Conference Photo Recap: SCBWI Austin 2014

Road Tripping through west Texas—the drive from ABQ to Austin

New Postcard Promo!

(SCBWI Tomie dePaola Entry)

Hey! I'm heading to an SCBWI conference this weekend and I got a new postcard made for the occasion! I just happened to have a new piece, the one I made for SCBWI's Tomie dePaola contest.

See the Unofficial Gallery to look at other entires!

This is the whole piece, check out the assignment/prompt here.

It's a visual play on Hear no evil, See no evil, Speak no evil… which originates from Japanese folklore. So I took the work famous Snow Monkeys (Japanese Macaque) and instead of having anything to do with evil, they're just all sneezing… but only one of them is covering their mouth. I thought it was fun, and I'm happy with the piece overall. It also gave me a chance to test a new style—I worked smaller than actual size on this, and I went back in and added the line work (breezes and sneezes) digitally.

Conference Experience: SCBWI-LA 2012

Peace, Love and Children's Books… what a wild whirlwind ride it was. It started out with a couple amazing coincidences, like meeting one of my online critique group partners for the first time in-persion, Alice Rattarree, on my flight. The plane was packed, but we managed to get a whole row to ourselves as we poured over each others portfolios and giddily discussed our plans for the conference. Then we ended up on a shuttle with Deborah Underwood, author of The Quiet Book and The Loud Book… I mean come on, what a way to start!?

Fabulous Peeps: Alice Rattarree, Deborah Underwood,
Leeza Hernandez, Diandra Mae, and Amy Farrier

The moment I got the the hotel though, I was already late for the big RA meeting… oh, I don't think I ever got around to mentioning that here. I officially became the SCBWI-NM Illustrator Coordinator this spring. So, in addition to attending the conference, I was also volunteering and helping out – it's the best way to experiences these events, IMHO. ;) At the meeting there was a secret practice for our upcoming hippie-hop flash-mob… it really says something about these SCBWI people that just being around them totally motivated me to participate. ;)

Even more fabulous peeps: Kelly Light, Brian Bowes,
Bonnie Adamson, and Jennifer L. Meyer

Then came three fully packed/overwhelming/inspiring/motivating/exhausting days that I can barely begin to describe. It's taken a month and a half just to process enough to post about it!

I met two other Melindas, both writers. Melindas Unite!

The Hippie-Hop extravaganza, including (but not limited to)
fabulous peeps: Priscilla Burris, Sue Rankin,
and Debbie Ridpath Ohi

There was awesome Portfolio Showcase where amazing illustrator, Juana Martinez-Neal, took home the top honor. There were also amazing faculty members like, Tony DiTerlizzi, Arthur Levine, Dan Gutman, Antoinette Portis, Jon Klassen, Steven Malk, Laura Godwin, and Melissa Sweet and those are just the ones I got to see – there were so, so many more! About the only negative thing I have to say is that it wasn't possible to see and participate in ALL the wonderful events that happened at SCBWI-LA 2012.

From Tony DiTerlizzi's presentation

Catching-up at Summer's End…

It's been a long, distracting summer here. There's been so much going on, I obviously haven't had much time to keep up with the blog. But here are some of the biggest news items…

I have a new agency representing me! I'm very happy to have joined up with the nice folks over at Beehive Illustration, out of the UK. I'll also have a page in their annual catalog coming out next year, featuring several new pieces from another project I finished this summer…

Beehive Illustration Agency, UK

The Zoo's Annual Piggyback Race is a picture book project I worked on over the summer. It was just so much fun, and the best part is being DONE! I did all the illustration, as well the layout and design. The book is currently in production, so stay turned – I'll be spreading the word when it becomes available for purchase.

New book work complete! Look for news later this fall.

New book work: sneak peeks!

And last but not least, I finished a private fantasy commission piece as well. At 16"x 20, it's the largest completely colored pencil piece I've ever done.

Fantasy commission

I also went to the big SCBWI conference in LA. I've been to the big NYC Conference and several Regional conferences before, but visiting LA was a first for me. But I'll have more on that in my next post…