The Time Has Come

Hello friends!

I'm writing to let you know that I won't be blogging here anymore, but never fear! I am just moving. I'll leave this blog open so that you can still view all the old entries, but if you'd like to keep up to date on my new work, you can visit me here:

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Thanks for sticking with me.
I'll see you around!

The Book That Almost Was

For me, 2012 was an important year, full of excitement and heartache. From winter 2011 to winter 2012, I poured my heart into a wonderful children’s book project that was ultimately canceled. After all that hard work, the book would never be published. I was devastated and completely disheartened. Shortly after that, my nephew was born and I went to live with my brother for over half a year to lend a hand. I threw myself into distraction, hid away everything related to the book, and just tried to move on.

Looking back, there are things I wish I’d done differently, but I learned a great deal from the experience and I’ve finally come to a point where I feel comfortable with sharing a piece of it. I did not write the story, and because of that I can’t share the entirety of the work that I did on the project, but I would like to share with you a few highlights.

Here are some pieces that were not quite (but very nearly) completed—






Just about everything else was in the final stages of sketches and color studies—










Here are a some of the very earliest character sketches from the project—







And some photos of my workspace while painting—






This is only a small fraction of the work, which consisted of numerous thumbnails, notes, changes, sketches, color studies, and mock-ups. I worked with an amazing editor who believed and trusted in my abilities, and I sincerely hope that I will get another chance to work with someone like her again. Despite the fact that the book was never completed, I still feel a great sense of pride and satisfaction now when I look back at everything that I accomplished in that year.

All this is to say that I’m not giving up on children’s books.

I’ve had a taste of it, and I know it’s something that I want to do. Whether it's someone else's story or my own, I am ready to try again. Right now I’m working on a few things of my own, and though writing is difficult, I’m trying. I’m giving it all I have.

Clownfish

Inspired by some of my favorite movies, including Finding Nemo, Ponyo, and The Life Aquatic, and by my childhood and family, which has always been full of love for the ocean.

Detail:











Inspired by some of my favorite movies, including Finding Nemo, Ponyo, and The Life Aquatic, and by my childhood and family, which has always been full of love for the ocean.

Detail:

Dragon Hatchling

Another dragon, a sweet little baby this time. This is round two of my digital experiments with texture and brushes, and I think I am getting the hang of things! There's so much more that I could possibly do with this, but I am happy with it as is and I think it is time to move on to something new.

Thumbelina

Click to see it larger!
Here's something I've been playing with for a while-- a scene from Thumbelina, shortly after her escape from the toads. I wanted to try a different approach from my usual and test out some new Kyle T Webster Photoshop brushes, which are all quite lovely. My favorite brush so far has been Gouache A-Go-Go, no surprise there! This was a lot of fun but it also took much longer than I would have liked. Working digitally has always been challenging for me, there are just so many options and it's easy to get stuck endlessly messing about with minor details. Maybe working like this just takes some practice?