Hey, folks--just wanted to let you know that one of our own, @Neha-Rawat won the SCBWI (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) Summer Spectacular Portfolio Showcase that just wrapped itself up a few minutes ago. Out of around 450 participants, she was one of two Grand Champion winners! Here at SVSLearn, she was a featured student for February 2020!

You may recall a couple weeks ago, Neha created a thread that actually asked if participating was worth the experience... I wasn't too optimistic, but I have to eat my own words as it obviously worked for her!!! She wins free admission to the next virtual conference in February, meetings with three art directors, and a $1000 gift certificate to Blick Art Supplies.

There was a group of us on Instagram DMing each other as we watched the sessions (thank-you so much @Coley for setting it up and corralling us all together), and we had a great time! It was nice touching bases with everyone as the event unfolded. Apparently, the usual attendance for the conference held annually in LA is around 1200, but because everything was online this year they had over 4000 participants from all over the world. Neha's work was seen by thousands of people.

You can see Neha's showcase here. Judging criteria included: 1) children's book publishing appropriateness, 2) consistency of a strong illustrative "voice" throughout, and 3) a fresh and unique style.

The entire collection of illustrators can be found here. It's a great resource, and useful to see what imagery other illustrators are including in their portfolios. It will be available through the month of August.

Congrats again, Neha!!!

This mermaid went down fighting, I think...

Over a year after work started on the album (thank-you Covid) my first paid work as an illustrator has finally been published/released! It's not a children's book or a magazine or anything--just an album cover. I did it all in Procreate, and I'm happy with how it turned out. The iterations this thing went through... whew! And learning what should be included in a contract and what shouldn't, and how very different the perceptions of process are when coming from different angles... Wow. ("No, illustration doesn't mean I know anything about selecting the correct fonts... No, illustration doesn't mean I know how to Art Direct and format the interior content you want... No, I think you need a graphic designer for that part...." Oy...) Learning curve all the way around.

Anyway, I thought I'd share.

https://hemisphere.hearnow.com/american-dreams

Alrighty. Here goes.

Personal first steps!

Someone saw one of my hands from my 100 Hands of Family and Friends ongoing personal project, and wanted something like it for an album cover for their band. Haha! I guess those square Instagram images are good for something, right? I'm also making different image assets distilled from layers of the same hand portrait so they can use them in their 12-page CD insert. Ironically, the part they didn't want was the hand itself... LOL!

Anyway, I finally got to practice making a contract, talking about logistics, so on and so forth. I'm sure I've screwed up something somehow that will come back and bite me in the butt, but hey--I'm just reveling in the idea that someone is actually paying me to draw for them.

And I thought I'd share this little victory of mine with folks who I know can appreciate it.

Happy Dance!!!

Alrighty. Trying a double page spread this time.

Now that I have a printer, I'm thinking of new ways to use it. Pondering an 11x17 "Story Calendar", but haven't quite figured out the graphics and the formatting.

@Melissa-Bailey-0 Thanks so much for taking the time to share! Your post is really informative! Very helpful (for me, anyway...)! Thank-you!!!

This week I got my first ever self-published project done and up for sale. It's not children's illustration but I'm really proud of it. I couldn't find a cheap source for the type of calendar I wanted to make, so I just did it myself. I learned so much doing this, and the things I had to do to make it happen are going to pay off in my future: I bought a nice professional printer (Canon Pixma Pro 200), I started an LLC, I invested in a good paper (thanks to @Lee-White for the B&H Photo source), a hole-punch and shipping supplies, figured out how the e-commerce offerings work on my website service... It has been a profoundly valuable endeavor with such a deeply intense learning curve--and I'm so glad I did it. Even if I don't sell a single calendar, the choices I committed to will pay off in the long run in many ways, with many potential projects now possible. It has been a very good couple of weeks in my studio!

https://www.coreyartusimagery.com/2022calendar/2022calendar

If you're using a computer, you should be able to pop the PSD into a free program like Gimp to change the color mode very quickly. That way you're not relying upon anyone else to change it for you if you have other files that are in Grayscale mode.

It is saved originally in Grayscale Mode. That's why it says the color mode is not supported in Procreate--it doesn't have a Grayscale color space.

I've changed the color mode to RGB for this version of the file I've placed on my Dropbox. You can download it from there. Maybe this version will work better for you.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/133kbptmfoppc0e/LightandShadow_Assignment_02-191217-181914RGB.psd?dl=0

Wrapping it up for the month of June by getting my calendar project on its feet! I purchased a new Canon Pixma Pro-200 printer, got myself some double-sided matte 11x17 paper, and finally turned my attention to getting my upcoming 2022 Bird calendar done. I'm beyond excited about my printer, and after plunking down a pretty penny on shipping supplies, I'm now potentially buying one of those fancy-schmancy binding machines to put in the holes and a metal coil in the top for the flip... This project has been more than a year in the making, and it's finally reaching fruition. It's so close to being completed I can taste it!

I agree with @jimsz. When I originally signed up for SVSLearn, I was coming off a disappointing year of self-driven classes through Schoolism, and I was looking for an educational experience that was about the wide range of visual storytelling possibilities without being singularly laser-focused specifically on career prep for the movie, animation, or gaming industries to the exclusion of everything else. As much as I love picture books, I think there are lots of other forms that ultimately tell stories visually. Even the monthly challenges are focused primarily through a picture book lens without specifically articulating it. On the landing page for SVSLearn, instead of saying, "Find work as an Illustrator," it is much more accurate to say "Find work as a children's book Illustrator", as all the classes that touch on any other type of illustration are noticeably tertiary to that specific field of focus and everything that goes into it.

And to be honest, even Will, Jake, & Lee don't just do picture books. They never have. It's exceedingly rare to have a career just doing picture books and nothing else. It would be nice to see other avenues of illustration being focused on in more than a passing manner--such as book covers, middle-grade illustration, self-publishing and non-traditional endeavors, illustrated novels, comics, posters, editorial work, and the vast panoply of new graphic novel modes for multi-various ages. SVSLearn obviously privileges illustration specifically for children of picture-book-age, and that's okay, but it would be good to have that very clearly spelled out initially.

Duplicate the brush.

Then tap the new brush and go into the Brush Studio. Go to "Properties".

Increase the Brush Behavior "Maximum Size" to something bigger than 9%, (which is what it's set at right now). I set mine at Maximum. See if that works for you.

You can also get the pressure of your pencil to adjust the size. If you go into the Apple Pencil settings and adjust Pressure "Size" to maximum, you'll be able to control the pencil's size with how hard you press.

I posted this in the "May Studio" thread before submitting this to this month's challenge. So I deleted that post and put it here.

Wrapping up the month with one last little ditty. Put this together during my live stream, then tweaked just a bit afterward.