when duse the new turme start!!!!!!!!!!!!!

is it jan the 1st were bake!!!!!!!!

n-way hears my ark book

Freddie and the fairy flickr Pool

Not sure if Vicky posted this before, but here is a pool which was linked to the following article:
http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/navigate.do?pPageID=1789
The Pool:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/picturethisatwaterstones/pool/

Note, there's an innumerable amount of dross, amongst the good stuff!

Merry Christmas everyone !

Short Story Booklet

Here's my short story booklet about a girl walking through the forest in the dark and finding a lantern to guide her, yet being followed by some strange cloaked creatures. Any ideas or feedback on these images would be great. Thanks guys, and Happy Christmas too all =)

spread test

Hi, Here is a mock up of my first spread. The type is just temporary and will change. Wanted to ask your opinion on:

I am going to colour the right hand image - should I?
Layout of left hand page
The edges of the spot illustrations - how is the cropping?
:) thanks!

(heres the originals)

Kit Williams

There was an interesting documentary about painter and infamous illustrator Kit Williams on BBC4 tonight. I would have posted it before it happened but i didn't know until I was actually watching it o.o However it should be on iPlayer soon-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00p5wpv/sign/The_Man_Behind_the_Masquerade/

It's worth watching if only because he's an amazing painter and very eccentric!

Moveable books/ paper engineering

Hey everyone!

Is anyone interested in making a moveable books collective? Sounds like a really wicked idea as ink soup seem to be going really well now and helping each other a lot, and after the talk the other day I'm really inspired to look at this type of thing and it seemed like a lot of people were really interested. We can all learn together and it should be really helpful, rather than us all going really slowly and making the mistakes all on our own. Comment on this if you're interested! (Although to be honest I'm not great at organising people so don't expect me to get everything together!!!)

Chloe

borders sales

hello people, as everyone may know Borders has gone down the shitter, so everything is 20% off if not more. Anyone doing picture books (especially for level fives who have just started) or graphic novels (or anyone who likes to read rows of words tbh) should have a gander, i know borders are pricey shits but it might be cheaper in some cases than amazon if u have a good dig. i found 'while u were sleeping' by alexis deacon and this big badass visual companion for the film version of 'where the wild things are', saved bout 7 quid on those together.

Book Swop

Heya picture book people -
does anybody want to do a "book swop" day? i.e. Bring in all your picture books and we can all look at eachother's research?

I say this because I think it would be a nice way of seeing new picture books without spending all our money. And I also have some looooverly new books which I want to show off to everyone!
So how about Wednesday?

Kt. :)

Publishers List

Hello everyone, I found this list particularly useful for emailing publishers about my work and for Q&A regarding my dissertation. There's quite a bit on here so have a good rummage!

http://www.kidsolr.com/language_arts/page6.html

Vicky Norton my heroine!

Okay, not said much to Vicky lately, because I'm still gob smacked - the most recent series that you have produced is absolutely wonderful. The use of simple spacial compositions that look carefully considered - the final two images with the dogs such a witty use of closure, the use of black and white, very confident, no shaky lines like before - I've just been waiting for Vicky to trip up somewhere, as a student should, and you haven't - I can visualize all of this in publication, and to be honest, I don't know of any pother student, who has produced a complete series capable of the same success - What next?

Just thought -

Think I'm going to tweak the one with the dog weeing on his head - i enlarged it a fair bit on p.shop and its lost a lot of clarity and looks especially ropey - wont take long. And I'm not sure whether it would be worth including a further two pages of him attending college? But Im not sure its necessary or whether I've left it a bit abrupt at the end? Hmmmm...

The last three...

Last three, the last two are intended as double page spread.

And the rest...

Almost to the end now, only 3 pages left to go, any thoughts would be great - just working on the covers and a small zine to go with it - also working on a piece for the next ink soup so watch this space!

And the next four....

For anyone whos interested lol here are the next four!

Here ye are!

And heres the next four! The last two are intended as a double page spread! Any thoughts on the different font?

And there's more...

here are the next two....

A new road!

As usual I start something then inevitably change tack for whatever reason which this time i wont bore you with but here are 4 pages from my new story which will become part of a series. My audience has now changed to older children, about 12 + really id say. More to come as I  

finish each page!

 

Meeting Anthony Browne at the Cheltenham Festival

This is an awesome post for me to be able to write, as we were give the chance to meet piccie book illustrator Anthony Browne today following his one hour session as part of the Cheltenham Festival. Bar my dorky grin and Cherry's interesting expression, it was a class day after he gave some background as to his inspirations, and his methods of teaching children stories purely through his illustration. We also had a quick chat after at the book signing session and i gave him a few cheeky badges one of which he is (ridiculously chuffed!) to be wearing in this photo.

SCBWI conference

http://britishscbwi.org/conference2009/

21st-22nd november, click on the link for further details, event for children's book illustrators and authors. Main points are that there will be art directors from walker, little tiger press and egmont and on the saturday there will be an open portfolio session to show work. sounds good for getting professional feedback from the very experienced panel attending.

Paw-lar Bear

Hey guys
I drew this on Sunday jus for fun and finished the colouring today.
It s a tiny picture story/sequence wonna-be artist s book mbe? I havent decided what i m gonna do with it but i do wona see it in somethin more substansial(..i think that is the word) than just drawings in my sketchbook.

It s a textless story-if you can call it this-which is:
Paw the polar bear, loves playin with his paws. But suddenly there are all over the place paw prints. We look around to find out whose paw are they and then Ha!Paw shyly admits they are his. 'What to do?' he shrugs and smiles and continues to play with his paws..

This is the over all story.
I havent decided whether i would add text or not that s why i havent worked on it.

I wanted to do is as a small saddle-stich booklet style buT i have problem with the pagination. i m missing two pages which i have no idea what to do with. I might have to add four endpages (so the whole layout wont be ruined aargh :s). But even so, i still have problem with printing it out as the photocopiers dont do double sided in practise (i was trying to make it work the other day and it was hopeless, and the librarian didn know how to help me either). Any other ideas of how i could print it and get the booklet or book-ish output?(without costing me a leg and an arm :s)
Thnx :)

South Bank Show

Hey just a quick one, there's a documentary on Disney Pixar on now ITV1, its all about how they created their stories and how they touch on the emotions of children, story concepts etc i think itll be helpful for picture book buddies! Sorry for the short notice only just realised it was on few mins ago

Spilt Glitter

New piece for Piano and la boy, ive changed the composition a little for this one so it still has balance but doesnt rely so much on straight symmetry. I'm still quite not happy with the sky but on the whole content with the final illustration. I know you love this portion of text from the story Chiu, now you can read it aloud to yourself whenever you feel like. Any opinions would be lavvly.

Cheltenham!

Now for these i can comment :)
It was on Saturday, part of the Cheltenham festival (i posted it a few days ago about it). I booked the two events on that day with Chris Riddell and both were fantastic.
The 1st,

1001 Children’s Books: Julia Eccleshare, Michael Morpurgo, Chris Riddell

was the three of them sitting on stage and discussing about children's books. Michael Morpurgo also read a part of one of his favorite stories and then they discoussed the link of the books they grew up and like and how that is passed on, which is mainly why so many classics are still so popular.


The other event i went which was only with Chris Riddell, Monsters and Mice, Chris read us two of his stories and then talked about how he started etc.
At the end, he chose a kid from the front, asked him to draw a big shape and then on, based on the childrens' requests on how many eyes/mouths etc there should be, he drew a monster. Pretty cool.
I didnt really have the chance to make him a small interview cz he was signing and then had to go else as well, but i did get to ask him whether he could come and give a small talk here and he said that for that we should contact with his agent.