Asian Festival of Children's Content: AFCC 2013 First Look, an Illustration Critique

Can't remember the last time I felt so anxious! Would I get a good review? Or would the professional illustrators and editors think that it was so sucky that I would not want to paint for a week?  My dinosaur illustrations was the first set to be critiqued. Lights went off, slides went up, I heard a few sounds but nothing that sounded like "ugh".

So here was my critique:
The bad: characters need more emotion and expression, perhaps using ink so that it would be more clearly defined. There should be some close-up angles to draw the reader closer in.  And I need to study dinosaur anatomy and watch my perspective.

The good: There was a flow between pictures (which was unintentional on my part) and clearly a good relationship depicted between the dinosaur and the girl. They also found the characters warm and endearing.

So overall, I was quite pleased with the feedback, although I don't totally agree with animals needing to be sorta structurally accurate. I like my dinosaur the way he is. Good learning experience at the conference overall!

Chickens

I remember when we last had chickens in the backyard. It was a LONG time ago and my sister had brought back the grown-up chicks from school after the lessons on the life-cycle were over. They would flap over to the neighbor's house and perch on top of the swing (who says chickens can't fly?). Then came that horrible day when I was playing by myself in the backyard. One of the chickens chased me and I was screaming for someone to open the door which had slammed shut and was unopenable from the outside. It came at me and pecked my foot. Hard. On hindsight, it probably wasn't that bad, but it did draw blood and when you're in kindergarten, you always think it's the end of the world when there's blood. I've never quite liked chickens since, except fried.

Paintinks by melt has landed in NYC!

I found out about the ABFFE children's art auction only two weeks before the submission deadline. I wrote in to see if they would accept a piece from a total noob and got the warmest welcome from Kristen Vlahos, as well as an invitation to attend the auction in NYC.  So alongside some of the most well-known illustrators such as Jeff Kinney (Diary of a Wimpy Kid) and Lane Smith (Flying Jake), sit my two little bunnies. You can see more of the artwork up for auction on  ABFFE flickr site. And the  details of actual auction are on the ABFFE online auction page.

It doesn't matter if whether or not someone bids on my artwork, I'm pleased to be part of this!

Paper

I've got a recent obsession with drawing paper. Photo-realism totally astounds me and paper seems a good place to begin. Check out Tutodraw's videos on YouTube. He's amazing!

Origami

Origami fox and origami rabbit. The origami pig was too horrendous to post up. I've yet to sell a pencil sketch but with more practice, hopefully that will materialize!

Buildings and a Big Bang!

It's no secret that I like drawing little buildings especially brownstones and townhouses. They're so beautifully quaint! I submitted this under for this week's theme of "Farewell" at Illustration Friday. Much to my delight, this painting was purchased almost as soon as I'd put it up on my facebook page.

People often ask, where do you get your ideas from? So here's a step by step process of how this one came about:
1. buy long frame at ikea
2. think of something long to draw. Aha! Dragon sleeping!
3. Something silly needs to happen. Rabbit come by and wakes dragon up.
4. A trumpet...maybe..a rock...too harsh... a balloon and a hedgehog... that will work.
5. add a little bystander and voila!