Imagination & Visual Literacy Class

I'm teaching a class called "Imagination & Visual Literacy" at UVU right now. I love this class. It's all the good stuff. I think I learned more than my students in developing the curriculum.

This was yesterdays in-class assignment. Draw a cat looking out of a bedroom window and include 25 items in the room but put all of the emphasis on the cat in 45 min. Since it was a drawing - students couldn't use color for emphasis which is one of the easiest ways to accomplish this task. High contrast and crisp lines were all they could use.

I drew the above image along with them on my iPad hooked to the LCD projector. I like creating problems that I would also like to solve - why should they have all the fun?

Online Story Art Class Coming!

Today's post is a teaser! Personally I hate teasers - please don't tease me! :)

In the next 4-6 weeks I will be announcing my new Online Story Art Class! It looks like I'll be teaching it with a rock star in the animation/comics/children's book industry! Not final yet so I guess that's another teaser! The class will be limited to about 15 students so we're thinking it might fill up fast but if there's enough demand we might offer a second section. We're still hammering out all the details but it will have assignments, critiques, instruction, - things we can't put in a video due to copyright/permission issues which are protected under the "fair use" doctrine.

I use my personal FACEBOOK account as my professional connection account on FB so if you want to send me a friend request I'll add you so you can get the announcement there. I'll also tweet it and of course post it here on my blog. Following my blog will allow you to get it in your google feed.

We'll price it very reasonably stripping out all the overhead that you pay for a University class since we won't be renting space. So excited to be able to do this! Stay tuned!

 Oh yeah - this was my demo last night in Digital Painting class.

Photoshop Demo For My Class

I painted this for my class at UVU for our next assignment. I don't work in this style so I wanted to work up a little example of what I'm looking for. I can't tell you how much fun I have playing with different brushes and settings in Photoshop - it truly is an amazing program!

Working With Children's Book Editors

I've been working on one of the funnest books I've ever had the privilege to illustrate. "Skeleton For Dinner" by Margery Cuyler is due out this coming fall by Albert Whitman - and is a very cute story about miscommunication among friends. The image above is just a mock up - the real type treatments to come.

My advice when working with editors and art directors:

1) Seek after the advice of your editor. It's a collaboration. The publisher is paying the bills. They are risking their money to make the dream happen. You and I are risking our time. We all have risk but I often hear about illustrators who feel that art decisions should be their call alone. Many of my books have been greatly enhanced by the discretion, suggestions, and requests of my employers and this cover is no exception. I had to completely re-do this cover because I broke some of my own design rules - I cut corners. I am so much happier with this current version and the input from my editors Nick Tiermersma and Wendy McClure.

2) Get to know your editors with good back and forth communication. Be clear in what your expectations, aspirations, intentions, plans, goals, etc are. Let them know how passionate you are - they want to know. Don't make it a secret that you're tickled to work on their project. Don't hide the fact that you're trying to do your best work ever. Let them understand that you value their opinion and input. After all you're a team even though you may be many miles apart geographically. If you're not a team player...good luck.

How I Use Procreate To Draw On My iPad

In the video below I show how I'm using Procreate to make drawings for my children's books, iPad apps, personal and freelance work. I love the Procreate app! It allows me to make high resolution drawings that I can email to my desktop and paint in photoshop. No more running out of paper. No more pens, pencils, not having a pen, running out of lead, etc. I can take my work anywhere and I can go through the entire drawing/refinement process without the use of a scanner or tracing paper. It has made me much more productive in that I can do finish work anywhere - doctor's office, meetings, waiting in the car, airplanes, conferences - you name it. The only thing I have to remember to do is take enough work with me before I leave the studio. I hope you enjoy the video...

Copy Your Mentors Work To Improve!

In this video I discuss the fact that public schools didn't prepare us to learn art (big surprise right?). The fact that there are rules in every creative field like writing, dance, music and yes - even sports...why then do we often fail to apply the same rules to the visual arts? From public school through college many students report that they were never taught concrete rules to help them find the boundaries that focus their creative energy into successful drawings and paintings. In the video I give advice on what I think you should do to improve the quality of your visual art.

Procreating! er um...drawing in Procreate

I created this image using Procreate on my iPad - I love this app!

I just got back from the SCBWI Southern Breeze conference in Atlanta. I was being entertained by Dianne Hess (editor at Scholastic) as she gave her speech - an inside look at her company. I have to draw to listen so I was on  my iPad using "Procreate". It's my go to program for creating all of my sketches now - I love the screen rotation feature and the larger file sizes. Oh yeah - and I'm still only using my finger. I find it fascinating that it bothers people that I won't go out and drop coin on a stylus. It bugs my students, friends, and strangers that I meet - like the guy who sat next to me on the plane. "You know you can buy all kinds of styluses for that device," he informed me...I just agreed....by the way it strengthens my resolve to run sans stylus with each criticism.

A special shout out to Elizabeth Dulemba for inviting me to speak, being a great host, running an awesome conference, and being a great illustrator. I met so many cool people down there - too many to list but you know who you are! I hope to be able to get down there again sometime.

Crawl, Walk, Run, Leap!

I created the image above for my digital painting class this semester as an example of what I want my students to do for our "circle straight edge" assignment. The rules:

Create an image in Photoshop.
Perfect your drawing.
Use only the circle selection tool and the lasso for straight edges.
Painting: use the paint bucket and airbrush tools.
Concept: Visually explain why the Abominable Snowman is grumpy.

I don't think everyone is happy with this assignment. The limitations are frustrating some of them (yay!) and locking them into a style they aren't excited about.

My philosophy: Mastery in any discipline such as science or sports - arithmetic or art is gained in small steps. You have to learn algebra before calculus - physics before string theory and lay ups before alley oop dunks. By taking away options I'm allowing students to focus on the basic elements of design and visual communication. If you can't develop a solid composition and execute good rendering under these restrictions how can you hope to succeed given unlimited brushes, selection tools, textures, healing brushes, filters, adjustments, mixing and blending tools, etc?

Imagine the following experiment: You are given the best brushes and pallet knives money can buy for oil painting -fine linens, mediums, easel, pallet, etc. Your set up is perfect. Then give someone like Caravaggio a pocket knife, an old tree branch, some cheap oil paints, and a crapy canvas board. Set up a still life. Do you think you could out paint him? I know I couldn't.

It's not about the tools - it's about your understanding of mediums, surfaces, tools, design, light & shadow, edges, color, value, texture, line, space, shape, etc. What you do with the tools is personal to your understanding and vision.

Try limiting your choices...wax on - wax off.

In addition: From the mouth of Kazu - the artist who just completed the new Harry Potter covers:

Anything else about your process as you went about it that artists should know?

I tried to work on a single layer in Photoshop. I used very few effects. All of the illustrations for the most part I didn’t separate elements. I try to keep it pure as if I was working on a canvas. I forced myself into a limitation despite having all of these tools at my disposal. (from CBS)

New Ways To Market Your Illustration

In the video below I took the time to explain the changes I've seen happen in illustration markets over the past 20 years and what I think artists should do to take advantage of emerging markets. Yes there still is plenty of freelance illustration work out there but there are more illustrators competing for it and budgets have either remained the same or gone down. The good news is that there are so many new possibilities for artists that unless you refuse to be open minded you and I can find success in many different places.

I give quite a few detailed examples in this video - it's long so put it on while you work - I hope you enjoy it!

Can Pinterest Help Your Art Get Better?

Well obviously I must think so or this would be a really short post right?

First let me just say that I'm like a lot of you - "NOT ANOTHER SOCIAL MEDIA SITE!!!" I know I know - but trust me - Pinterest is worth it...and you can get in and out quickly!

For starters lets deal with that title - what if I told you that there is a way to see how your art stacks up against your competition? What if you could be that fly on the wall in the office of an editor, art director, agent, or fellow artist? What if you could know what people really think of your work? I'll show you a very simple way to use Pinterest to do just this.

1. Make your own Pinterest account BUT do it by logging in from Facebook or choose the setting so that every time you make a "PIN" it updates facebook - reason? - so people see your pins, visit your board, and re'pin your pins.

2. In the "search" bar at the top of the Pinterest page after you're logged in - type in something like "illustration" or "Children's illustration" or "characters" and hit enter.

3. Click on "boards"

4. Click on a piece of art that interests you - you might want to scroll a little - pick a goody! Ok - now pick five images to "re-pin" AND - pin them to your illustration board.  (I figured all this stuff out so if I can do it a snail can do it - sorry snails :( ...make sure you REALLY like the images you're re-pinning. These need to be images that you really admire and perhaps wish you'd created so be picky!  Also - if you don't pin really good stuff people will ignore your board and that will kill this whole experiment.

5. Ok - now pin one of your own images and then over the next year repeat this ratio - a handful of other artist's images to one of your own.  I suggest you pin from your website or blog so that if people click on them they come back to your portal - but that's not what this post is about but you should still do it for marketing reasons. (There's a way to download some thing-a-magiggy to your browser so you can "pin" from any site - I don't remember how I got it to work - I think I googled "how to pin with Pinterest")

6. Here's a look at my illustration board on Pinterest. If you zoom in you can see how many times each image was "re-pinned" - and here in lies the magic! You get to see how many votes or "pins" each image gets including your own. In a way people are casting their votes in an impartial way - self serving! They see something they like and they re-pin it for themselves. This is more valuable than a critique from friends in some ways because it's a rather large sample size and it's honest. The people pinning don't really know or care that you're looking at the data this way -they're just grabbing images for future consumption on their own boards.

So how can Pinterest help you improve your art? You can learn a lot by seeing what people like and don't like. If you're work isn't getting re-pinned as much as the other work you pin you have some work to do - but not in the blind - because you can see exactly what images people respond to the most. You might want to make a list of the things the popular images have in common - then compare to your work. However, this could also be a little dangerous if you follow it too closely and copy what is getting votes - you could become a follower- you still have to innovate but in order to create great art you have to consume great art!

Pinterest is in my opinion a very valuable tool for inspiration, strategy, and marketing - I'm starting to get emails and messages from customers who are finding me on Pinterest - and I hear it's the fastest growing website! so get pinning!

Thank You!

Words can't begin to describe the feelings I've had over the past few years since making my first video tutorial: "How To Illustrate Children's Books". I've recieved hundreds of letters, emails, Facebook messages, etc thanking me for making that video and the subsequent videos I made afterwards. I get to chat with people everyday about their enthusiasim and renewed energy for working on their art projects.

With permission from James Horvath I'm sharing his letter because it really touched me yesterday - I'm glad I was home alone so my kids didn't see me get all mushy. My emotions come from the leftover feelings I have growing up in the shadow of academic achievers in my family and thinking that I would never be able to do anything important with my life. There really isn't anything better in life than knowing you make a difference - so I thank all of you for the kind words you've sent me in the past few years!


Hey Will

It's been a while since I downloaded and watched your video series, "How to Illustrate Children's Books". I just wanted to write to you and let you know how well your course has worked for me. 

I've been a freelance children's illustrator for many years. I worked primarily in the education market doing work for Scholastic, Pearson, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and a few others. And while I've enjoyed some modest success, I always wanted to write and illustrate my own children's picture books.

About a year and a half ago I decided to get off my butt and actually do it, instead of just dreaming about it. I found your video course online and decided to spring for the $29.99.

I developed my story, worked on some sketches and sample art, basically, followed your process and submitted my dummy (an email with a PDF) to one publisher. A test run so to speak. I braced myself for the almost inevitable rejection that I was sure would soon follow. 

Instead, within 24 hours, I received a response with a very enthusiastic reply. That was on a Tuesday. By the end of the week I had a 3-book deal with HarperCollins Publishers. My first book comes out on April 30th. And is up for pre-orders at practically all major on-line retailers.

I just wanted to send you this note and say, "Thanks". I really do credit you and your course with outlining a path for my success. I would, and often do, highly recommend your video series to anyone looking to break into the children's book market.

Thanks again!

James Horvath

Check out his work! 
 

Congratulations James - I can't wait to buy your books when they come out and to brag that I might have played a tiny part in their creation. It's been a crazy ride with our Folio Academy project. We've now sold our videos in about 40 countries and counting. Never in my wildest dream did I think this would happen when we uploaded our first video a few years ago!

New iPad APP Composer Tutorial - Demibooks!

Great News! Folio Academy just released a new tutorial that teaches how to produce a children's story app using the Demibooks Composer software. Here is a link to the TUTORIAL.

Heidi Berthiaume gives a very in depth and clear tutorial on how you can take your story and art work and use the Demi Books Composer to create your own iPad app. You use your own iPad to download the free software from Demibooks.http://demibooks.com/home/ You import images and assets to your iPad and actually create the app on your iPad for the iPad - how cool is that? No programmer necessary. After you're finished you have a few options: you can choose to publish to the Apple app store on your own and/or submit your book to Demibooks Storytime and become part of a growing library of books from other indie developers AND McGraw Hill and Kane Miller. DBS - is promoted by Usborne Books.

In the first option you pay Demibooks $249 to get the digital file to upload to Apple - then every sale you make apple will pay a royalty of 70% to you. So, if you priced your book at $1.99 Apple would pay you roughly $140/sale. In this option you would also need to set up a developer account with Apple for $99/year. The cool thing is that they will hold your hand and do the submitting on your behalf!

Personally I feel that this is really worth it. I've already made back the money I spent on I EAT YOU! and then some from Talespring and my royalty is 50% with them. I would advise that you do everything in your capability to make your app appealing emotionally i.e. amazingly funny, cute, sad, gross, offensive, touching, etc. The time for A is for Apple is over.

The second option is really a continuation of the first - I just wanted to make sure that we discussed it separately. If you go through the development and publishing process in the first option and Demibooks likes your book they may decide to include it in their Storytime library. This is especially exciting because it's hard enough to get attention for your digital book without any extra "love". Demibooks curates it's library for artistic quality, story, and overall product integrity. In some ways this feels like a higher form of indie publishing and what I have been predicting for many months - that there will be collections developing online to help consumers find higher quality digital story books.

Here is a little on Hedi - creator of "Develop A Children's Book iPad App"

Heidi Berthiaume loves to create stuff - from websites to iPad apps to written stories to fan music videos. She spent fifteen years as an information architect providing instructional documentation for programmers and designers so they could develop applications and websites for businesses such as 3M, Hilton, and American Airlines (which paid the mortgage but was less fun than writing a novel and developing her children's picture book Bud the Bunny into an iPad app). The portal to all of her stuff is http://www.heidi2524.com/

I'll be doing an update post on "I EAT YOU!" in the not too distant future...

Fun With Pooch

I'm working on a bunch of freelance projects at the moment but I can't show any of them to you :(

So you get a cat with a red cape riding Pooch. Pooch is my dog. I go hiking with Pooch almost everyday...and snap action shots just for fun.

And I've played with a few of them in Photoshop. I know - it's weird - but I'm weird - so....

I don't know why I like to draw other animals riding on my dog's back...I think it's ok as long as she doesn't find out.

Cool & Warm Colors

I painted this as a demo for my digital painting class this semester at UVU. I really wanted to play around with a dramatic lighting situation.

One of the reasons I'm a big advocate of getting out there and seeing the world with your own eyes is the feeling you get and the inspiration to find a place for it in your work. I woke up to this last year in Utah's Goblin Valley last year - my tent was about 5 feet to the right.

So this is how I begin my sketches on my iPad. I call this the ugly stage. I'm basically making a "map" for me to trace and perfect on another layer. At this point I don't care about detail - just the raw elements and proportions. It's sketchy and loose but it will serve as my guide.

I'm using "Procreate" now because I can have a much larger file size then "Brushes"  - AND - I can rotate the "paper". That's a huge improvement. Down side: (why is there always a downside?) It's much slower than brushes. I'll be making an update video for my "Painting on the iPad" video tutorial that demonstrates how you can use Procreate for your workflow.

And this is the perfected sketch. I probably used about three more layers to get to this point reducing the brush size and increasing the value of my lines.

I think it's really neat to look at this part of the painting because it looks so dark and different than the part in the sunlight...similar to the photo I took. I added the color in Photoshop CS5.

I love light and shadow. You really can't have one without the other can you? I really like exploring with cool colors vs warm colors to see what interesting blends happen and the mood it creates.

Oil Start - Photoshop Finish

One of the problems with digital painting for a lot of artists is that it's often hard to get the subtleties and happy accidents that traditional mediums provide.

One of the problems with painting in traditional mediums - like oils for instance is the lack of control or the tedious nature of finishing details - not to mention the fact that you can't undo, adjust color, or zoom in.

Of course the solution won't work for gallery painters or people who enjoy having originals but I had fun painting on this little oil painting in Photoshop. Originally I painted it on a gessoed board in a few hours in my University painting class but never got around to finishing it. So yesterday I thought - why not scan it and spend an hour in photoshop?

This is the original oil painting that I never had time to finish

You can see the flat strokes I made in the oil painting and the gesso texture.

 I used one stock photoshop brush - the flat blunt (bristle tilt).

and here is the same oil painting with the digital strokes added in.

My process is far from perfect. I don't do this sort of thing every day but it can give you an idea of what is possible if you wanted to start your paintings in oil and finish them digitally.

The Teacher In Me

The teacher in me is excited to teach the student in you.
The teacher in me wants you to find out what you can do.
The teacher in me knows what it's like to have dreams come true and wants yours to come true too.

The teacher in me is afraid you won't do what you need to do - but the teacher in me is still rooting for you.

The teacher in me lives through your triumphs.
The teacher in me knows you will fail again and again but prays you won't quit.

The teacher in me can't wait to see the teacher in you.
The teacher in me wants to be taught by the teacher in you.

Classes begin for me again today at UVU and I love it! I get so much out of teaching. Last semester in my children's book class I gave my students the option to work on story apps. A hand full went in that direction and it was really fun to see what they came up with. We didn't have time to work on their stories since it is an illustration class so they lack some of the polish that taking a children's writing class would provide - but they learned by doing and are that much further along.

Here are a few of the apps they created last semester...but one is missing :(   Alicia VanNoy Call had her (TOTALLY AMAZING) app rejected by Apple twice because it didn't have enough animation/interactivity. They wanted her to publish it as an iBook but she doesn't want to do that for various reasons - so it's in limbo at the moment.

I will really miss this group of kids - we really had a lot of fun!

Kitty Wants by Ginny Tilby (pink sweater) - check it out! 

Ricky the Fortune Cookie by Jared Salmond (second goof from the right) - check it out!

Jumping Jackie by Kari & Von Brimhall - check it out!

Jumping Jackie is from my long time college friends Kari & Von Brimhall - They did an amazing job animating their app using Talespring.com ...if you want to see what's possible at Talespring you should check out their app! I love their enthusiasim for creating ebooks and story apps. Kari is a homeschooler who's kids are flying the coop and doing very well at college and now she and Von are living out their dreams creating for the pure love of it. They are one step ahead of me in that they already created a website to showcase their titles called instant sunshine.

Ask For An Honest Critique

Oh, and don't buy American.

What? Don't you care about your country?

Of course I do - but supporting manufacturers because of geographic location or membership in a group is devolutionary.  Good products come through trial and error and plenty of failure. Good companies too. Products are like living organisms and giving artificial unearned support will only weaken a product by providing positive feedback for poor performance and secure mediocrity. If you really want a company to evolve you should only support them when they have earned your business. In nature if an organism can't cut it - it get's replaced.

So shouldn't we want the same for our books, art, illustration, animation, ebooks, and story apps? Shouldn't we wish for an honest critique even thought what we hear or read might be very painful? Of course we want a 5 star review and a description that will send customers flocking to our _______, but what if it's undeserved? How do you feel when you watch, read, or use something you bought because of a good review - only to be disappointed later? We are fast becoming a society that relys on reviews more than ever. With more products and services available online we often buy items that we don't get to experience until they reach our doorstep or tablet.

If you and I want to survive and thrive we need to create - get good feedback - make changes and create again - repeating this process over and over. We shouldn't get caught up in trying to game the system with "like me" - "vote for me" - "give me a good review" or "give me a 5 star rating". This is time WELL wasted! If your product doesn't cause an emotional change in your target audience you failed - isn't it wonderful? Wonderful because you did it! Rather than trying to peddle a bike with flat tires make a new bike - one that's pumped up and ready to go. Ask for an honest critique so you can evolve and say "thank you."

How To Price Your Illustration For Clients

I've been wanting to make this video for quite sometime. I get asked all the time by students, people at conferences, and visitors to my blog - how should I price my work? In this video I share my opinions about figuring out exactly how much to charge and how it can vary depending on many factors that are happening in your life. I realize it's a bit lengthy but I didn't want to leave stones unturned. I wanted to have a detailed answer that I can email out whenever I get asked this question in the future.


If you've even wondered how much to ask for on an art project I hope my ideas help you.

Nice To Take A Little Break

WOW! I can't believe this year is coming to an end so soon. I've been so busy - this year went by in a blink!

I started this little painting in class a few weeks ago and decided to finish it for fun. I love Christmas imagery - I've always wanted to make a Christmas children's book...you never know :)

I wish all of you the best of luck on your art projects in the coming year! ...and have a wonderful holiday with your families and loved ones.

Experimental Demo

I painted this as a demo in my media techniques class a few weeks ago. I'm not very proficient with watercolors so I decided to combine it with photoshop for a hybrid traditional/digital piece. I really like some of the accidental textures watercolors (or watercolours for those across the pond) provide. The pooling water and pigment dry in some unique patterns that are nearly impossible to generate digitally (unless you have a smoking machine).

You can see that the texture is a little heavy in the original but I was able to "tame" it using opaque layers of digital paint in the final.

What I really wanted to accomplish was the texture in the larger areas...hmmm...I might want to do a few more this way.

Are You Killing Your Blog? - RANT!

Ok from time to time I make a nuisance of myself and do a little video rant. Spoiler alert I'm going to type it out as well for those using google translate - so watch the video or continue reading...


This is going to be pretty short but basically it's like this:

Sometimes before I get going on my own sketching or designing I like to blog hop other illustrator's sites to get some inspiration (aka creative borrowing). Inevitably I'll find my way to an image that really stops me and I get totally absorbed in it's amazing qualities....and sometimes I'm moved to leave a comment to compliment the creator. Most of the time I say a few words and move on but every now and then I run into a blog (usually composed in Wordpress) where the blogger has made it extremely difficult to leave a little comment. Upon typing a few complimentary words I'm smacked with: "You must first login to leave a comment on this site". Hold up. Back up. What the? Are you kidding me?

I'm not going to sign up for your blog. I like you but lets get something straight. I want to give you something. I want to tell you how awesome you are. I'm not going to jump through hoops to do so. I'm already feeling like I need to get to work.

If we were to meet at your gallery show and I found myself diggin your art and I finally get to meet you and tell you how much I love your art - are you going to put stipulations on how I do it?...then why do it online?

I already know the answer...you want to be able to spam me later when you have a new "fill in the blank" for sale....sorry...I care...but not enough to jump.

Buy One Get One Free - Folio Academy!

For the month of Dec Folio Academy is running a buy one get one free! (equal or lesser value)

How it works: If you already bought a video(s) or if you buy a video at Folio Academy in the month of December 2012 you can simply go on the Folio Academy website and send an email to Folio Academy asking for your free video. Just make sure you specify which video you would like to receive for free and it needs to be of the same value or lower than the video you purchased.

We're working hard to increase your video library and we just got this one (Learn To Draw Cartoon Zombies)  in from Justin Cook - our friend from across the pond.

New Photoshop Tutorial Makeover

I'm happy to announce that I just finished another tutorial and this one is a re-make of "Digital Painting in Photoshop". I bought better screen capture software so I decided to make another tutorial that displays higher quality video so viewers can see the settings more clearly. If you've already purchased the old version of this tutorial - you get this new one for FREE! You can still view the old version but you'll now notice that this new tutorial has replaced the old one. To view the old version you'll have to click the link at the top of the Digital Painting video page at folioacademy.com

In addition I demonstrate how to actually make several physical textures - scan them - and manipulate them to be used in digital paintings.

I begin with a sketch and describe how I begin adding value and then work into color.

I also made a sped up version of the painting and put it up on my Youtube channel. I love making these tutorials because I get to paint something I love - and talk about it - I love helping others unlock their potential!


Note: This is not a general "how to" in Photoshop - rather it's how I use textures to paint illustrations in Photoshop. You can purchase the tutorial here!

Also, we are doing a buy on get one Free (of equal or lesser value) at folioacademy.com for the month of Dec.! More on that in my next post but if you want to take advantage of it simply purchase a video and then email us from the folioacademy website which video you would like for free and like Christmas Magic it will appear in your account!

The Secret To Your Success

How's that for a title? Like I have the answer right?

I often run into budding artists either in person or online that ask me what I think they can do to be successful. Aside from portfolio advice, going to school or getting tutored, blogging, sending out promos, making awesome art & products, etc (all of which are super important) here's what I think the most important thing is:

Drum roll....

I think you have to be committed for life. Some plan on writing and/or illustrating a book but if it doesn't get published they'll move on and find something else to do. Some plan to apply for studio jobs but fall back on something else if it doesn't pan out. Just the other day someone told me they were going to try making a story app to see if it will sell. I think this is the wrong attitude. What if it doesn't sell? Does that mean you didn't learn something valuable for your next one?...and the one after that?

One thing I've come to realize is that the truly successful artists have been and continue to be - committed for life. It's all they want to do. It's all they live for. It's what they do. It's who they are. If they have a set back they accept it as part of the journey. I dare you to show me a successful artist that doesn't have his/her fair share of bumps and bruises. I can't count the number of time I've had to lick my wounds - but they scab up over time and those scars become great stories later on.

Stan Lee - creator of Spider Man said, "Mine is the longest overnight success story of all time!"...he was committed even when his comics were being canceled by his publisher - he stuck it out...what if he had quit? Think of all the super hero movies he's responsible for...

The piece above was a pretty crappy demo in class but I love working on art so much I came home and played with it in Photoshop for two hours. I love art and I'll be making it for the rest of my life.

NOW! - Get My New Tutorial - Free!

The first 10 people to enter their email in the comments section below will get a free copy of my latest tutorial - "Making Art For eBooks & Story apps" !

But please don't get it if -

You're an expert in photoshop. This new tutorial was designed for the person who isn't very familiar with digital graphics and illustration. It is a basic tutorial on scanning, cleaning up, working in photoshop, creating assets, managing an image library, working in layers, making animated GIF's, making PNG images, light animation techniques, etc. It really won't teach you anything new if the a fore mentioned is well within your wheel house.

However...

I also made an hour long Youtube video that teaches how to make a story app using Talespring.com (below).



This video will take you through the entire environment of Talespring.com. This is a companion video to the paid videos. Think of it as "part 2" The reason I didn't want to include it in the paid series was to separate myself from Talespring as far as any liabilities or responsibilities. Also, if Talespring decided to upgrade or change their online tools I didn't want it to detract from the overall resource that the paid version is meant to be...and, the paid version will deliver good information for working with many different app builder tools.

I will be fulfilling the free videos on or before Wednesday, Nov 27th.

Good luck!!!

Get My New Video Tutorial - FREE!

I'm finally finished!!! Wow - these videos take a while to put together...and then there's the normal mishaps that take place like my kids barging into my studio asking if they can go to their friends house...or one of my personal favorites - the unplugged mic that you notice after a half hour session - trucks driving by etc.

So lets do another give away!

"Making Art For Story Apps & eBooks" will be live at Folio Academy in the next few days. I'd like to give away 10 copies to you guys.

THIS IS NOT THE GIVE AWAY YET - how it will work:

1. Sometime between Monday & Friday the 30th of November I'll make another blog post announcing the give away.

2. If you see the blog post - quickly enter your email in the comments section below. Please use the email that's already associated with your Folio Academy account - or if you don't have an account just enter your primary email address so I can set you up with your free account and video.

3. I'll give a free video to the first 10 people who leave their email in the comments section.

Last time I did this if I recall right we gave away 25 copies of my last video in just over an hour! Here's a link to that one.

Tips: 

1. Have your email address an anything you might want to write ready to just paste in the comments section so you don't have to worry about spelling under pressure.

2. Some people use Google Reader to keep up on blog updates quickly so they won because of that - simply "join this site" on the right in order to get up to date information.

GOOD LUCK!

Having Fun In Photoshop

Here's a quick one I just finished -  I'm trying to gear up on my Photoshop skills for an upcoming video tutorial that I'm working on.

Other things I'm currently working on:

Video Tutorial for Folio Academy - Making Art For eBooks & Story Apps - almost finished! check back after Thanksgiving for the give away! I'll be making the announcement so if you want to get my public updates you can follow this blog.

Working on a new Picture Book for next Halloween! - I wish I could show character sketches.

Working on a few freelance projects  - also can't show them :(

Working on my next story app - I'll be using Kwiksher - a photoshop plug-in and it looks really sweet!

and....the semester is coming to a close! Time to get some stuff done!