For my
"Marks and Splashes" course, this week I was working on research - a scavenger hunt of sorts to find reference images and videos for our book (
Amy's words, my illos). What a fun exercise this was! The next image that I am going to work on is for the page that will read "pesky, scary mice". I have had the image for this page in my head for a long time, but have never collected reference photos for it. I was looking online - Google-ing and scrolling through Pinterest (how lucky we are as illustrators now with the internet and thousands of images at our disposal in seconds), and then I thought why not set up a still life of this image in my head rather than looking through tons of photos? So I went to the one room in the house that has the door opening the right way and set up various items, used a flashlight to get the shadows I needed, got my boys helping me, one as a model, one holding the door and one as a cheerleader (although he did let me borrow one of his "Pet Shop" character which was the stand in for the mouse in our story). It was such a fun exercise to do and I think I'll enjoy drawing the image all the more since it's more personal with our familiar household items in it.
Session 9 was a review on perspective. Not very long I ago I did a few chapters on perspective with Matt an instructor at
SVA in NYC and creator of the online drawing class
DTO (highly worth investing in by the way!), but good to address perspective again and take the opportunity to consider composition and value at the same time...there is so much to think about when creating an image that work!...My next thing about perspective to master = to throw a character into the perspective mix (scene/person/animal/action all working together)
I am feeling a bit like a illustration junkie - trying to take advantage of and collecting all the learning I can. This week I was trying to win a copy of
Will Terry's 6 video session on designing an image. I was so diligent checking his blog multiple times a day, but the one night I got sucked into working on our family blog I missed the window of opportunity! Oh well, I have heard such great things about his class too, that will be my next investment...thank goodness I have a supportive and patient husband. :)
