February 14th, 2012

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Just sharing a little valentine cheer!  :)

 

January 17th, 2012

Children’s book illustration samples

I often have aspiring children’s book authors ask me to do sample illustrations that they can submit with their manuscripts. I’ve learned, though, that in many cases first-time authors don’t really understand the process of getting a book published, and so I don’t typically jump at these opportunities.

 

I’ve learned through my years in a children’s publishing house that publishers prefer to pair the manuscripts they acquire with their own vision for art style so almost never will take in art submitted with a proposal. Therefore, unless it’s a well-known author or a big budget is offered—these kinds of projects can be a lot of work with no real benefit for an illustrator.

 

But, I recently had a woman approach me with a book idea so fun & unique & fantastic…it really spoke to me, and she had a good understanding of the process and realistic expectations for her budget—so I took it on and created a few tight sketches and one finished piece to accompany her proposals. I can’t divulge too many details, but I love her character and her story—I had a blast creating these and she didn’t mind if I share.

 

These are 2 of the sketches; I inked the one she liked best, and the other I would love to revisit for a personal piece at some point.

 

 

 

Here’s the piece I did as a final; the story lends itself to a limited palette-so this was kind of a fun and different way for me to work…has a bit of a looser, more washy-feel to it.

 

 

I don’t expect much more to happen with these-though she did say her literary agent recognized and really liked my work. So we’ll see! :)

January 16th, 2012

Mermaids with a twist

A few months ago, I had a super fun YA book cover project with Sourcebooks for a villainous mermaid-adventure tale set in Coney Island. Given my love of Coney Island & it’s annual Mermaid Parade—plus anything generally creepy and/or scary—I can’t think of a project that could be more perfect for me! There were a ton of fun ideas to explore for this one, because the story is jam-packed full of amazing imagery. I worked with the art director to ultimately come up with this cover, which focused on the story’s evil predatory mermaid and includes hand-lettered title type.

 

 

This cover was well-received, but before it went to print, the publisher decided to change it to reflect more of the epic adventure aspect of the story & appeal more to boys (especially since the main character is a boy). The final cover that they developed is similar to one of the initial concepts I had submitted, and I think what they ended up with looks fantastic! The book is a really great, super exciting read! I def. recommend checking it out!

January 8th, 2012

Logo design

I recently wrapped up a fun little project creating a logo for Life Coach, Kendra Levin. She was really great to work with, and it was a fun change from my book cover design work. We worked together to create a simple icon that embodied the intuitive spirit of her life coaching business through color and type. I combined hand-lettering with a font to give it a personal, yet down-to-earth vibe. She’ll be using this logo on her website, and in some of her printed promotional materials.

 

Kendra is truly amazing. Please stop by and check out her website!  http://www.kendralevin.com/Blog.html

 

December 27th, 2011

Artwork makes great gifts…

Here’s another personal piece I made over the holidays. This one is for my mom, who loved the piece I did for ART, LOVE, JAPAN a few months ago. Since that was sold at the benefit exhibit it was created for, I created this piece for her that has a similar style. This image is inspired by the story of St. Theresa, who “showers her roses” on those who pray to her.

 

December 26th, 2011

Illustrated map

The holidays always end up being a great excuse to make some fun, personal pieces as gifts. I created this one for my boyfriend—It’s an illustrated map of the roadtrip we took this summer down the Pacific Coast Highway, from Portland to San Diego. I’ve always wanted make a map with loads of cool lettering and icons. Plus, it gave me a chance to revisit some awesome memories from one of the best vacations ever!

 

December 15th, 2011

Wedding Prep 101

I just finished up an editorial illustration for Baltimore Magazine’s 2012 Bride edition. It was an interesting article about what brides and grooms do to prep for their big day, outside of the actual event planning—everything from working out, to yoga, to plastic surgery! I had a blast coming up with lots of ideas; The art director liked this concept, since much of the article is about couples “prepping” together.

 

   

Thanks Staci, for this super fun assignment!

November 13th, 2011

“Today’s Best”

‘Tis (almost) the holiday season and I’ve just posted some holiday cards, postage and gift ideas up for sale at my new zazzle shop. Have already had some sales and nice mentions on the new products—including this keepsake ornament being chosen as one of Zazzle’s “Today’s Best Award”.

 

 

November 4th, 2011

New lettering projects

I’m excited to share a few recent hand-lettering projects. These were all done for book covers over the last few months (the book cover process can be lengthy, and often have to wait for some time before sharing these projects-so it’s always an exciting reveal!)

 

SECRETS AT SEA is a wonderful middle-grade novel by award winning author Richard Peck. And I was lucky enough, as the jacket designer, to get to work with the fabulously talented Kelly Murphy on her amazing jacket and interior illustrations. (She’s so wonderful! Please check her out at http://www.kelmurphy.com/)

 

The nature of the story and the art lent itself to a hand-lettered type style, so my Art Director commissioned me to create the title. I’m happy to share, too, that this super sweet book has been getting 4-star reviews!

 

 

Over the summer I also worked on a lead title for Sourcebooks. The project has since been postponed and I’m not sure I’ll have the opportunity to revisit the design/image, so for now just giving a peek at the title type I created. This is a great book, and I really loved working on this one. I’ll be excited to see how the final ends up.

 

 

And this last one was initially part of the Sophie’s Mixed-Up Magic illustrations in initial rounds before they were killed.

 

November 3rd, 2011

Illustration vs. Photo

This summer, I shared an illustration project that had gotten killed—it was a 3-book middle-grade series for Penguin. I wanted to make another post about it, now that the new covers have been finalized, because I had the unique position in this case of being the illustrator, as well as the designer & art director—and it proved to be a very interesting experience.

 

Being a full-time staff designer, I had to pitch myself anonymously to my publisher to get this illustration assignment. I was thrilled to get the job and had a great time creating final art for 2 of the books. I also, however, had to sit through the big sales meeting where they ultimately decided that photography was a better direction for this particular series.

 

I know to some of my illustration friends, it sounded like torture to put myself directly into that meeting! But, having 8 years of experience in a big publishing house I know that feedback is just part of the creative process and not always a reflection on if the art is good or not; Rather it’s a decision on what is best for the project based on genre, trends, competition, author sales, positioning…and about a zillion other things. I’d being lying if I said I wasn’t a little disappointed that I didn’t get to see my art published for the final book, but I still completely enjoyed creating it. And, as a designer my challenge became solving the project in a new way (there’s always more than one good way!) So, I got to put on my Art Director cap and do a photoshoot for the final covers. The shoot was so much fun (come on, how often do you get to photograph a little girl on a flying carpet?!) and ultimately I am still pleased with the outcome of the covers. All around, everyone in house—as well as the author—was happier with these sleeker, more mass-commercial photographic packages.

 

The books go one sale next June, but since they are already listed on Amazon, I wanted to share the final covers as well as a little of the back story. Here’s 2 of them-side by side with the illustrations I had originally done. You can see I still was able to incorporate some of my swirly, decorative illustrated elements into the background.

 

 

All in all, it was a fun and interesting project for me, from both my viewpoints as an illustrator and a designer/art director. I definitely feel like having the behind-the-scenes look at a project like this is so beneficial for me in understanding the publishing industry overall. …And the books themselves are really cute! Check ‘em out! :)