Doodle Day August

I didn't manage to complete the prompts for every day of this past August, but I did have fun with the ones I ended up creating art for. I used my Doris the Squirrel and Larry the Frog characters throughout as a common thread.

Most of these were quick sketches, though I did refine (ink) a couple of those to make them into more finished illustrations later.

under the bed

in a cave

in a bakery

in a junk drawer

at an aquarium

in a doghouse

at the doctor's office

at the airport

at the playground

behind a curtain

at the office

out a window

in a treehouse

under pillows

behind a tv

on a mountain

at the farmers market

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

The Magnificent Julie Rowan-Zoch

Through the 12x12 Picture Book Challenge, I have met many talented illustrators, some of whom became good friends (and two of those are also my wonderful critique group mates!). Julie Rowan-Zoch is one of good friends who constantly inspires me.

We exchanged postcards one day recently - that's fun! I need to exchange with my artist/illustrator friends more often - and I was so taken by them, I had to share with the world (or at least the small percentage of the world that reads my blog).

Here are Julie's business card and promotional postcard:

This is the front of the promotional postcard. It's brilliant the way she tied the front and the back together around the central characters.

One of the things I admire most about Julie's work is how she can make a piece look so simple and yet convey such emotions and narrative at the same time.

Is this darling, or what? Reminds me of the fun time I spent in the Netherlands...but much cuter.

 In addition to being super talented, Julie is also generous. She created illustrations to celebrate all her Facebook friends' birthdays. Here's one she made for me the first year I "met" her:

 And this is the one for last year:

a little frog must have told her I've owned chickens for about 12 years

Julie's talent has now been recognized far and wide and she's been signed by the prestigious Wernick & Pratt literary agency. Check out Julie's success story at Julie Hedlund's site.

Hope you'll go look at some of Julie's art at her website and Facebook page. You'll be glad you did!

p.s. following advice from my very wise friend, Sylvia Liu, I am changing comments back to being always open

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

Doodle Day December

We're half-way through the month and almost done with the year...I believe it's time to panic about all the things I haven't finished yet for the year.

I'm doing Doodle Day (started by the lovely Alison Hertz) again this month - at least the first half of the month; I don't know if I'll have time to continue in the second half of the month because I have other art I need to work on.

The theme for the month is holiday words which we can interpret as we like. Enjoy!

12/1: light

12/2: peace

12/3: tree

12/4: bell

12/5: star

I liked this so much, I made it my profile pic. Sometimes, a drawing just falls into place without too much effort. This was one of those times.

12/6: flame

12/7: life

12/8: oil

12/9: presents

12/10: snowflake

12/11: skates or skating

12/12: frosty

I ran out of time and could only manage this rough sketch

12/13: boots

12/14: family

Yellow-billed Cuckoo on left, Smooth-billed Ani on right: same family, different genus and species

Hope you're having a not-too-stressful December so far!

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

Squirrels on my mind...and a prize bomb!

Remember my squirrel drawings? Well, I went and had some postcards made with the illustrations to send to art directors:
 
Those are from Moo.com and look pretty nice. People I know have also requested their own sets of postcards or note cards, so I've been looking at different printing places to make some nice ones that don't cost an arm and a leg. VistaPrint did a good job at reasonable prices. For 4.25"x5.5" cards, I am asking $1.75 for one card or $8 for a pack of 5 cards (both with envelopes). 

I've been doing squirrel drawings every day, so I'll have plenty more designs to choose from. :)

Now for the exciting part of the blog: prize bomb!

I know how hard it is to get around to reading a bunch of different blogs, and even harder to actually make the effort to leave a comment, so I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge a couple of people who leave more comments than anyone else on my blog (besides my sister, but I already give her plenty...advice; she loves that because all younger sisters love unsolicited advice from their older sisters). And those two lovely peeps are....*applause*... Maureen and Steve!

So, Maureen and Steve, for being loyal commenters you have a choice of a set of my squirrel note cards, a paper copy of In A Land Far Away, or some handmade soaps. Let me know!

Do you have a favorite site to recommend for printing up cards or do you do it on your own printer?

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

That Squirrel! (with apologies to Marlo Thomas)

It all started with an innocent enough drawing of a squirrel to celebrate September birthdays...

but because it's the fall, the season of squirrel antics, my friends had a lot of stories about mischievous squirrels, and I was inspired to keep drawing them.

Bad squirrel, bad squirrels; whatcha gonna do?

 They're fussy...

 And have I mentioned they don't like to share?

 But they are tenacious buggers.

I think I might do a few more "bad squirrels" pieces. Or maybe they're not bad; they're just drawn that way? (Now I have to apologize to Jessica Rabbit.)

Do you have any interesting squirrel stories?

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

The creative process blog hop

Well, it looks like I've been tagged again. I've not been tagged this often since on the grade school playground! Last time, it by the lovely Catherine Johnson (here's the post). This time, it's my dear friend and critique group buddy, Sylvia Liu.

1. What am I working on?

Right now, I'm 
a) putting finishing touches on two stories for upcoming anthologies for my sci-fi critique group, The Minnows Literary Group. We publish science fiction anthologies of different themes and donate 100% of profits to Doctors Without Borders. So far, with our first two anthologies, Out of Time and In a Land Far Away, we have donated close to $5,000.

 
In "That Way Madness Lies," to appear in Centauri Station, a space-travel themed collection, I quote Shakespeare and put my poor main character, Nathan, in peril. 

For our second time-travel themed anthology, I'm writing a story called "Occupational Hazard" wherein Bertrand and Alexa face a time travel disease that may end up being a cure for loneliness.

b) finalizing three picture book manuscripts for my agent. 

c) revising a sci-fi short story that I want to submit to Writers of the Future. 

d) working on illustrations to prepare a portfolio and samples for art directors.

e) editing a middle-grade humorous sci-fi novel

f) doing research for, and writing, a young adult steampunk novel

2. How does my work differ from others in my genre? 

Science and science fiction guide pretty much all my writing (and some of my art).

I had a much better answer last time:
Aside from having a voice that is uniquely my own, as every writer does, I tend to weave science facts into my work. In the adult pieces that I write, I sometimes make people work a little bit to "get" the story. For example, in In a Land Far Away, some of the things I mention in "Three Long Pigs" will make the story much richer if you looked them up.

3. Why do I write/create what I do?

Because it gives me joy and I hope it gives others joy too to read my stories or to see my artwork.

4. How does my writing/creative process work?

In fits and spurts, between harvesting and processing veggies in the summer, and homeschooling my kids year-round...tucked between my various other creative endeavors, and spurred on by the fires of Hades deadlines.

For writing, when I get an idea, I just open up a new document and do a brain dump. I need to work on being a plotter, though, if I hope to write novels that make sense.

For art,  I think about what it is that I'm trying to draw or convey, and then like with writing, I dive right in, sketching either with graphite, charcoal or digitally (I just started using the ArtStudio app that Sylvia had told me about; it's marvelous for beginning digital artists). After I'm happy with an initial sketch, depending on what kind of art I'm trying to produce, I will either work tight or loose with colors. My favorite are chalk pastels, water-media (either watercolor or tempera), and colored pencils.

Some of my current digital art can be found at http://trobesonart.wordpress.com/portfolio/illustrations-digital/

I normally don't tag people, but there are some folks whose creative processes I'd love to know more about. So, Steve Long, if you are up to the challenge, I'd like to see a blog post from you. No pressure! ;)

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams

July's Doodle Day

I have good intentions to doodle daily, especially since Alison Hertz's Doodle Day group on Facebook is such a fun place to hang out. But, most months, I don't get around to sketching regularly. *hanging head in shame*
July's prompts were all about animals, which is a favorite topic of mine, so I made an effort to play along. Here are my quick (most of them taking 5 to 10 minutes) drawings.

I started out with graphite...

dog - large breed

 But then, I noticed my box of charcoals...and remembered how in love I was with them once upon a time. And you know what, I'm still in love with them.

dog - small breed

cat - long-haired

cat - short-haired

fish - moray eel; I hope I put that song in your head!

squirrel - flying (a.k.a. Super Squirrel)

when I got too busy, I combined the next two topics: deer and rabbit

Right after that last piece, I bought the Art Studio app for the iPad on Sylvia Liu's recommendation. I've never done digital art before, so took the opportunity to play with it, doing quick gestural sketches:

raccoon

opossum

another mash-up from not having enough time - snake and chipmunk

I cheated on July 13, and used this panda I did back in 1988

I didn't do a new doodle for July 14th either, but substituted this kakapo pastel piece for the "parrot" theme

Compared to the more traditional pieces like the two previous ones, my digital drawings are "quick and dirty" but I think they convey a lot anyway.

l'éléphant dansant

Which inspired a little limerick:

There once was a young dandy elephant

Who fancied himself trés suave and elegant.

’Til one day, by chance

He was invited to a dance,
And found he was quite out of his element.

giraffes are weird, weird looking beasts and their spots are a pain to draw

I tried combing two prompts, giraffe and octopus, but I wasn't pleased with the octopus, so I tried my hand at a seahorse (next)

the theme of the day was aquarium animal

in honor of the first moon landing of July 20, 1969

have never drawn a griffin before; may never draw another again

chimera - some depict it with a lion and goat head and a serpent on the tail, but I prefer the equal footing creation with all three heads on the shoulders

For the owl prompt, I did a sketch of a Barn Owl cocking its head...

but I really didn't like it, so I drew a second one, which I liked slightly better even though it's creepier:

Barn Owl, take 2

jaguar, reaching for something...

comedian in training

also a funny guy

I need to fix the shadow on this; makes him look like he's floating

a little coquettish, no?

third time cheating this month: for the theme of mouse today, I used this sketch I did back in the mid 1990s

baby chameleon

Hope you've enjoyed this art post today as much as I enjoyed participating in Alison Hertz's July Doodle Day!

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." ~ Douglas Adams