Art & Soul

Color Palettes

 
I've been working on toning down my color palette for a while. I like my candy-bright colors, but some of the manuscripts I've been working on seem to be calling for something a little less bright.

I was inspired recently by fellow Texas illustrator, Mary Sullivan's work, to try an even more muted palette. She has an awesome sense of color (and detail by the way). I played with this image of a panic-stricken mom.

I'm not sure I really have the hang of a muted palette yet, but I had fun experimenting.

The July 4th Project

 

Chris Duffy started a fun project for the 4th of July where various cartoonists sent in images of all-American type superheroes.

I sent in Captain Drive-Thru, staunch defender of every American's right to clog arteries and pack on pounds.

I love group participation projects like this!

Color Withdrawals

 

I've been hard at work revising sketches for my next book, Caveman: A B.C. Story (Sterling Publishing, 2011), and enjoying every minute of it. I was getting the itch to play with color though, so I took a break and played with one of my other characters. It felt good to put some color somewhere.

Spring Postcard

 

Jana and I are combining marketing efforts and doing a Spring postcard together. She has illustrated April Showers and I've taken on May Flowers. We're using each other's strengths and dividing the work accordingly. (Note: I will NOT be going to the post office.)

Once we get the card designed, we'll post a copy on Dos Juanas.

What's Your Label?

 

Has anyone ever asked you what you do for a living, and you stuttered or stumbled over your answer? What do you call yourself?

For years, I felt comfortable with the cartoonist label. Try to call myself an artist or illustrator though, and I'd choke. I felt like a fraud just tasting the words.

Even though I'd done many illustrations for advertising, editorial, and corporate projects, I didn't feel comfortable with the moniker. It took getting an illustration representative to make me feel ok calling myself an illustrator.

Then I wrote two picture books. I felt the need to acknowledge this new found status, but every time I tried to call myself an "author," I giggled helplessly. I'm working with a literary agent now and finally feel confident enough to call myself an author. Maybe I'll just wait a little longer before I update those business cards though...

What's your label?

Another Milestone

Forging a career in children's books is such a journey. Everyone takes a different path to get where they're going. Some people jog up the smoothly paved road, and others meander off onto little side trails. Whichever way you go, there are milestones along the way that help you mark your progress.

I've recently hit another milestone on my journey. I teamed up with a running partner when I signed on with Jamie Weiss Chilton of the Andrea Brown Literary Agency.

I'm extremely excited about this partnership. We seem to share the same vision of where my books and I might fit in the market. I can't tell you how thrilling that is!

I wanted to share a few resources I found really helpful on the agent hunt.

• http://www.agentquery.com/

• http://www.querytracker.net/

• http://verlakay.com/board/index.php

• http://www.writingforchildrenandteens.com/category/agents/

• http://www.guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog/CategoryView,category,Children's%20Writing.aspx

• http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/peala.htm

• http://asuen.wordpress.com/category/agents/

And since I loved reading how it worked for other people, here are the details:

8-28-08 - queried with link to four PBs

12-2-08 - phone call to discuss projects

12-2-08 - sent seven more PBs

1-12-08 - offer of representation!

 

Snippets #2

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We've got the second page of Snippets up over at dos juanas.

This is our opportunity to try out different styles. I had a great time with these muted colors and bold painted lines.

dos juanas

My pal, Jana and I like to play art games across the internet. Some of the stuff we've done has been a lot of fun, so we've set up a little online playground where we'll be posting a few of these doodles.

Jana has already shared the first page of our ongoing comic jam, Snippets.

Eating Frogs

I've been listening to a great audiobook on productivity and effectiveness: Eat That Frog: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time by Brian Tracy.

The main thrust is based on a Mark Twain quote, “If you eat a frog first thing in the morning, the rest of your day will be wonderful.” The idea is to get your ugliest task out of the way first thing.

I'm listening to it one chapter at a time and putting each step into practice before I move on to the next. I've been eating a lot of frogs in the past couple of weeks and have the crossed off to-do lists to prove it.

Now I'm off to plan my amphibian menu for tomorrow. Ribbit!

Memories of Me

My pal Jana Christy and I have been swapping quick sketches of childhood memories.