I've been multitasking lately, which means I've been really busy and not quite done with anything. That's not a bad place to be- there's a lot of possibility in potential energy, right? I've been writing and drawing on the graphic novel, working on a new Domestic Life of Bugs piece, and then there's Eejm. I finished the illustration, but haven't finished the flag. I am den mom of a Bear Cub den, and I am very interested in getting my boys out hiking. We hiked (and summited!) the highest "peak" in Long Beach: Signal Hill. I got to thinking that no explorer went out into the wilderness without a proper identifying flag, so I did an Illustrator version of the coffee-can totem pole my Bears created. They named him Eejm, which is Ethan, Eli, Justin and Micha. I will now print this onto iron-on transfer paper, iron it onto white fabric, trim it with navy blue, punch in the grommets, and tie it to the stick. We'll be ready to conquer the next peak!

Happy Boxing Day! I don't really know what Boxing Day is. I have various friends from Down Under, and I never really got a satisfactory answer out of them when I asked. Some say it has to do with the (?) Boxer Rebellion. Some say it's when you box up all the things you got for Christmas that don't fit and take them back. I don't know. They do love to wish it to you though.

Today the Cub Scouts had a fishing derby. Actually, it was kind of a trial run to see if they knew how to cast before we got really serious. No actual fish were caught, so by default we honored the kid who caught the biggest tree. If you want to stock up on hooks and bobbers and things, find out where cub scouts are practicing casting, and then scale the trees. We all had a great time, though, except for the worms, which Cubmaster John made sure to name before they were sacrificed. Enjoy some watercolor and pen and ink sketches from the trip.

Merry Almost Christmas! I talked to my great aunt in Massachusetts, who was expecting a snowstorm. I'm so lucky to live in Southern California, where I spent the day not waiting for a snowstorm, but sketching at the zoo with my illustrator group! I got very caught up watching the monkeys, with their cute little hands. I realized that while the largest bone in a human's body is the femur, and thus the largest muscles all involve the upper leg and pelvis, in a monkey those areas are almost afterthoughts! The big bones and big muscle tie-ins are all in the shoulder girdle. It was great to watch them hang and swing. Enjoy the sketches...

Ho ho. One day to go in this semester, I've finished the last project, and it's not midnight! I guess I get to watch House after all...

This is for digital illustration class. I think it's my most successful digital illustration yet, because I did most of it traditionally. I photographed the little tin guys (so cute! Thanks Millie and Jeff!,) then drew it, inked it, and colored it in photoshop. My friend Erin introduced me to the work of Tomer Hanuka, who has the most awesome sense of color. Inspirational! Anyway, it's called "Wind Up" and it's all of the little robot caffeine junkies waiting for their morning cuppa jo. Just looking at their psycho painted eyes gave me the idea. Incidentally, I am (once again) trying to give up caffeine. You should see my eyes...

Kelp is cool. It's a combination of two of my favorite things, plants and the ocean. I was out at Dana Point, and found this floating in the kiddo swimming area. I popped it in the cooler, took it home, and painted it. I tried to do that earlier in the summer, but I left it for a couple of days in a bag in the fridge, and I don't recommend that. It got really really stinky. If you're going to paint kelp, do it while it's fresh. I have been searching the internet, trying to figure out what kind it is, but to no avail. There is plenty of info on Macrocystis pyrifera, which this is not, but not a whole lot of help if you're trying to ID anything else. Hmmm... maybe that could be a project... Anyway, I've been doing a lot of exploring of native California species for Surfside Girls. I've been sneaking all sorts of cool things into and onto my pages.

Hey there, I've been cranking away at my graphic novel pages, trying to get as much done as I can before my freelance hits.  I'm amazed at how much there is to think about in trying to tell my story this way!  I've been checking out other graphic novelist's websites and have been very inspired by what I see.  Boltcity.com has a great tutorial.  I don't know if I want to post my pages yet, because I may put them up on their own website.  I will post some character sketches I did of Sam, trying to get my technique of watercolor and sepia pen down.

These are a couple of photos of the patio garden I created for my client in Seal Beach.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.  As I've said before, the working in the dirt, with plants and all of their amazing colors and textures is such inspiration to me and my illustration.  I have been working quite madly on the graphic novel, and will post some sketches next.

Good Morning!  I haven't posted this last week, because I have been exercising another creative side- landscape design!  Brita of Brita's Old Town Gardens, where I used to work on Main Street in Seal Beach, found me this darling job of bringing color and beauty to an upstairs patio on the beach.  I will go photograph the job on Monday, and post it, as it came out beautifully (now I'm inspired to get after my own garden!)  The colors and textures of the plants are so amazing and inspirational.  I am posting a piece I had done for the CSUF show, which we just took down.  It includes two of my direct influences- plants, and reading.  The words in the background of the piece are from Madeline L'Engle's "A Wrinkle in Time."  It is the part where Mrs. Whatsit explains to Mrs. Murray, on that dark and stormy night, that there is such a thing as a tesseract.  When I read that as a ten year old, I fell in love with science fiction, fantasy, and all of the kinds of writing that confirm that there is more going on in this world than what is obvious on the surface.  Enjoy!

Well.  School starts today!  I love the rhythm of the school season...  Anyway, I thought I'd put more up about the SCBWI LA conference.  One of my favorite quotes came from a writer's workshop, from a woman named Karen Cushman who wrote The Midwife's Apprentice, among other things.  She had such quotable things to say; very inspirational and funny.  My favorite was,

"Write, and Keep Showing Up."  Wow.  That's pretty much it, isn't it?  She also said, "Write, don't fantasize."  I got that one loud and clear, as I'm often dialoguing in my head, and it really does need to get put on paper to be of any use.  I also liked, "Inspiration often hits when my butt is far from my chair."  I write as well as draw, but I think the advice applies very easily to both.  I have put in my posting today a very silly thing, but I'm realizing that staying connected to the very silly thing is an important thing to me.  If you're an artist, you may understand this- to take in a lot of audio information, I have to doodle.  Not just take notes, actually draw.  Teachers get kids in trouble for this, but it holds true for me, and I'm sure those arty kids in detention, that letting the brain drop into that swimmy vat where doodling frees up the thinking (like listening to jazz) really does help the information land and sink in.  So here are the backs of heads I doodled while at the conference.

I went to the SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) conference a couple of weeks ago in LA.  Wow, what a friendly, amazing and talented bunch of people!  If children's book illustration is what you're looking to do, this is such a good support group, and so inspirational!  I haven't posted in a while as it's been all about readying the portfolio and postcards and such.  I am going to be in a small group show opening August 28 at CSUF's Exit Gallery.  The show is called, "From Here to There," and we have our development work up as well as our finished pieces.  The other participants are Erin Shea, Pat Cantor, and Katy Betz.  I did a new piece for it, and am posting a little teeny bit of it.

This is colander-head boy, compare with the digital version from a couple of weeks ago.

Colander-head boy has led me to a whole new challenge, which I am exploring in my special studies Illustration class this summer. I am attempting to paint characters in watercolor, and then duplicate the illustration using Adobe Illustrator. There was a time when I said I would rather dig ditches than work on the computer, but this week I've been doing a Landscape Design job which involves a LOT of soil preparation, and I think I am going to take that back. Working at the computer may not be great for the posture, but at least you don't wake up sore! Seriously, though, there is something good for me in the being out in the dirt, and it's as satisfying as finishing a good illustration to see a newly mulched yard with beautiful, healthy plants.

Happy Summer! I have been spending a lot of time in the garden and it's so cool how that fuels my drawing... nothing like dirt under the fingernails and communing with carpenter bees. I saw an amazing variegated agapanthus today at Target of all places. I'm going to have to find a place for it. I'm in the process of ripping out a whole planter of agapanthus at a client's house on a landscape design job... I understand they're common, and that I may have "pedestrian taste, (as my former nursery-job boss let me know,) but I figure that they grow well and are beautiful- what more can you ask? I wish that was true of more things in life! I get a garden magazine from England, and they showed people growing them in hothouses. So Bob's your Uncle... Anyway, I wanted to post a couple of things; first, a Jack in the Beanstalk I did in Children's Book class, and second, a character design of my Grandma, God rest her soul. The woman swore like a sailor, and was never far from her scotch, cigarette, or Sambuka and coffee, but she had a heart of gold and I miss her.

Kim is digital

Woo hoo. I am digital! I am spending this summer revisiting my computer skills, and getting up to speed on Illustrator and Flash. Quite a different way to think, and sometimes I just want to solve the problem with a pencil or paintbrush (it's faster!) but the results are fun and I enjoy the learning curve.

School's out!  Woo hoo!  I did this study of a mantis from a photo-  I took a whole mess of photos of one we had here at the house as a pet.  My son named her Katrina the Bikini Girl after the notorious American Idol contestant.  I'm not exactly thrilled that my eight-year old has a crush on her... anyway, I am fascinated by mantises and how sentient they seem to be.  I think they came from another planet, or perhaps they're animatronic.  They don't seem to move like anything else.  Summer school will be starting next week, and I will be finishing off some of the illustrations from the 32 page dummy book we completed in Sequential Art- Children's Book class.

Two down, one to go!  Wednesday is the last class of the semester, and I'm still working to get all of that work done.  I did this little spot as the last assignment in my Special Studies Illustration class.  Cliff (the professor) clued me in to how cool spots are.  I tend to think of finished artwork as square, in a frame.  It's so freeing to edit down to what's really necessary.  When I started this idea, I had sidewalk, telephone pole, and a larger cast of characters (ant, mantis, slug.)  It's fun to reduce!  

fairies and bugs

Here is the other buggish piece.  It makes me laugh, hope you enjoy it too.  I did the spot of the fairy because I'm trying to work on more spots- I'd love to get some work doing children's magazine illustration.  I will post some bug spots (?!) next week as I finish them.  We're in the final week of grad school, well, for the semester at least... wish me luck!

The homestretch!  Almost done with the semester, and totally stoked from all of the work I've been busting out.  Nothing like a little pressure... anyway, here are some bugs.  I'll post Bugball now, and New Arrival when I get it off of the watercolor board.  Bug spots to come, as well!

Here is the last in the Surfside Girls location paintings- this is the Burger Dude, Sam's dad's restaurant on the sand.  The monster is just silly, I taught art in Ethan's classroom yesterday (trying to enlighten second graders to light side and shadow side, and using color in shadows, phew!) but I've been working so tightly it was fun just to let go.  Only three more paintings and a dummy book to go before semester's over in two weeks.  Go Kim!