Knock on Wood.

Knocking on Wood is one of history's most enduring superstitions. It comes from thousands of years of mythology, folklore, and religious beliefs that trees are sacred, and believed that trees housed gods and nature spirits. People have laid hands on the trunks of a trees to seek favors from tree gods and nature spirits, and have believed that knocking on wood would wake up and shake out mischievous tree sprites and fairies.

I think these little tree sprites would happily stay napping if it wasn't for that pesky woodpecker!

If you're interested in my working process, I've posted a summary here.

I went through a lot of ideas for this prompt, and nothing felt right til I focused in on the word ‘shocked’ and started researching lightning folklore. I asked, “what if a little girl literally brought lightning to school?” So, I found the tale of the Kadlu, and fell in love. According to Inuit folklore, Kweetoo, Ignirtoq, and Kadlu are the three little sister goddesses of lightning, rain, and thunder. Kweetoo makes lightning by hitting flint stones together, and I was thinking how fun would it be to show the moment when Kweetoo goes to school and shows her sisters that she can create lightning.

You can check out my full process (this one was a doozy!) on the forums here.

Love seeing everyone's work! Good luck all!

This is a story of going down a lot of paths before you paint.

So, I was going to do "Everyone was shocked to see her show up to school with and octopus." I had lots of fun sketching some cute girl and her octopus sketches.

But, when I went to draw and paint it, it just wasn't me. It wasn't the kind of magic, myth, fantasy, and folklore jam I love doing. I don't even want to share the line art I started, but for posterity's sake here ya go.

So, I went back to the drawing board, and tried to figure out a way to turn the prompt on it's head, so I focused in on the word 'shocked' and thought about a girl literally bringing lightning to school. So, then, I went down a research hole into lightning folktales and mythology and stumbled upon the story of the Kadlu, and fell in love. According to Inuit folklore, Kweetoo, Ignirtoq, and Kadlu are the three little sister goddesses of lightning, rain, and thunder. Kweetoo makes lightning by hitting flint stones together, and I was thinking how fun would it be to show the moment when Kweetoo goes to school and shows her sisters that she can create lightning.

These are some of my favorite thumbs.

I went all the way to finished line art that never got a bit of paint. When I finished it, it just didn't have the spark I was looking for, and just had that generic kidlit look that is not my jam.

So, I started over -ish AGAIN! But, I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to do a portrait and expression heavy piece, but wanted to make sure it had good storytelling, and that's when I thought it'd be good to really bring the sisters in.

I'm pretty proud of the finished piece. I took Jake's critique to heart last time, and really tried to get the full range of levels in there, and did everything I could to make the final image and any illusion I wanted to include as realistic and magical as possible.

Line Art

Watercolor

Finished Illustration

Hello all!

I'm so excited to get going with SVS Learn, I'm already eating up the business lectures.

My name is Elinore Eaton, and I'm a professional illustrator, but very much at the beginning of my career, and looking to level up both professionally and technically. I began my career over 12 years ago as an art director and graphic designer in advertising, and have been pivoting into full time illustration over the last couple of years.

My most recent project is a 44 illustration oracle deck, set to be published towards the end of this year. I will be literally painting the last few illustrations next week. So, because I'm working with a publishing company, and keeping the art for the whole thing mostly a secret so far, I haven't been able to share the bulk of what I've been working on over the last year in my portfolio or elsewhere. So, in the meantime, I need to develop my brand, create some great products, and get some awesome client work!

I've been really taken by the 3 Point Perspective podcast, and finally decided to join the community, since I've decided to fully embrace illustration as my lifelong profession.

I am really inspired by symbolism, visionary, myth, folklore, and fairytale illustration with high emotional and conceptual impact. My main goal right now is really to get professional work (good work), so I'll be going through all of the business material first, and see where I go next. Not sure if I need an agent, go directly to some publishers, build a shop on my website, apply for art fairs and illustration contests, and/or just focus on a personal product/project, so am hoping some of the material here will help clear those things up.

Looking forward to joining you all on your journey, and sharing mine with you!

My website is https://www.elinoreeaton.com/
I am @elinoreeatonart on all social media, and am currently most active on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/elinoreeatonart/

I work mainly in watercolor and digital painting. Here is a taste of some of the work I do!

I just posted my entry for this month's "Superstition" contest, "Knock on Wood" and I thought some folks might want to see my process for the work.

I started off with some very messy thumbnails and researching superstitions until I find a concept I really like. Knocking on Wood is one of history's most enduring superstitions. It comes from thousands of years of mythology, folklore, and religious beliefs that trees are sacred, and believed that trees housed gods and nature spirits. People have laid hands on the trunks of a trees to seek favors from tree gods and nature spirits, and have believed that knocking on wood would wake up and shake out mischievous tree sprites and fairies. I love painting nature, fairies, and spirit, so this was a good choice for me to play with.

From there, I create a finished line work.

Then, it's time for watercolor!

Finally, I do clean up and a little "digital magic" to finish things up.

I think these little tree sprites would happily stay napping if it wasn't for that pesky woodpecker!

I've begun a personal product (as @Jake-Parker likes to say, "you need a product not a project!"), and thought it would be great to share the journey and creation with you all, maybe get some great feedback in the process, and maybe inspire my fellow illustrators in their products and projects! It's also so great to have a forum of illustrators to keep accountability with. Freelance illustration can be lonely work!

I'm adapting The Snow Queen, and am already deep in the research, thumbnailing, and concepts process, and am hoping to be complete with that and ready to start painting by September 16th.

My timeline for the product's completion is about 7 months, barring getting hired/a great illustration job in the meantime (fingers crossed that happens!), in which case, I'll have to re-assess my timeline. My current count on illustrations I'm planning is 37, but that may change a smidge over the next 2 weeks as I am completing the thumbnails and basic layout. Whew! I recently completed a 44-card full color oracle deck, and have created a pretty streamline process for getting often pretty complex illustrations complete, and am happy to share it, and always welcome feedback and ideas for improvement! I also just finished the "Illustrating Children's Books" course here, and am doing a mashup of my process with what I am learning from that class to make this book happen!

I'd like to eventually have the book published and hold it in my hot little hands. I'm also hoping to design lots of prints, trinkets, and hopefully some licensed images along the way. I'm thinking Christmas cards and ornaments would fit in really well. I know The Snow Queen has already been done a million times, but my hope for this, my first children's book, is that the familiarity with the content may endear a larger audience to my work.

I'm also posting on my Instagram and Facebook page, and any follows there as well are most welcome.

Wish me luck, and I look forward to sharing the journey with you!

Here are some of my initial thumbnails for the first half of the book. I'm letting myself have some flexibility with the compositions, so am just using squares for now to get the ideas down, and then assess the best layouts based on the composition ideas. Nothing is more inspiring for me to get this part done than not letting myself start any real designing, drawing or painting til this is done! It really is the hardest part. <le sigh>

I'm currently trying to really tighten up my style and get to that next level of polish, so I figured this would be a great class to tackle.

This has already been quite eye opening, and not for reasons I thought it would be. I've had Pinterest boards and folders on my computer of work I love and/or want to emulate, but I've never actually focused on just the style aspects, and then plot them all out on one sheet. Seeing them as one whole made it easier to get clearer insights. But, then doing the same with my work...holy moly, what an eye opener.

Dream Portfolio (Step 1)

My Current Top Illustrations (Step 2)

Elinore Eaton/Dream Portfolio Observations

Large overall constructed shapes, very designed compositions, divided by highly detailed and decorated sections--often areas or lines comprised of dots, snow, stars, complex costume, etc. alongside large simplified areas. The high contrast areas/focus of the compositions are often the simplest, or like an overall light painting with only one dark area or vice versa.

Light. Lots of these seem “special” because of the treatment and attention to light.

Curving, wavy lines, motion or a suggestion motion even though most of these feel quiet. Even the Delort piece (which I realize is the only black and white one and has a bit of a horror genre to it, but totally belongs and has been a favorite of mine for years) feels quiet, but full with tension and mood.
Everything seems very dreamy to me. Themes are relationships with animals, flying or leaping, symbolism, stars falling, seeing words and energy. Not surprisingly, fairytale vibes and wonder, often feminine.

Most of these have a very limited color palette. Lots of blues and warm neutrals. Some with pops of a bold red. Wow...actually all of them are blue and yellow to some degree, with some version of one of those colors almost black.

No heavy line work. The few that have line work, it’s that delicate Golden Age style of lined edges with complementary colored lines with watercolor glazing and texture.

The big thing I feel like I am missing with my work is cleanliness. My values are also not as good. Just less sophisticated and more evenly distributed.

Notes for me:
-Create larger areas of rest, truly large solid shapes and higher levels of contrast in size of shapes. Visually, my pieces just seem busier.
-Pay special service to light or the darkness, reflections, spotlights, stars, golden hour, etc. Some of your newer pieces are getting flat.
-Enjoy curvy lines, wavy shapes, and marks that express motion, but not everywhere.
-Dreamy quiet quality. Stop yelling.
-Can’t go wrong with blue and yellow. Warm up your whites, darken your darks. Similar to the value idea, don’t go halfsies, think more one overall color, with the support of one other, and only sometimes a punch of a third, most likely red.

• Decide on an overall value for a piece (mostly dark or light), a lot of mine seem equally divided between darks and lights, and then use the lesser value to define focus.
  -Soften edges, think more impressionism, pastels.
  -Work on polish. Work on polish. Work on polish.

-Themes to focus on:
animal/human relationships
dreams, symbols, metaphor
fairytales
costume, jewelry, ornamental objects
girls, feminine sensibilities
scenes in nature with motion--flying, swimming, weather
Lights, stars, dark creatures with glowing eyes, golden hour, large figures or a grouping with small figures

Any other observations?

Looking forward to going through Step 3 and rocking some Master Studies!

I totally echo what @Lee-White is saying. As i've gotten more experienced at painting, the research and thumbnails take way longer. I feel like paintings used to take 40 hours (and I'm thinking of full color watercolor to digital paintings I do), but I didn't spend as much time on the research and thumbnails, and would often struggle through the painting, and have to problem solve as I went. Now, I spend way more time on research and thumbnails, and not only does the painting happen pretty quickly, but it's much more enjoyable and relaxing. I do all the problem solving before the brushes come out. I do sometimes spend extra time at certain stages of a painting because it's just fun (we all have certain things we love to savor), and I don't feel bad about indulging in that because I didn't waste a bunch of time re-painting a hand over and over or get halfway through and realize the composition is bad.
That said, my paintings usually take about 16-18 hours (2 full work days is how I like to think of it) from start to finish depending on the complexity--but keep in mind these paintings used to take me about 40 hours.

Ummigah, I did it!!!

First time laying out a chapter book, and I'm pumped. I didn't go into this project planning a chapter book, but after looking at what I wanted to do, the age group I want to aim at, and the length I wanted to keep, I think this is the right choice. Other than the spot illustrations I plan to do for the chapter beginnings, I have all the composition sketches in place and the text complete, and laid out. It ended up taking slightly longer than I had expected, because as it turns out, I am fully adapting the text. Pretty much changed the ending, made it more modern and easier to understand for the age group I am aiming at which is 7-9, with the word count clocking in at 8440, and I ended up going with a 8.5x11" book with 18 pt font and 24 pt leading. Adapting a long text was great practice to get me back in the swing of writing, and I really am grateful now for the years I spent teaching ESL! I was a little intimidated at first, but am even more in love with the story since the changes I made. I'm also grateful for the years working in advertising and working with InDesign. Eighty-six pages would have been stupid difficult to do in just Photoshop.

Is it painting time yet? Pretty please? (Well, after much reference hunting and line art anyhow.) I'm pretty sure I'm going to start with Story 1 which is the most snow themed, then story 5, which is the Lapland story and has the bulk of the reindeer illustrations, and will be great for the holidays I think. I'm hoping to do Snow Queen ornaments and stickers, maybe even jewelry! Not sure after that at this point, but will probably save all the flower and garden illustrations for spring. Who wants Snow Queen pendants?!

Thanks so much y'all! I'm glad to share. Making art is often a long journey with lots of twists and turns, not a one stop shop. Sometimes you gotta just dig your heels in and keep going til you get where you really want to go.

@Julia I've been working on a process that blends watercolor and digital painting together. It's kind of my secret sauce right now, and I'm having so much fun with it. Ultimately, the look I'm going for is that it looks like something very tangible and relatable and real, the watercolor; but then has a lighting quality and magic to it that doesn't make sense for watercolor to do by itself--not easily anyhow--so the viewer isn't quite sure what they are looking at. I've tried to get the look just using one or the other and it just isn't the same. Watercolor has a natural alchemy that you just cannot re-produce digitally, and it also already has a natural luminance to it--and digital painting always has that human touch, hand to media, missing from it. Sometimes the pieces look more watercolor and people can't even tell there is digital painting involved, but there almost always is in my work.

I LOL'd.

Time to get that imagination motor running!

Thanks so much y'all! I'm glad to share. Making art is often a long journey with lots of twists and turns, not a one stop shop. Sometimes you gotta just dig your heels in and keep going til you get where you really want to go.

@Julia I've been working on a process that blends watercolor and digital painting together. It's kind of my secret sauce right now, and I'm having so much fun with it. Ultimately, the look I'm going for is that it looks like something very tangible and relatable and real, the watercolor; but then has a lighting quality and magic to it that doesn't make sense for watercolor to do by itself--not easily anyhow--so the viewer isn't quite sure what they are looking at. I've tried to get the look just using one or the other and it just isn't the same. Watercolor has a natural alchemy that you just cannot re-produce digitally, and it also already has a natural luminance to it--and digital painting always has that human touch, hand to media, missing from it. Sometimes the pieces look more watercolor and people can't even tell there is digital painting involved, but there almost always is in my work.

This is a story of going down a lot of paths before you paint.

So, I was going to do "Everyone was shocked to see her show up to school with and octopus." I had lots of fun sketching some cute girl and her octopus sketches.

But, when I went to draw and paint it, it just wasn't me. It wasn't the kind of magic, myth, fantasy, and folklore jam I love doing. I don't even want to share the line art I started, but for posterity's sake here ya go.

So, I went back to the drawing board, and tried to figure out a way to turn the prompt on it's head, so I focused in on the word 'shocked' and thought about a girl literally bringing lightning to school. So, then, I went down a research hole into lightning folktales and mythology and stumbled upon the story of the Kadlu, and fell in love. According to Inuit folklore, Kweetoo, Ignirtoq, and Kadlu are the three little sister goddesses of lightning, rain, and thunder. Kweetoo makes lightning by hitting flint stones together, and I was thinking how fun would it be to show the moment when Kweetoo goes to school and shows her sisters that she can create lightning.

These are some of my favorite thumbs.

I went all the way to finished line art that never got a bit of paint. When I finished it, it just didn't have the spark I was looking for, and just had that generic kidlit look that is not my jam.

So, I started over -ish AGAIN! But, I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to do a portrait and expression heavy piece, but wanted to make sure it had good storytelling, and that's when I thought it'd be good to really bring the sisters in.

I'm pretty proud of the finished piece. I took Jake's critique to heart last time, and really tried to get the full range of levels in there, and did everything I could to make the final image and any illusion I wanted to include as realistic and magical as possible.

Line Art

Watercolor

Finished Illustration

I went through a lot of ideas for this prompt, and nothing felt right til I focused in on the word ‘shocked’ and started researching lightning folklore. I asked, “what if a little girl literally brought lightning to school?” So, I found the tale of the Kadlu, and fell in love. According to Inuit folklore, Kweetoo, Ignirtoq, and Kadlu are the three little sister goddesses of lightning, rain, and thunder. Kweetoo makes lightning by hitting flint stones together, and I was thinking how fun would it be to show the moment when Kweetoo goes to school and shows her sisters that she can create lightning.

You can check out my full process (this one was a doozy!) on the forums here.

Love seeing everyone's work! Good luck all!

What an interesting question! I've heard that style is actually a laundry list of someone's weaknesses. I think this is sometimes true, but not always, and I think it comes down to choice. I think it is ideal to be able to draw and paint everything realistically if tasked to do so. Though this may be a tall order, if you have this basically under your belt, your style comes from stylistic choices based on your preferences, rather than your weaknesses. I think you know what you may or may not be doing based on weaknesses as opposed to choices. Nothing wrong with that! In fact, I think it's quite smart to design illustrations always keeping in mind what you're good at, and enjoy doing. (The recent SVS Podcast on style talks about this a bit.) But, you don't want to feel limited on what you can and can't do, so always be working on improving weaknesses and hard skills.

On to your specific question, "How do you personally choose what elements of reality to keep and strive for and which you let go of?" I've been leaning pretty hard into figuring this out lately, since I have spent the bulk of the last two years really working on hard skills (anatomy, perspective, composition, color and light), and a lot of my experiments in really honing in on my style is listening to what people are liking in my work and wanting more of, and then crossing it with what I'm noticing I enjoy and want to incorporate more of into my work. I think this middle ground is where good style happens. I think that it's a better goal for your style to be driven by your strengths, rather than cover up your weaknesses. Find things that you love in other artists' work and work hard on re-creating it in your own way.

@MissMushy ANytime! GL on your masters adventures!

@MissMushy You are asking some very good questions!

I think one of the keys to master studies is having a very clear purpose. Ask yourself what it is that you are trying to learn or take away from the art you are looking at: the line work, composition, color, light quality, maybe how they paint eyes? Otherwise you may just end up trying to make a copy, without learning much. It happens to the best-intentioned of us. So, if what you are trying to learn is the medium that the original artist used, then yes, do everything in your power to know the medium that was used, do the research, and use the master study as a way to explore and learn that medium. If not, then the medium doesn't matter. I appreciate the skill that goes into a master study where the student is just trying to make an exact copy, but I've found over the years (and I am a master study junky), that the best way to get the most out of your master study is to be really clear about what you want to take away from the original artist and incorporate into your own work, then focus on that.

One of the best ways I have found benefits of master studies, is to do many from the same artist. For example, I did a very lengthy series of Edgar Payne master studies with the purpose of understanding his use of color and decisions around composition. He's an oil painter, but I could kind of care less about learning how to paint in oil, but I did want to figure out how to get some of his brushing technique replicated digitally--so, I did the studies digitally. I also didn't waste time getting the paintings to look exactly like the originals, because my purpose was to understand his color choices and compositions, so that's where I spent most of my time. I would do a one hour study of his original, and do a 3-4 hour original painting using what I learned. This is how I do all my master studies now, and highly recommend it to anyone else who wants to be a fellow master study junky. When done with purpose, master studies can be the best teacher.

So long rant short, ask yourself first, "what do I want to learn SPECIFICALLY from this master?" and just focus on that takeaway.

@NessIllustration Yay! So glad, anytime. I'm kind of a composition junky.
Looking forward to seeing how this goes!

@Lee-White Awesome! Thanks!

What a fun illustration! @NessIllustration I'd love to see the running characters be a bit larger and closer to the audience, maybe have the cat the closest. It will create a stronger dominance structure, as well as bring some stronger layering and perspective. If you make them larger and shift them just slightly so that they overlap the stairs a bit, you're also going to lead the eye from the mummy to them and back again, and the composition won't be divided by that strong line illustrating the corner of the room. I did a quick re-size to show you what I mean. Nice work!