Inktober! (I haven't been updating!!!)

Okay, I'm NOT gonna add ALL of them I've been working on the last month on here, but from now on I'll ACTUALLY make updates!

So, Let's Go!

Lately I've been stumped on the many projects I've buried myself under (what else is new, eh?) and created what is known as a "writer's block" or "creative block." Some authors and creatives debate on wether this "creative block" exists. In these SCBWI conference notes, one author, Pam Muñoz Ryan, says there is no such thing as a writers block. On the other hand, Neal Shusterman on the same note page says writers block is very real. 

Is this creative block real? How does one overcome this wall blocking the way to the land of creativity and success? 

Well I for sure don't know... BUT...

Here's what I've been up to to help me through it, even if I'm doing everything to procrastinate:

• Read some topic related books to get my mind reeling. Favorites at the moment: Pete the Cat series, Where the Wild Things Are, Millions of Cats, How do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight, and Dragons Love Tacos. 
• Yeah, I read articles about Picture books too... Tara Lazar always has some good stuff. 
• Jot down ideas even if they're lame. This can also apply to the PiBoIdMo challenge as well as NaNoWriMo.
• Work on something other than my stories, like this postcard contest piece!
• Work on one Picture book at a time. WORK ON ONE PICTURE BOOK AT A TIME. Should I say it again. ONE PB A TIME. <3 This is probably the most important one of all haha.
• And, since I'm working on Nightlander continuously, I've decided to focus on character building until November for NaNoWriMo. ONE CHARACTER AT A TIME. 

And that's it! Personally, I don't believe in a creative block necessarily. I do however believe in a creative meltdown, consisting of a list of procrastinations/reasons why the creative force should pause because of "real life worries" (day job, bills, health, dealing with the "real world") Indecisiveness can also pause the creative force (what project will be more successful? Which project won't waste my time?) 

The only way is to power through. So, let's go!

Critique from Lorraine Owen and the Organisation!

Stitching Butterflies got a critique!

To sum up the critique, I need to work on my tone/color and drawing a lot more.

They seemed to like the Lily piece more, and I would agree.

The Stella piece needs more work, particularly I think with big Stella I need to draw it again (haHA!)

Overall, very helpful. I will say that I want to keep my color palate. I don't think that children's books must be radiating with color and brightness and I want to keep my palate. Work on darks and lights? Yes. Work on drawing? Yes. I'll make sure to practice these but I like my palate and I want to stick with it.

Postcard in Progress!

The Maryland/Delaware/West Virginia SCBWI has a post card contest each year. This year's theme is From Dreaming to Doing. 

This is my take on that theme. 

I've never entered the postcard contest before so this is my first time. Will I have a chance? Ehh, maybe. I see this more of a chance to perhaps make a portfolio piece, or even just an activity that's not my own personal project. 

This is the original sketch (after a few thumbnails.)

The image below is a digital color sketch. After working on it, I see I need to go back to the drawing and re-work the fish in the back ground along with the underwater city background.

I have until october (I think? Got to check that...) to complete this piece.

Better get to working!

Book Dummy Update

Another post on this, really? Will I ever finish this thing? (HAHAHAHA...ha)

Anyway, the book dummy saga continues. I'm nearing the end of my second SB draft with it being critiqued (with most of the ones critiquing being confused) and have to say that my type of writing is very comic book-esque as a lot of the time I use only dialogue and onomatopoeia.

I don't want to change because the manuscript is a little confusing without the illustrations!

So for me this dummy is extremely important for Stitching Butterflies. I wrote about it on the wordpress. You can find some helpful links in there, as well as here and here. In fact, subscribing to these blogs help too.

Some pieces! Part of the reason this blog exists lies in the idea that an artist has to fail over and over and over again just to get what they want inside their heads on paper.  Still, that may not even happen.

Can I get what I want SB to be on paper? 

The Last Post was a Lie, ALL LIES

I need to step back a bit; perspective challenge will be started AFTER my book dummy.

I wanted to do this kinda challenge to myself and then I realized I was already getting buried alive by projects. Look at this list man!:

1. Stitching butterflies- I have the manuscript getting critiqued this week or the next, plus I have to re-draw the book dummy AND still have to finish Stella's illustration. 
2. Lues and Sues- yep, wrote another manuscript and now editing it. I wrote this one called Lue's Place, but it was missing serval things. I put it away for a year and one day I work I was suddenly writing a rhyme on a piece of scrap drawdown paper that began Lues and Sues. Oi.
3. Nightlander Oil Painting- and nightlander in general as it is an on going novel/comic that is now getting oil paintings because I wan to do a comic in oils and oh boy oh boy, JUST KEEP ON ADDIND TO THE PILE.
4. Critique group- I'm in a new critique group and we critique one manuscript a week.
5. Blogs/monday reviews- I'm writing a PB review every monday on my wordpress, which means it'll take the entire week to write unless I do everything last minute and pull an old review out. Oi. 
6. With Friends Like Us- Oh yes, another PB manuscript. WHY. You know, I have the notebook to write ideas down, it's just when a story pops up into my head it takes over.
7. Oh Yeah, Hello Robot is another PB- oh well, this is my life.
8. ANNND Work, the day job as quality control for inks, no need to elaborate this is takes time out of the day.

I should complete AT LEAST Stitching Butterflies before adding another project. Maybe I can edit Lues and Sues/start illustrating while SB is getting critiqued. 

I'm pretty sure this happens to illustrators/writers all the time though. I know an oil painter tends to start five oils paintings and complete them as they go. Same idea with stories. 

They're all jumbled. 

Just Looking Back...

Looking back at SB, remembering that I've been working on this picture book for little over a year, I see a dramatic change in the character design for Lily.

Here's how the first two characters began:

The change begins here. I just had this vision of adorable little girl with pigtails trailing behind her as she creates her dreams. Lily is a wilder character than Stella who likes things neat, a bit orderly, and pretty. 

I have a feeling that SB will go through more change as I get closer to finishing. I've also posted this change on my wordpress because it makes me wonder how many changes the books I'm studying went through. 

Book Dummy update!!!

Working on Stella piece. I'M MOVING SLUG PACE ON THIS ONE.
At least I'm moving, even if it's slow. Perhaps I'm moving so sluggity slug slow because I'm trying to match the previous Lily piece and making sure that everything is consistent.

I still could get a move on it though...

Another positive thing about yesterday was I kinda figured out the last page spread of the dummy here.

Still needs a WHOLE HECK OF A LOT OF WORK (the perspective of those buildings are god awful) but it is better than what I had before!

Moral of story...eh, PROGRESS and maybe slow and steady wins the race?

Just an update on digital color sketch

Digital color sketch! okay, so I figured a lot out but I still think there are some things that need fleshing out with the composition. I shall draw it again.

Finally Working on the Last SB Illustration

I'm finally doing it. This last illustration will hopefully be finished next week (HA RIGHT?!) and maybe I can move on to having the manuscript critiqued and the dummy fleshed out by the end of the month so I can work on Lue's and Sue's. Welp, here I go.

I'm about to do a digital color sketch. @_@ there will be pink, lots and lots of pink.

More Nightlander Update...and Now I have a Word Press

I have a wordpress now yaaay. My internet is acting funny so perhaps the menu is a bit off at this time but... I can fix it.

I decided to go with a wordpress for research purposes. I used to use blogger for this, but Draw it Again has become just that, me drawing and painting things over and over again, my long process of failure. So hopefully I can organize all research material on this blog (HOPEFULLY.)

In other news, Nightlander has been developing as I've procrastinated on SB (shame!) and now has more content and character development. Is this normal for a PB illustrator/writer to jump between projects, even if it means to jump from a PB to a YA comic novel thing? I'll have to research that and put the information in the blog.

Anyway, peace!

I was NOT finished! (Am I ever really?)

After showing the Facebook critique group and going over it with friends and family, then going back to a critique group, I came up with this:

final before 

final after

The very first reaction was that the colors were lovely, but very dim. I needed to brighten the whole composition (and ultimately I agree with this move, however I now need to go back to the first illustration to make sure everything is consistent) The second reaction what that most people could not see the "Stitch stitch stitch" which is what I was afraid of. I still need to clean up those "stitches" a bit before calling it a final. 

Lesson: If you think your illustration is finished, it's probably not finished. 

Second Illustration COMPLETE (I think)

I truly believe that my process could be a lot easier if I tried. This next piece took about a dozen sketches and re draws and tears (haha) to make. 

The biggest problem that I've had for a long time is tone/shading and clarity. Perhaps I'm an abstract artist at heart, but rarely is abstraction acceptable in illustration...especially if that abstraction was meant to be a hand or something or other important detail that needs clarification.  To fix this issue, I began to determine tone in photoshop by scanning my drawing in (after sketching out the darks and lights in thumbnails @_@) and just going through with photoshop paint. After that, to help with color (which sometimes I'll get too many layers and forget that this is acrylic and NOT oil paints) I just plop in the color to determine where things are placed, and gain more clarification.

Then comes the re-draw yay! I figure out what I enjoyed most of about the sketch, then draw the final. The acrylic layer is then painted on for texture purposes (and for patience purposes as working with acrylics can be annoying sometimes, but I suppose thats what happens when working with a plastic paint, not nearly as flexible as oils or digital) as I like painted textures with a strong color and found the combo to be fairly interesting. Prints way better too! And quicker! Joy.

In the middle of making this, I realized in my sketch I didn't see the gutter problem with the dandelion and the first "stitch" sooooooo... had to fix it. 

I did.

And here it is.

Perhaps I'll add the words on here later tonight, but this is the page spread! Another illustration complete for the dummy. I'll be making this one next!

AH I FAILED!

SO I failed the April 50,000 word challenge.

That's because I finished my Stitching Butterflies book dummy! YAY!

I'm still working on Nightlander like usual. It'll just be a long term project like I thought it was going to be. If you're interested just go here to see my progress, slow as it is. I supposed you can't write a YA novel/comic in a month (or at least I can't.)

After making my book dummy, I began a final illustration to go along with the dummy. This process was similar to my others: lots of  sketches, final sketch, acrylic painting, digital painting over acrylic, and I'll do a final acrylic after the digital. Here's the process:

Took me a week of frustration, but I got it eventually. Next final I'll do...