possibility that the reason Jim Dear and I feel like the summer has flown by is because through some twist of cat magic Moses actually pulled all the ambient relaxation out of the atmosphere around us. Then he sucked it into his skin and stored it up like a bear stores berries in winter. Therefore we get to spend all summer feeling like we are working hard, chasing kids and yard projects and Moses gets to open one eye and watch us once in a while.

Here's a few slices of work in progress:

Doodles from the 2014 Midsouth SCBWI Conference

My complete recap of the 2014 Conference is over at Once Upon A Sketch. The conference also got some great coverage in Publishers Weekly and of course there's the conference blog.

Instead of rewriting my notes here (when you can find those fabulous details at the places above,) I'm just going to show off some character sketches for a work-in-progress I did while listening to the speakers.

Also I won a little award again. At this point saying I was honored with the top illustration prize two years in a row feels a little like bragging. But it's my blog so I'm gonna;) This year the conference gave an honorable mention as well to my friend and fellow Nashville illustrator, Cat York.

My Summer Blog Tour plus…. meet the family in The Little Kid's Table!

Wow summer is almost done and it seems I've been everywhere but on my blog. To start here's a few guest posts and interviews I did over the summer:

I was profiled on Kid Lit 411. Ya'll this is a terrific site for readers, creators, and lovers of children's literature. I was interviewed by the talented Sylvia Liu, who curates the illustrator's sections.

In May and June I contributed my regular columns to Once Upon A Sketch.com and Word Disco.com:
Both Once Upon a Sketch columns focused on best practices for illustrators. In May I discussed how to deal with a difficult client. In June I wrote about the difference between sampling for a client or working on spec. These are both issues that aspiring illustrators will encounter.

While Once Upon A Sketch is about hardcore, practical advise for illustrators, Word Disco is my fun dance floor. In July I wrote about my summer reading list.

Finally last week, I kicked off Telaina Muir's DOT Drawing Challenge with this post about art, love and fear.

So go catch up on reading and come back when you want to see my characters for The Little Kid's Table….

What's that? Let's see them now? Ok you twisted my arm… BUT I'm going to introduce them in batches. First here's the family portrait:

The family members are Grandma Mable, Grandpa, Mom, Dad, Aunt Nancy and Uncle Bob, Uncle Fred, cousins, Little Brother, Daisy the dog and MC (main character.) Whew, this is a lot of people to keep up with but I decided to create my own backstories for all of them. And because most modern families are colorful these days, The Little Kid's Table has a lot of diversity around it. Here's some more family groups.

Grandma Mable is bringing out the pie… and the real fun is going to start

This is a proposed page layout for one of the final spreads:

Kind of like casting for a movie, determining who each character is as a person helped me illustrate how they would react in a different scene. In this book most of the action takes place in one area - the dining room at Grandma Mable's house. The drama had to be heightened through the characters' personalities. Next week I'll post about building their individual personalities and backstories. 

My Favorite Books This Week Plus What I Blogged at Word Disco

True to my New year's Resolution in this post, I've been reading 5 books a week, rating them, and researching the agents who represent. Here are some of my favs so far:

The Santa Trap - Jonathan Emmet and Poly Bernatene, really funny with a satisfying ending

Tornado Slim and The Magic Cowboy Hat - Bryan Langdo, great illustrations

Crankenstein - Samantha Berger and Dan Santat, really funny illustrations that go with snappy story

Carnivores - Aaron Reynolds and Dan Santat, this book is funniest book I've read in a while. Great story and great illustrations.

Also over on Word Disco this week I discuss what happens when a sketch for a good idea leads to an existential crisis. It's all part of the job. Read that post here.

The Naughty Car Twelve Days of Christmas

In case anyone wonders why we didn't manage to get Christmas cards in the mail…. here's what we were doing:

On the FIRST day of Christmas my cars gave to me a transmission crunching badly...

On the 2nd day of Christmas my cars gave to me
TWO pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 3rd day of Christmas my cars gave to me
THREE trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 4th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
FOUR different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly



On the 5th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
FIVE problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 6th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
SIX cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 7th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
SEVEN more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly


On the 8th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
EIGHT wheels sitting useless
seven more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 9th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
NINE mechanics busy
eight wheels sitting useless
seven more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 10th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
TEN miles in a tow truck
nine mechanics busy
eight wheels sitting useless
seven more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the 11th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
ELEVEN charges on VISA
ten miles in a tow truck
nine mechanics busy
eight wheels sitting useless
seven more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission crunching badly

On the12th day of Christmas my cars gave to me
ZERO cars a working
eleven new charges on VISA
ten miles in a tow truck
nine mechanics busy
eight wheels sitting useless
seven more radiator puddles
six cranking no starts
five problem codes
four different rental cars
three trips to the dealership
two pink dribbles
and a transmission CRUNCHING BAAAAAAADLYYYYYYY

Glitteramous

The Sprout has a habit of making up and mashing up words to best express just exactly how beautiful something should be. Usually that something is a version of a princess/fairy/ballerina/bride or anything that might be frothy, flowing, bouncy or decorated. This past week her new word for that was glitteramous, as in:

"Mommy, I don't like that cake. It's not glitteramous"
"Mommy, I want Santa to bring me a bride dress - one that is GLITTERAMOUS!"
(exasperated sigh) "Mommy why can't I wear ALL THE DRESS UPS to the doctor?! You know I like to be glitteramous!"

However glitteramous makes me think of something that is both glittery and enormous.

Like a ballerina hippopotamus.

Is this glitteramous enough for you Sprout?

New Project: The Fort

I'm happy to be working again with Reading A-Z on another classroom reader. The Fort is about 3 friends who turn their living room into something other than a place with boring sofas. My kids make forts all the time in the playroom so I had plenty of inspiration for these sketches

SCBWI LA Conference in Notes and Doodles

Two weekends ago, on Saturday night, I was attending my second SCBWI International Conference in Los Angeles. Actually this is what I doing at 8pm Saturday night two weeks ago:

Yep, that's a costume boa and my friends Renee and Heather are wearing wigs. Thats how kid lit creators roll. You can dress us up and we will still find a way to act like the characters in our minds.

However the days surrounding Saturday evening's Black and White Ball were filled with workshops aimed to entertain, educate, and most of all inspire all of us before we headed back to solitary studios and writing rooms. My usual MO is to take lots of notes in longhand while simultaneously drawing furiously in my sketchbook. Below are some of my favorite notes from the sessions and key notes and the sketches that accompanied them. Also check out the  official conference blog here, and my Word Disco friend Jenni Bielicki has lots of other great photos on her blog here. Plus stop into Word Disco later this month for some Schmooze It or Lose It stories.

*******************

The conference begins with each speaker or faculty member stepping to the mic and saying one word. Here's my scribbled down list of words. About 10 minutes in to this I noticed the person sitting a few rows down flipping back and forth through her conference guide writing the words by each of the speaker's bios. Brilliant. I am totally doing that next time:

Opening Key Note:
Laurie Halse Anderson, author
Be brave today

We are lucky, when you were born a fairy godmother crept into the hospital and blessed you with magic. Books are proof that humans can do magic.

Jon Scieszka, author
Kids = nuts. They are the best audience

Giuseppe Castellano, Penguin Art Director
You guys had to pay to come here, all the while daring to be artists. 

Art directors and editors do not sit in ivory towers smoking cigars. We're not elite jerks.

Then he told this really touching story about his parent, particularly his father, coming to America from Italy in the 60's. His father struggled to find a creative outlet as a child while dealing with strict parents who did not approve - and demonstrated their disapproval by occasionally destroying his father's childhood creations. The moral of this story was that if his father could go on to succeed creatively, as an immigrant, with no family support, then we all can.

Steven Malk, agent, on career planning:
Be in control of your career, don't let it control you.
Take a deep breath and slow down.
Know your history, read it, breath it, live the books you create.
If at first you don't succeed, don't abandon ship.

*******************

Kirby Larson, author
Palimpsest (this was her word from the opening) it means writing that has been effaced to make room for more. We all create on the well worn steps of those who went before us.

Editors Panel with
Namrata Tripathi, Andrea Pinkney, Donna Bray, Claudia Gabel, Allyn Johnston, and Melissa Manlove
The main topic of the panel was "What makes a hit, what makes an evergreen"
Hits speak to a moment in time
A close examination of a moment in time can turn out to be an evergreen.
An evergreen is also about the human existence.

Each editor wants a book to have magic

Allyn Johnston thinks All The World is the perfect picture book (I agree)

Mac Barnett, author
Most of all, get the reader to be willing to suspend disbelief.
Don't break the contract with a kid reader.

He told the story of a contest in his book Billy Twitters and Blue Whale Problem where a reader could send in to get their own blue whale as a pet. Then as an example of how to break the contract with the kid reader he played voice mails left by preschool age Nico, for his pet whale Randolph. This had us simultaneously laughing and wiping tears.

Jenny Bent, agent, on queries:
I found myself in this session only because the one I was trying to get to had closed. But I found Jenny Bent to be really funny and personable. She explained the different parts of a query letter giving really great examples of real life successful queries. Google her and you'll find similar information on her blog. Google also query mad libs for a fun exercise.

Matt de la Pena, author
He gave a stunning keynote about growing up the child of teenage parents and how he landed in writing. In short college equaled girls which equaled poetry which equaled no girls but a great voice for YA.

Ask yourself, Where are you coming from?

Write what will be written

Laurent Linn, art director
I've seen Laurent Linn speak many time and I'm always entertained and I always find a new way to look at picture book art. He had do a quiz to see if we could tell what was traditional art, digital or a mixture of both as its increasing difficult to tell.

Carolyn Mackler, author
Writing is an antidote to the darker days.

We should all watch Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.

Market Report
I admittedly checked out of this one after the picture book news, but here's what I gleaned:
Picture book sales are actually up, driven by character driven books and franchises. Bullying is a frequent theme. A growing number of projects are originating in house.

*******************

Agents Panel with
Ginger Clark, Mela Bolinao, Joanna Volpe, Steve Malk, Jenny Bent

This was Sunday morning, after the Black and White Ball, and it was time for a bit of a reality check. Here it is:
Agents get 25 to 75 queries a DAY. 
You should be careful what you sign away.

David Wiesner, author/illustrator
I saw David Wiesner at the SCBWI New York conference in 2008. In fact I wrote this post about it. I still think the guy is a rock star and frankly I don't ever want to be in an elevator with him because I would probably a) really embarrass myself by stammering about how much I love his work or b) give myself skin cancer by blushing shades of red not found in the natural world. I am happy to admire from afar. That is, until I win the Caldecott, then y'know Dave and I can hang out and be in the same critique group. Also monkeys might fly out of my butt.

Anyway here was his keynote wisdom:
Follow the story where ever it leads
Always go back to old ideas you have, you never know where they can end up

Jarret Kroscocka, author/illustrator
I went to back to back sessions with him and then attended his closing keynote. I admire Jarrett for his unrelenting drive in this business and for just seeming like a nice guy.
Think about colors for each character
Multiple characters means humor is born.
Let your brain go to the more interesting story.
Google story mountain.
Keep a Word doc of all your story ideas.
Visit schools for free while you are getting used to doing school visits.
Create educational value.
Link your books directly to publishers site you avoid any preference for Amazon over independent book sellers.
Give away a little bit of your presentation on-line so they know what they are getting.

*******************

On Monday I attended two intensive sessions, the first with Melissa Manlove on using picture book texts to inform your writing, the second with Namrata Tripathi on creating a better dummy for picture book author/illustrators.

Melissa Manlove:
Do a close reading of every picture book you read. Look closely at language, try to figure out what is working for the book. 

Humor comes from disrupted expectations.

Namrata Tripathi:
Don't say you can do this because there are so many bad picture books out there. That tells her you want your book to be the second worst in the store.

Pay attention to voice and line work in illustrations.

My Next Big Thing

The Next Big Thing is a global blog tour to showcase authors and illustrators and their current work. I was tagged by the super talented (and fellow Ringling Alum) Wilson Williams, Jr.

I decided to post about my newest picture book idea in progress....

Then after the Q & A I'll pass it along to Meridth Gimbel , Jessica Young, and Alison Lyne who will pick up the tour on June 6th.

1) What is the working title of your next book?

Bernadette's Ghost Light - though this is totally a working title as I'm terrible at titles! As I divulge information on the story line I might be taking suggestions for real titles....

2) Where did the idea come from for the book?

I'm a huge theater buff and a few years ago I read Frank Rich's memoir, Ghost Light. His life is a very compelling story. In the book he describes what a ghost light is - a simple light left on in a theater all night so that the theater never "goes dark" and risk bringing ghosts and bad luck with the darkness. In Rich's memoir the theater itself was a ghost light during his troubled boyhood. I was struck by both the literal and figurative idea of the ghost light. At any rate Bernadette does not have a troubled childhood... except that she's the smallest of her family with the smallest job at the theater and one very modern grownup does not take that job seriously... until it's too late.

3) In what genre does your book fall?

Definitely a picture book

4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie version of the book?

This is a great question! Definitely John Cusack would be Mr. Black. Ryan Gosling is another possibility just so that I could hang out on the set with him.... because illustrators are cool enough to do that right? Bernadette is harder to think of because I don't see her as the typical cute blonde little girl actor. She's more like the spunky kid from Beasts of the Southern Wild.

Smarmy Mr. Black

5) What is a one sentence synopsis of your book?

Nobody mess with Bernadette's mojo.

Faced with being told she's not important, Bernadette has to prove the one thing she's in charge of at the Music Box Theater is the only thing that can stop the chaos around her family.

6) Who is publishing your book?

Clearly a publisher with impeccable taste

7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

I rolled the idea around in my head for a couple of months before even starting to write it down. My very first stabs at any idea I write in long hand in my journal. After writing 4 or 5 drafts there I took the story to a writing retreat and over that weekend really fleshed it out. Then I started creating the sketches. I'm still in that process and have pages and pages of discarded spreads on my studio floor. So up to this point it's been about 3 months.

8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Good question... I've been trying to think of this as it's always good to mix into a query. Right now I'd say it's David and Goliath meet The Haunted Mansion.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

Well I have to give a shout to The Circus Ship by Chris Van Dusen. I love that book and the fictionalized story of a real event (or in my case a real item.) I also originally got the idea (late one night in a bubble bath which is where all my ideas come from) thinking about how we as a society tend to prize certain jobs over others but this is almost always to our own detriment. Instead what we should value is dedication and excellence in any job. So then how to turn that concept into a kid's book...

This is a rough sketch of a spread. After getting the rough plotted out, I scan it in and size to the what the finished size of the dummy will be. Then I redraw it from there.

10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?

Well what I've already said, that a ghost light is a real theater tradition. Also there really is a Music Box Theater in Chicago. My story is not set in that theater but I do plan to give it a feel of a 1920's vaudeville/movie house with lots of gold and dark red and little scalloped touches. 

Thank you for stopping in here to help me celebrate my "Next Big Thing." Now onto the next two candidates who will post on June 6th. I'll update with direct links then!

Meridth Gimbel

Jessica Young
Alison Lyne

Nashville Public Library Showcase: From Good Idea to Finished Piece

This month I was included in a group of four other fabulous illustrators displaying our artistic process at the Nashville Public Library's Main Branch. That sounds innocuous right? Well for anyone who's never seen the Main Branch of our library let me set the stage....

Our work is displayed behind glass in the main entrance foyer. This room soars three stories into the air and is lit by tall glittering glass windows surrounding the top. A sea of polished granite stretches from the 15 foot high main entrance doors back to a towering bronze and marble staircase that winds its way up to the 2nd and 3rd levels. Cool, efficient library workers hold court over the dark paneled wood circulation desk. Behind ivory walls wait reams of ideas waiting to be discovered or enjoyed for the hundredth time. Everywhere there is the click and hum of learning, loving, and prizing books.

I have been in love with this building since it opened.

I want to go to story hour every week. I want to have a party in the 2nd floor outdoor courtyard. I want to take my sketchbook and draw for hours in the tremendous quiet of the Grand Reading Room. And, of course, some day I want to have my books on the shelves.

My Ladybug spread is one step in that direction, so it's fitting that that is what I chose to display. While its creation was a solitary endeavor, it was definitely improved by the input of the other artists displayed -  talented illustrators and friends. Here's hoping a dreamy ten year old, like each of us used to be, will see the display and realize that they too can find a life in making books. So Nashville readers, go visit the library and everyone else please stop by their sites for a closer look. Below are some pictures of the setup and finished displays of how we get from a good idea at one o'clock in the morning to a finished piece ready for the client:

Isn't this space spectacular?

First here's my display:

Not in Nashville? Read my process here

Our illustrious leader Susan Eaddy, check our her super cool clay creations at her blog, youtube channel and website:

My long time illustrator friend, Cheryl Mendenhall. Check out her CUTE characters at her agent's site. Plus this photo does not do justice to her display which has all kinds of cool projects and she feng shui'd up her display with her tools including a wacom tablet:

Fellow illustrator/designer crossover Kris Sexton brought two of her clay dino models to include. See her watercolor and Illustrator work at her site:

Finally Doug Jones, the self-proclaimed big brother of the group! He creates really funny cartoons regularly for his blog. Check out his fill portfolio at his site:

How To Catch a Ladybug: the process for my May/June 2013 spread

Ladybug Magazine, published by Carus Publications, is one of the most prestigious literary magazines for kids. This is the story of how I got my first illustration with them. Without a doubt, the first step was the hardest one: work very hard for a loooong time to be good enough to catch the attention of the editors and art directors. I mentioned in this post about how long that took for me.

Step Two was just like any other project. It starts with the assignment on my drawing table and a blank sketchbook.

The assignment was for a silly illustration involving a May Day picnic with all kinds of fairy tale characters. Some of the characters would be doing traditional fairy-tale-y things others would be doing zany, silly things for the kids to find and laugh at.

Right away I decided I would knock it out of the park on the silliness. My goal was to put no less than twenty silly things into this 10 x 18 spread.



Here's what the first sketch I sent looked like:

"Whoa nelly" was the response from Ladybug.

Apparently twenty silly things is a little bit of overkill.

They explained, and this made all the sense in the world, that too much crazy stuff made it hard for young readers to figure out where the punch line is. So I de-sillyed.

Here's the second sketch I sent:

With just a couple more tweaks this sketch was approved. As I mentioned, I was swamped with work right about this time but I was determined to give 110% of my attention to this piece so everything went on hold. I estimated it would take me three uninterrupted days to get the final done. I started by transferring the sketch to watercolor paper via my light table and penciling in the tonal values. I think of this process as a pencil "underpainting." It helps me map out - in an editable medium - where the lights and darks will go:

Finally I could procrastinate no longer. I was going to have start painting it and keep my fingers crossed that I didn't spend the next three days completely messing it up.

Obviously, since it's a giant scene of an outdoor picnic, there was going to be a lot of green involved. Let me tell you something about green.... it has a way of being a bad influence on every other color in a palette. It makes reds look brown and blues look washed out. Since I knew that the background color would have a huge effect on the rest of the painting, I did it first. That sure is a lot of green:

Then little by little I started to fill in the rest of the characters:

Finally it was finished on the drawing table. Time to bring it into Photoshop and work out some of the details as well as increase the saturation on certain colors. But here I ran into a problem... my scanner was only 8.5 x 14, too small to fit the whole painting on the bed. Two awesome illustrator buddies Susan Eaddy and Wendy Lawrence had offered to let me use their large format scanners but at the last minute Susan came down with a stomach bug and Wendy was out of town. So two days before the piece was due I sat down at my scanner and scanned it in four sections. Doing it in that many sections allowed plenty of overlap so I was able to piece it together seamlessly in Photoshop.

Then I worked on the colors, including the sky and the details on the tea cup. I made the queen's skin tones a little more creamy, and darkened the leaves around the cup. I paid extra special attention to the right side because I plan to use it as a promo mailer later this year, the composition on that side is strong enough by itself.

At last, the finished piece:

Off it went to Ladybug and a few days later I got back the best response I think I have ever gotten on a project:

I always wanted to be funny. And yes I really did pin it to my bulletin board. Frankly a key step in an artist's career is keeping inspiration and encouragement close at hand.

That was the first of February. Last week I got the contributor copies in the mail. The color reproduction was stunningly good and I couldn't be happier with how it turned out. Then Baby Sprout got her subscription copy in the mail. Possibly the best part of the whole process was sitting with her to look at the magazine. Sprout's copy showed up just a few days shy of my "freelance anniversary." The issue is currently in bookstores and libraries and the original piece is on display at Nashville's Public Library (I'll tell that story next.) All in all not a bad way to celebrate 15 years as a children's artist.