Children's Illustration Class

Last week there was no time for blogging as I was commuting to the Maine College of Art for my Children's Illustration class with Judy LaBrasca. I was hard at work from 9-5 all week. Tuesday was the most difficult as it was about 120 degrees on the fourth floor of the Porteous building. My fellow students were very kind and talented people with varying knowledge about the publishing industry. Judy honored my knowledge and let me speak about SCBWI and Maine Illustrators' Collective.

During the week, I was able to take my ROAR manuscript to the next level. I started the week with a manuscript just under 500 words. I think I cut at least 200 of those words as my vision for the illustrations became more concrete. I found that many of my words were redundant and I ended up getting rid of them. I analyzed other picture books by creating story boards for existing books and learned a lot about pacing. I also focussed on character development using clay to sculpt my main character. (A technique borrowed from David Weisner, Tuesday.) I found that after this process, I was intimately aware of the curves and lines that made up the character. I also completed two finishes for spreads. I am working on the book dummy I will submit to publishers.

Now that I am home, I hope to do one spread sketch a week for the dummy. I am eager to start the submissions process as this book has been a work in progress for about four years now. I am efficient when I have a long period of time to work (and no internet or children to interrupt me.)

School will be starting before we know it. I have the Staples commercial playing in my head, "It's the most wonderful time of the year..."

Ideas

Here is a bit from my comments for the children's illustration class I'm taking this week at the Maine College of Art with Judy LaBrasca:

I keep an idea file with bits of paper with unfinished poems or possible titles. Often these ideas come to me in the car (during carpool) and are scrawled on the backs of receipts. More often, I try to keep the ideas more organized in a sketch book that I keep beside me in the car and in my purse. Another sits beside my bed. My sketch books are full of writing as well as sketches. I have been carrying a sketch book pretty religiously since 2002.

Actually, it was a journal with lines in 2002. At that point I saw myself as a writer who liked to draw. In 2003, I got rid of the lines. In 2004, I took Leticia Plate’s Business of Illustration course throught the continuing studies program. In 2005, I had a web site, a portfolio, and sent out two rounds of postcards. I got two small jobs last year. I was an illlustrator. This year, I had a lack luster portfolio review at the New England SCBWI conference. This, in addition to the fact that I have not been able to make any money through my illustration or writing this year has caused a lack of confidence in my skills. I have been questioning if I am really an author/illustrator or if I am indeed, a writer who likes to draw. I am taking the class, in large part for the support and constructive criticism of an instructor and fellow artists.

Actually, I am jealous of other artists sketch books. Too me, other artists have drawings that look so finished and accomplished. They seem to sketch all the time. I love to see the sketch books with a collage of ideas, crowding the pages, new characters peeking out from behind each other. I love the drawings that are born out of the artist’s mind’s eye. Fantastical and free, tripping from page to page. My scrawling is big with a single drawing filling a page. I find it difficult to draw anything well if I am not looking at reference of some type. Instead, my sketch book is filled with quick gesture drawings, unfinished observational drawings, composition ideas and words.

Posing for figure drawing class

I am a confident person. I am a performer at heart. I am comfortable in my own skin. So being naked in front of a room full of artist is not difficult. The challenging part of modeling for a figure drawing class is coming up with interesting poses one can hold. The one minute poses are fine. I rock at one minute poses.

My one minute poses invoke dance and yoga, real life experiences, interesting twists and turns of ribcage and pelvis, arms outstretched or entwined, eyes searching the sky or the past. Five minute poses still have some of these qualities but when we get to the fifteen minute poses, I am "nude in recline." I sit. I kneel. I lean. I lay. Every once in a while I will stand but I have to make sure my hips are in line, my neck is just so, my arms are not throwing me off balance, and that nothing is pressing into any part of my body. One table or stool edge pressing on a thigh isn't much for five minutes. Add in another ten, however, and it feels as if the edge has permanently pinched all nerves, veins and arteries in that locale. Did you know that a whole leg could fall asleep?

The thiry minute poses do me in. Change "nude in recline" to "sleeping nude." At this point it is 8:30 at night. I've been awake since 5 am. First, I went to the gym and took a yoga class. Next, I chaffeured my children around from baseball, to camp, to swim lessons. We had two scraped knees along the route and at least five arguments which sent my small son into a fit of whining that made me want to rip my hair out. (Or maybe his.) After all this driving and refereeing, I plopped my children infront of the TV while I whipped up home-made pizza. I digress. As I pose nude at 8:30 pm, head on pillow, legs on a box slightly askew, one hand on belly the other above my head, I fall asleep. Not a deep sleep mind you. A cat nap sort of sleep. Twenty minutes into the pose I am wide awake again but I cannot feel my biceps in the raised arm. "I'm sorry," I say, "I have to put my arm down." It takes a good five minutes trying to get the blood back into that part of my arm. In the mean time an artist says, "Your arm keeps moving." That's a good thing as far as I'm concerned, because I thought I had lost all movement in that arm. "I'm sorry," I say and keep still.

Another thing about posing is the time you have just being. It is a slightly meditative state where knots in the wooden floor can be figured into dogs, or old ladies with floppy hats. The cupboard pulls in this studio, for instance, look as if they are cartoon eyes staring right back at you. You can count the drips off the skylight as it rains or listen to the Veery birds at dusk. All this in your best suit without any children about.

Agent wanted

My brain has been on overload for a while now. I am filled with bits and pieces. I agreed to edit our synagogue newsletter, I am trying to learn my choreography for the aerobics class that I teach (I need to know it by Monday), I applied for a great job that I didn't even get an interview for (or so it seems), I got an interview and an offer for an okay job that I didn't even apply for (can't decide if I should say yes or no), and I got an inquiry about a job that could be very interesting, I would need to develop it but it is somewhat iffy. All this job talk is because I can't seem to sell my writing right now. One does not make money from rejections. Maybe once I get in the summer groove I'll be able to get more stuff out and off of my desk. Right now, I'd really like an agent but that seems to be just as hard to find as a publisher.

Don't smile at me Mommy

My small child is learning to inline skate. He puts on his skates and starts to chug around the basketball court feet furiously moving back and forth. I'm a little surprised that he gets anywhere this way but there is definetly forward motion. "March a little, kiddo" I call out. "It is more of a step than back and forth." He is ignoring me. Finally he finds the new rhythm. March, march, march, roll. March, march, march, roll. "That's it!" I say. I watch him smiling. He mumbles, "No smilin'." I'm not sure I heard him properly. I grin as he rolls again. "Don't smile at me, Mommy," he says in a frustrated tone. I thought these teenage moments would wait until nine or ten. It seems we have them early.

A great birthday for a five year old

My small son turned five yesterday and, I must say, had a great birthday. He spent the weekend swimming with his cousins in his grandparent's pool. A carnival was in town and it was ride all you want for one price. He rode the small train, the big trucks, motorcycles that did wheelies and jumped, and airplanes that soared in circles. Cake and presents topped off that night. On his real birthday, he received roller skates and went skating. His grandparents arrived again, this time in a red convertible. They took him for a ride that he loved so much, sweet boy, he fell asleep. In the evening we had a barbecue and finished the night with a bonfire. The kids roasted marshmallows and made s'mores. They hunted for lightening bugs with the neighbors and ended the day with a story by the fire. It's good to be five.