Copyright held by WillowRaven & 4RV Publishing
Today,
Being Jacob: First Day of School is featured on
Books4Moms.
It's Suzie's first book in the Being Jacob series.
I rarely have the opportunity to work in true medium (most are looking for digital work), but am glad I did with this one.
With Jacob being a red head and sooo cute, I had a lot of fun helping to re-create his first day of school.
The expressions, the freckles and the hair were key elements in the character creation of Jacob.
Here is what she says about my work:
The illustrations are also a beautiful part of the book. Aidana WillowRaven of WillowRaven Illustration & Design Plus does an amazing job of bringing the characters to life. Her art work is very realistic and beautiful which makes this book very fun to read. You can see her work in many other young readers, tween and teen books.
“Mommy, it is so loud. It smells yucky in here, and there are no toys, and I don’t see my brothers anywhere.”
copyrights held by WillowRaven & 4RV Publishing
In book two,
Being Jacob: A Day at the Zoo, I get to work with exotic animals.
So cool!
So swing on over to Christine's review of
Being Jacob: First Day of School on the
Books4Moms blog and keep a look out for
Being Jacob: A Day at the Zoo Spring of 2010.
Signed copies of
Being Jacob: First Day of School, can be ordered on my '
Buy the Books' page. You can also order on the
4RV Publishing website, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.com
Until next time ...
Aidana WillowRaven When you think of a gift, think of a book!TinyURL:
Copyright held by WillowRaven & 4RV Publishing
It has been in the works for a long time now, but I finally finished Being Jacob: First Day of School by Suzy Koch.
So many delays ...
First the CPSIA issue, I started having weird health problems (which is better now, btw), I moved (right before Christmas), Christmas for three kids, my entire hard drive locked up, then, do I need to keep going?
But, I finally not only finished book one, but I designed the cover for book two.
So as not to delay the rest of the series, I am starting illustration for it now, even though it is not due to be released until Spring 2010.
Copyright held by WillowRaven & 4RV Publishing
One of my professors said to me on more than one occasion 'It's disturbing when you do that,' ... lol.
He was referring to how I 'build' an illustration. Though I am formally trained, I don't illustrate like a fine artist. I also don't illustrate like an animator. I am somewhere in between.
In traditional classes, we are taught to build the visual as a whole. For example, if you use light peach as you 'lightest' tone, then everything that is light peach is done at once. Kinda like a monochromatic/pastel layer. Then you are supposed to build it up from there with varying shades and shadows by using contrasting, yet complimentary colors.
As you can see, I do that to an extent ... but I do it by element, rather than by the illustration as a whole. Here, you see I focus on the main character first. Bring him almost to completion, before starting another element. My profs HATED this.
Now you see where I incorporated the secondary character. A lot less detail is wanted here, because I WANT YOU to focus on the boy's eyes -- his expression -- not how well I can do hair .... so I deliberately understate that element.
Also, if you compare the two drawings, you'll see I finished it off by doing the darkest tones all at once (kinda how they taught me to do all of the colors ... lol). This allows me to tie in all the elements as one and create a color balance.
Before it's all over, I may be tweaking it a bit in Photoshop later, to 'finish' it a bit more ... but for now ... it's on to the next project.
Until next time ...
Aidana WillowRaven
WillowRaven Illustration & Design Plus
http://willowraven.weebly.com
willowraven.illustration@yahoo.com
When you think of a gift, think of a book!
Today, I want to talk about something all authors, illustrators, designers, and definitely publishers need in this internet age.
A website.
The one I have featured here, I did as a starter site for the author Suzy Koch for our Being Jacob series that I am illustrating at the moment. I used Weebly, which suits her needs, and lets her get used to having and maintaining a website with little-to-no money out of pocket.
Sometimes a free server like this is all one needs. Other times, it is too limited to do what the site owner needs or wants. That is when a new web host is needed.
It can be tough finding the right server ... there are so many out there ... and at so many different rates, with so many different features/restrictions. WebHostingRating.com helps to make the job of choosing a web host a little simpler for those of us not what we'd call internet savvy ... lol.
Right off the bat, the home page lists the Top 10 Web Hosting Providers - Best Web Hosts for 2009. The chart gives you the link to the featured host's site, the price, the space, the traffic and a one-five thumps up web hosting review - five being the best.
Unlike most business sites, they don't just try to sell you on a high cost host. They present you with your options, and then you get to decide what's best for your needs ... even if it is a free service like Weebly.
Myself, I learn more from blogs than I do boring, stale, sales-pitch type sites ... so I follow their blog (follow the 'Articles' link) to keep myself up-to-date on the world of web hosting. Articles like: Does Your Business Need Colocation? What is Colocation anyway ... lol?
Like you, I NEED a website to run my business. And like you, I want the best deal for what I need to do. The only way to know that is research. This is where you do it!
So check out their page, the articles and bookmark it ... you never know when you'll need to know what web hosts are on top.
Until next time ...
Aidana WillowRaven
WillowRaven Illustration & Design Plus
http://willowraven.weebly.com
willowraven.illustration@yahoo.com
When you think of a gift, think of a book!
As part of my wanting to help, in any way I can, to keep people interested in Being Jacob: First Day of School while I finish the illustration and design, I wanted to add Suzy Koch's new slide/trailer I made for her (see last post) to her site. Then I found out she didn't have one. So, I designed her one! LOL, please visit at her new site and let her know what you think of it.
She's still leaning how to use it, but there is a blog and contact form to reach her with. So stop in and say hi:
http://beingjacob.weebly.com
Until next time ...
Aidana WillowRaven
WillowRaven Illustration & Design Plus
http://willowraven.weebly.com
willowraven.illustration@yahoo.com
When you think of a gift, think of a book!
It seems Like there are always unforeseen complications when it comes to my work on Being Jacob: First Day of School. I am six months behind schedule on project completion and have not been accepting any new projects until I complete this one. I really like this book and have really warmed to it and sooo want to finish it so I can get started on book two's illustrations, Being Jacob: A Day at the Zoo.
Some re-introductions will need to be made soon as well, for the rest of Jacob's family in up-coming posts. Along the way, I had slightly altered the illustration style from realism to portraiture, and found that portraiture -- though fun and a refreshing to do -- wasn't going to be practical with this series and also would not really 'match' the rest of the books' look. So, I am re-doing recent illustrations to closer resemble the rest of the book, and return to realism rather than portraiture.
As a matter of fact, I just submitted my next article to Poetic Monthly Magazine that touches on that very subject: Children's Book Illustration: Understanding Medium, Style, and Scope. It will hopefully be published in next month's issue (if there is enough space).
Portraiture can be described in many ways, but in this realm it is a type of realism (at least my style of portraiture is). Where my style of realism, lies somewhere between caricature and portraiture, not abstracted enough to be considered a caricature and too simplified and lacking detailed to be considered a portrait ...lol.
Actually, when looking at my work as a whole, it's kinda a merging of various styles and techniques, each being distinct on their own. Maybe that is why my professors kept pulling their hair out (or in Okala's case -- his proverbial hair - he was bald when I met him ... lol).
I was both blessed and cursed by the vast differences in my studio classes because I wasn't trying to get a specific degree, but rather prep myself to do what I am doing today. Which, by the way, there is no degree for ... lol. I sorta took all the studio classes, whether it was considered a fine art class, a design class, or an animation class ... lol. They thought I was a little confused as to what I wanted to be when I grew up ... lol.
There was no confusion, though. I knew from the day I enrolled that I wanted to grace the covers and pages of books and found to my surprise that there is no degree for that. Your either trained to be a graphic artist, or an animator, or a gallery artist, or an art teacher. So ... I took everything ... lol.
As a result, ya'll will need to suffer through the occasional shifts in my artistic representations and try to tolerate, as best you can, my sometimes contradictory perspective. Which can be as affected by my moods and the weather ... as most artists are ...lol.
We are a troublesome people to deal with, aren't we? But then again, so are authors ... so I hear. ;P
Until next time ...
Aidana WillowRaven
WillowRaven Illustration & Design Plus
http://willowraven.weebly.com
As predicted in my last post, weekends don't really allow time to focus on my drawing.
I do admit it took me two days to complete one drawing, but I made big breakfasts, big dinners, spent time with the kids, and got to pet the dog while sitting on the back porch until it began to drizzle ... so it wasn't a loss.
This illustration is for Being Jacob: First Day of School by Susy Koch, being published by 4RV Publishing.
Tomorrow is a school day, so I should have more to show for it ... lol.
Aidana WillowRaven
http://willowraven.weebly.com
Have you ever had one of those projects that took you a long time to get "the right feel"?
The illustration for Being Jacob: First Day of School by Suzy Koch is one of those types of projects. It took me a month to find the right medium and style I wanted for the story but as you can see, though it knocked me a bit off schedule, I finally settled on a look and the author and publisher (4RV Publishing) seem to both be happy with when I presented it to them a couple of days ago as Vivian was returning from Decatur.
Let me know what you think.
If my sanity holds up, I will be presenting five more children's book covers and at least three more fiction covers this month alone:
Children's books:
Chris Cricket by Charles Whit Renaldo
Puff Bear by Charlene Walden
Henry Eagle by papa mick
JGDS State of Quarries by Elysabeth Eldering
My Backyard Friends by Kaye Lynn Booth
Cover designs:
Wett Ink by delmetria millener
The Ratt Pack by JE Reed
Send me your prayers, rattle some juju beads, light me an orange candle for strength and success and send those flows of sanity my way...lol.
Looks like I'll be needing all I can get from all quadrants!
Did I mention the author/illustrator/publisher interview on the 15th on my Cover Chatter Blog and the three websites I am designing?
Aidana WillowRaven
www.WillowRavenIllustration.com
RSS Feed
BookSwim
