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Children's Book Pro

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I participated in the Children's Book Pro course from SVSLearn.com these last several weeks. The course pacing is really fast. It was definitely tough to stay up with the assignments in the timeframe given. But, the material was great and I'll have continued access to it, so I'm going to go back and revisit it as I build out my portfolio and write and illustrate my own stories.  The course has guidance for the practical side of developing illustrations for a children's book. The instructors provide three manuscripts based on familiar fairy tales as source material to allow students to practice the various stages of illustration. My choice was Jack and the Beanstalk . To make it interesting for me, I tried illustrating the story as though it was a metaphor for a young upstart from rural America coming and stealing the political thunder of a dustbowl-era politician. The politician is the giant. The various items Jack steals (the coins, the goose, the harp) represent vari

Textures

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 l have been working on a class on svslearn.com with Will Terry. His explanation and demo were great Can you see the additions I made on each image?

Draw 50 Things

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There's a class on svslearn.com by Will Terry where he demonstrates drawing 50 items in a single image. He recommended it as a way to create a compelling portfolio piece that helps illustrate how you can tackle complex drawings. This is my first attempt at a drawing with such a large scope. I feel like the demonstration by Mr. Terry really opened my capacity a great deal. Finished piece. Expanded thumbnail. Early stage line drawing

Drawing for April's SVS prompt

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Winter’s gift to men

This column was published in The Times-News probably in 2002 Roads less traveled Christijan Draper Winter’s gift to men  I earned my first ice-covered beard over Christmas. I spent much of my youth pouring over climbing and outdoor magazines, seeing pictures of rugged men with full, ice-caked beards. My dad also kept old slides of his climbing excursions with his buddies. I loved looking at their misty breath frozen in the air. I loved the ice caves. The images stirred me: wool balaclavas, crampons, sunglasses, ice axes. But most intriguing and wonderful was the full crust of ice on hairy faces. That was the image of a perfect man. I love winter. I enjoy camping in the snow. I love the crispness you feel when you step out from a warm house into a sub-freezing day. One winter while camping in the White Mountains of northern Arizona, my dad and I hopped on some c ross-country skis and skated into the woods at midnight. The moon was full and glowed against the snow. Th

Cool thought on education from Qualtrics founder

When one of the co-founders at Qualtrics, Stuart Orgill, was choosing his major at BYU he selected accounting. I asked him why and he said, “Because I’m not good at it.”  While others selected what they were good at and what they thought was a good fit, he selected an area where he was weakest and dominated it. That’s the way that we feel. See full article here .

On creativity

Milton Glaser as quoted in "Imagine: How Creativity Works" by Jonah Lehrer I think people need to be reminded that creativity is a verb, a very time-consuming verb. It's about taking an idea in your head, and transforming that idea into something real. And that's always going to be a long and difficult process.  If you're doing it right, it's going to feel like work. (p. 69) The book isn't great, but I like the quote.