That was Illustrator’s Day LA 2012

I had a great time in LA for the SCBWI’s Illustrator’s Day. I got to meet amazingly talented writers and artists and heard inspiring and funny presentations. I did some portfolio reviews and I saw some of the best work I have ever seen from individuals who are just looking into what it means to write and illustrate picture books.

I gave a half hour presentation on the state of ebooks and Apps along with Joe Toscano, the developer who helped me with my Cave Bear and Duck application for the iPad. We answered a lot of questions and could have answered a lot more but time ran out.

Thanks to the SCBWI and all the folks down there who made it possible.

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Illustrator’s Day 2012

This Oregonian is scraping the moss off and headed to the SCBWI’s Illustrator’s Day in sunny Los Angeles. See you there.

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Illustrator’s Day. Los Angeles. 2012. The Rumble in the Brumble.

What is Illustrator’s Day in Los Angeles?

 

Well, illustrators eat for free that day at any restaurant. They are attended to by an Illustrator’s Assistant all day as well. The assistant will carry your illustration gear. Brushes, varnish, laptops, wacom tablets. I’m not sure where they carry it all, but they do. And people are allowed to stop an illustrator and get books or baseballs signed at any time on Illustrator’s Day. Illustrators also have access to air conditioned rooms which are well stocked with cold drinks and free wifi access and paints.

Oddly enough illustrators also have to do most heavy lifting that day in Los Angeles. And they can’t get their haircut on Illustrator’s Day. Weird I know, but these are rules handed down from the Illustrator’s Days of old. The earliest one on record was celebrated in 623AD. All we know about that first celebration for certain is that each illustrator got a free rodent to eat.

Illustrator’s Day in Los Angeles, sponsored by the SCBWI, of which I am a member. I’ll be there. Will you? Most likely not as about 75% of the traffic on this blog comes from outside of the United States. And most of the rest of the traffic is my mom and dad trying to figure out what exactly a blog is and what I do for a living. I have the same questions…

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Illustrator’s Day in November in Los Angeles

I will be speaking in Los Angeles for the SCBWI sponsored Illustrator’s Day in November. But I won’t be speaking about illustrating. I’ll be sharing my favorite under-10-minute cookie recipes.

OK. That’s not true. While I WILL be speaking at the SCBWI’s Illustrator’s Day and I do have favorite under-10-minute cookie recipes, I will not be combining said activities. Instead I will be talking about iPad Apps and what they offer illustrators and writers. Not just from a ‘sell your book as an app’ POV but from a marketing POV and some technical information about the process. I’ll be sharing the stage with one of the developers who helped me create the Cave Bear and Duck App for the iPad, which has enjoyed a steady pace of downloads over the past year. That’s probably because it’s FREE for the iPad so go get it. I mean it’s one thing for me to say it’s the BEST free iPad read-along comic book app ever. But quite another for Walter Jenorjustky to say it. And he did. “It’s the best free read-along comic book iPad app ever.” – Walter Jenorjustky *.

But THERE will be two great illustrators speaking. Peter Reynolds and Dan Krall. I’ve never met Peter but I have visited his bookstore in Massachusetts. He got like a hundred bucks off me when I stopped there…But Dan Krall used to knock books out of my hands in the hall in Jr. High. Maybe that was a different Dan Krall? Well, I think it’s him. I hope he demands my lunch money ’cause jokes on him – I’ll have no lunch money on me. Dad said just ignore him and he’ll stop trying to take my lunch money and in time maybe he will also stop drawing so darn well…

Anyway, see you in November in LA for Illustrator’s Day!

* – Walter Jenorjustky is a quiet person who mainly does reviews of my work when I ask him. For this he receives several Oreo Cookies. He lives beside the Willamette River near West Linn in a small house that’s inviting and not-so-inviting at the same time. He does not have an iPad but often pretends he can use a large flat stone as one.

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SCBWI article

I wrote an article for the SCBWI newsletter from the Los Angeles chapter. Here is the home for the local SCBWI chapter, which features a link to the Spring 2010 Kite Tales newsletter. (Here is a direct link to the PDF.) Now that I reread it, it seems a bit too serious and humorless. I didn’t want it to be that way.

In the article I talk about how I use  the computer to draw and paint. I don’t consider my digital work an extension of any one traditional method. I’m not doing ‘digital’ watercolors. Or ‘digital oil painting’. It’s a unique, mixed media approach that creates a new technique. It does some things well and other things not so well. And as in any medium, the skill and creativity of the artisan can make a difference.

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SCBWI – Inside Story 2009

I’m trying to catch up with posts. But in catching up I just get further behind. Maybe it’s my artistic temperament. Remember, go back to my desk, settle down, focus, and catch-up!

I was a guest at the SCBWI of Western Washington’s wonderful event Inside Story on October 28th. I was up there to discuss, what else, The Book That Eats People. It was held at a great independent book store called Third Place Books in their Lake Forest Park location. We had an enthusiastic audience and a bunch of wonderful writers and illustrators who gave the Inside Story on their projects. I got to meet old and new fans of the book (amazing considering it’s only been out since August I think, but one person already had two copies for me to sign and bought another). And of course I got to look at a mountain of beautiful books and hear from an array of writers working in different genres.

Mike Cressy even showed up just to let me know I couldn’t get into Washington without the Oregon Alarm sounding.

Below are some rather bad iPhone pics from the event. Thanks to Meg Lippert and crew for putting together such a cool event.

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Oregon – writing and drawing

Thursday night I spoke at the Willamette Writers meeting in Salem. It was a good time and I had an opportunity to meet lots of new Oregon writers and artists and discuss graphic novels.

I attended the Oregon SCBWI conference on Friday and Saturday and spoke for a bit about Graphic Novels again. It was a great opportunity to catch up with old friends and meet some new ones. And what do illustrators do when they get together? They sketch. I did a lot of frogs for some reason. I think I sat too close to Carolyn Conahan. She draws some great frogs (and fishes and horses, which I still don’t draw well!) and it just took over. David Billings was there, another excellent Oregon based illustrator/animator whom I hadn’t met before. If all the Oregon animators, artists and writers ever showed up at one event at one time, I think we’d fill the Rose Garden. There’s a lot of productive, talented people up here but distance and business (and giant trees and rain and Sasquatch and the threat of volcanic eruptions) keeps us from bumping onto one another too often. Less fisticuffs that way I guess.

Good speakers and reviews and critiques of work and a chance to step back and think about the bigger issues of story, plot and structure in your work. Can’t ask for  more than that from a writing and illustrating conference.

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Oregon SCBWI Conference

I just got back from spending a few days at a SCBWI conference in Silver Falls Oregon. Amazing location, wonderful people, a great way to recharge and gain some new insights into writing and drawing .

Here are a few snapshots. A little bit of Middle Earth right here in the ol’ USA.

one of the cabins at the Silver Falls Conference Center.

Sun starting to set. Flying monkeys on the prowl. Actually, one person did have a close encounter with a bear.

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