New Portfolio Website and Blog

by Eliza

I've been devoting the past few weeks to building a new website and blog, and I'm excited to share it with you all! Hot off the press:http://www.wheelerstudio.com

For the past year, I've been wanting to start a blog, but hadn't quite the courage to get one going. Having this group blog has really helped me warm up to the idea, learn the ropes a bit, and give me clarity on what I would be using my blog for. It also helps that other members of this group have blogs, so I was able to follow their examples and see what seems to be working for them.

On my blog, I explain a little bit about the new site, why I needed a new one, and what I used to build it. Please check it out!

SCBWI-NYC Illustrators Intensive: Dan Yaccarino

Takeaways from Debbie Ridpath Ohi

The first Keynote speaker at the SCBWI Winter Conference in New York was Dan Yaccarino. I had already seen Dan speak at the LA conference last year (I think it was last year), so was looking forward to seeing his presentation.

Dan Yaccarino is a NYC artist who work has been featured in books, television, magazines and newspapers worldwide. He's written and illustrated over three dozen children's books, created and produced two animated series for kids, illustrated for hundreds of magazines.

Dan showed us clips from his past and current projects as well as entertaining us with some visual puns (I love his sense of humor). Here are some of my takeaways from his talk as well as interesting info from the Q&A section:

- Focus on STORY and CHARACTER. Don't worry about digital technology changes -- it's all still about good story and compelling characters. The medium is secondary.

- On a "good day," Dan says that half his time is spent illustrating: about 4-5 hours. The rest of the day is spent doing writing, promotion or other projects. He tends to write in the morning, illustrating in the afternoon.

- Have a website is better than having just a portfolio. It's important for illustrators to have a website! A website can include multimedia, something a regular print portfolio can't.

You can find more info about Dan Yaccarino at:

http://www.danyaccarino.com/ys/

Dancing Sketches

Lots of fun fun fun work lately on a story about a dancer, including a zillion sketches; here's the first set, with lots more to be posted soon. It has been a real joy and challenge to represent dance as more than form and doing - it is feeling!

~John

New Work: Cinnamon

by Eliza Wheeler www.elizasportfolio.com

I thought I would share with you all a new illustration that I created for the SCBWI-LA scholarship contest, due to be postmarked by tomorrow. The challenge was to create an illustration inspired by the word Cinnamon. A toughie! I came up with this solution after thinking about where cinnamon comes from. Of course, it's from the little lady who collects it in Cinnamon Land.

From Debbie's camera: John & Andrea after the NYC Winter Conference

John, Andrea and I had a fantastic time at the SCBWI Winter Conference. I'll be posting more about what I learned as well as more pics, but here's a fun collage I put together of some quick snaps I took when the three of us got together at the end of the convention, to compare notes and just to catch up. I told John and Andrea to look as if they were talking about something fascinating. Heh.

To Kimberly, Eliza and Ashley: we missed you!

For those of you who missed the conference: check out the official SCBWI Conference Blog, where you'll find great info, summaries and video interviews (including a somewhat overly ENERGETIC one from yours truly :-)).

-- Debbie