It's a Breeze

    Hello Everyone, Happy Saturday!
Here is my entry for the Tomie dePaola Award.  It is painted in watercolor with details
in watercolor pencil and touches of pastel for the softness of the hair.

  I enjoyed working on this piece.  It was a real challenge and it taught me a lot about planning
and listening to assignments.  I thought I had my design but then reworked it twice.  First
the main character was a bunny.  Then I remembered something about the prompt saying
we live in a country with diverse ethnicity, so I developed this cutie.  I didn't want her to  
look too girly, but the flower kind of makes her so.  I like my results but now looking at it 
from afar I can see the two large flowers are too close in size.  They sort of compete, which
is one element in design you have to be wary of- duplicating size of elements.  I also recommend
taping your project up at eye level and then standing back and really looking at all the elements
and how they  relate.  It has been a while since college, but we always did this for critiques and
I sort of forgot.
  The winning entries for this award were announced yesterday.

You can view them here...http://www.scbwi.org/awards/tomie-depaola-award/  This is my 

third time entering this contest and I am not upset about not winning.  Really!  I think I have 

finally grown a bit, developing that "thick skin" they say it takes to be in this business.  

    I promised more of my gnu illustrations.  I did this sketch, then realized the layout was 

way too much like the first illustration (see last post).  Then after creating this store, Love Above,  I thought although I would love to shop there (I really want the giant bird head display holding the purse), a bookstore would be a better idea.

 So I reworked it.

The idea being that this gnu girl 

is a lover of books and needs a job so perhaps it's a perfect fit. When I started drawing this 

illustration I really liked the look of the pencil.  I wanted to make this a weekly story, but 

honestly started to get bored with it already.  I think it would be fun if I explore this story in 

whatever way I feel could be interesting.  It could go anywhere and keep you guessing.  

So be it.  Have a great night and wonderful week!