preparing for the SCBWI Conference in LA

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Well, I'm finally managing to post a new blog. I've just been really busy with a lot of new work--yay!--and haven't had much time for anything else except sleep and work. I'm teaching a summer art class for kids every morning and afternoon during the week at OCHSA that lasts for 6 weeks. Next week is the last week...goes by so fast! It's been really fun actually and the kids have been great. They have a bunch of classes the kids can choose from and I'm teaching beginning drawing & painting. After classes though I've been beating it home to work on my illustration portfolio. I'm going to the annual SCBWI Conference in LA and I want to dazzle! I went to the conference last year (I also went a couple of years before that for the first time) and came away resolved to refocus my work and push myself to the next level. My porfolio this year is all new work and I'm pretty excited about it. The conference is right around the corner now--it's August 7-10--so I'm hurrying to prepare the best I can. The task that remains at this point is updating my website with my new work. I'll be getting that done in the next couple of weeks. Wish me luck!

P.S. Here are a couple of the new pieces that I've done lately--they were both painted digitally.

Catching Bernie Wrightson at Gallery Nucleus

Pin It Now! Hi Everyone,

  I'm very sorry I have put any new posts up in a while.  I have been doing some new artwork.  However, for this post I just wanted to tell about a really cool artist I was able to see present his work today.  The artist's name is Bernie Wrightson and I've been a fan of his work for a long time.  He is most known for his gorgeous pen & ink renderings for an illustrated version of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, as well as for the comic book series Swamp Thing.  Attached here is one of the Frankenstein illustrations.

  The talk Mr. Wrightson gave was up at Gallery Nucleus in Alhambra.  This is actually the second time I've been able to see him present his work since he presented a few years back at Cal State Fullerton.  I've been a fan of his work though since my freshman year studying art in Indiana back in '94 when my drawing & illustration professor used to project slides of his work to illustrate principles of composition and values.  Because of that, it's really pretty cool for me to get to see this man in person whose work I admired so much in my classes.  He's very humble and personable and it was quite informative hearing him talk about his process and how these iconic pictures came about.  I definitely left inspired!

  Getting the chance to feed my artist's brain with such great visuals once again is so necessary as I keep plugging along trying to get better on my own stuff.  Great art cannot happen in a vacuum.

  Keep finding inspiration to feed your life.

Mist Rider painting

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  Here is the acrylic painting of the rough comp I did a little while ago.  I'm not sure what to call it, so for now I'm calling it "Mist Rider."  I plan to go back and work a little more on it later on, but for now I'm setting it aside.  I think I want to go back and make the sky a bit more dramatic, as well as to resolve the horse more.  I'm pretty happy with it though.  I think the mist really added to it, after not having it in the rough comp.

Cara

Rough comp of dragon picture

Pin It Now!   Here's a rough comp version of a dragon painting I'm working on as another cover illustration.  For this one I had a sketch I was pretty happy with, then I made a little clay model of the dragon so I could light it.  I then painted it in Photoshop.  I'm working on the acrylic painting of it now, which is almost finished.

Rough Comp of Horse and Rider cover picture

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Here's a rough comp done in Photoshop of a new piece I'm working on.  I'm actually working on the acrylic painting right now.  Once again, it's a cover picture but not for any particular story.  She's some sort of Celtic-ish warrior woman I think.  I haven't done many horse pictures before, and I haven't done too many action pictures either so I thought I would try that.  I like horses in fantasy and mythology so I hope to put more in pictures in future.

  Speaking of horses, I was back in Upstate NY visiting my family over Christmas and I was able to do a little riding.  My cousin Sarah operates a horse stable and riding arena (handy!) so while I was there I got a chance to take one of her horses out for a spin.  I rode for quite a few years when I was younger.  I used to compete in English style and do some jumping.  But that was many years ago now.  I was so rusty and those muscles you need were really not there anymore.  I definitely enjoyed it--I was riding a beautiful and big horse named Paris--but I was very saddlesore for the next few days!

tree drawing

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  OK, so my two favorite subjects to draw are people and TREES!  I love their sculptural organic shapes...the trees I mean.  Well, people too, I guess:)

  Here's a tree drawing I did the other night when I was killing some time--I teach a night art class at Golden West College and I was waiting for the last student to finish his final project so I could go home.  It turned out to be cool getting to really spend some time on this drawing.

still working

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I haven't posted anything in a while though I have been alive and drawing!  Here is a sketch of a dragon done recently that I'd like to turn into a cover painting.  I like it and think maybe I'll do more dragons:)  I'm also working on a cover showing a horse and rider, but I'm struggling a bit on that one still.  I hope to have something to post for that soon.