Best posts made by jenithornhill

Here is my entry for this month. I have been busy with other projects, and didn't get to do the last two months...but I wanted to get at least one Yeti in before the theme changes.

I just wanted to share some exciting news! A book I illustrated last year was nominated, and shortlisted for the IODE Jean Throop Award. It is a self published book, but it is shortlisted with 4 other books, one by Scholastic and three by Kids Can Press. What an honor to be listed with these big publishers!! Here are a couple of illustrations from the book. If you are interested the book is called SCRUB: HOW SIMPLE SOAP SAVED THE DAY and was written by Suzanne Belliveau.

Oh, I think it worked this time.
My submission for the January contest prompt.

BIG TROUBLE!!! The school bus is never the best way to transport your projects to school!
Digital art in Photoshop.

Here is my entry for 'Nightfall'. I decided to keep the canoe. I am not sure if it qualifies, but I was also attempting the "Draw 50 Things" drawing from Will's video. At one point I did count, and had more than 50 items, but I am now sure if 50 of them made it through the final edits. If anyone wants to count, let me know!

Hi Everyone, I am new to to SVS and digital painting. Here is my entry for the February Octopus Contest.
It is my first full digital painting, so I would love someone to critique it.

I have been working for a long time to choose a style for my portfolio, and I think i have finally settled on this. I would love to hear people's opinion. Could you see this type of drawing in a children's book? Is it too simplistic? Does it look too digital?

I just finished this spread for a new book project I am working on. Hoping to finish the full book soon!

I had a university professor who told me I should have a whole sketchbook fill of pictures of eyes!
I spent a lot of time worrying about hands and feet (and eyes) in my illustrations...and then one day I was looking at a children's book and noticed how bad the hands were. This led me to look at more hands in more books. They arent good! Noone is good at hands and feet.
Every time I look at a book now, I always check out the hands and feet. Do you know how many 4 and 6 fingered hands are out there. Lots! Dont worry about yours. They cant be any worse. Worry about composition. Light and shaddow. Color choices. Those are the things that matter.

I have done a little more work on this... (a little work that took a long time!) I think some of it will be easier to make out now. I have shaded the foreground section just to visually separate it while I am working.
My biggest question at this point is about the linework on the bear. I have used a solid line to outline everything so far, but a sketchy-furry line for the outline of the bear. Does that look ok? Should I do a solid line?

@jenithornhill Here it is again with some color blocked in. Thoughts?

I hope that a couple of people can see what this is supposed to be, and give me some feedback. I know that it is very rough and scribbly, but I would like a couple of opinions before I move on.
The idea is that the bears have come out after nightfall and are enjoying the campfire, while the people hide in the tent. In the final drawing the bears will have broken up all of the people's things, and made a big mess of the site.
The things I would really like to know, at this point are...

1. How is the composition so far. Does the darker areas around the outside, bring your eye into the center where the bears are?
2. Does the perspective look okay?
3. This is a spread, do you think the fold in the page is going to be too close to the one cub's sandwich? (the tall scribbly thing the cub furthest to the right is holding)
4. The large dark space in the bottom right is allowing space for text. Does that look right? Should it be bigger?
5. Are the raccoons too much?

Thanks!!

Hi Everyone.
I am working on simplifying the design concept for a book I have been struggling with for years.
The story is about a boy named William who feeds a hungry snowman in his yard, which attracts more snowmen. Every time he turns around, the number of snowmen in his yard has doubled. By the end of the book there are over 500 snowmen. (You can probably understand why I am struggling with this.)
I have had this idea to solve the problem by greatly simplifying the design concept for the book. This is an illustration from early on in the story, when there are only 8 snowmen, and William is just realizing what he has gotten himself into.
I am liking the design this way for a couple of reasons. First, I like the way William, and one snowman looks nice and empty and roomy, then as the story progresses, it fills up more and more with lots of snowmen. The conflict in the story comes in when William's yard is so full that the snowmen are blocking the access to the house. Second, since the day I though of the idea for this book, I wanted the pages to have a border, so that as there got to be more and more snowmen, they could start sticking out of the border, emphasizing the idea that they cant all fit into the space.
This brings me to the thing I am not so sure about. Is this to simple of a design? Does it still look like a story book If I don't draw the house, the fence, the tree, etc. into the background?

This is the first page of a new book project. I am hoping some of you wonderful people can share a bit of expertise on it before I continue with the rest of the book.

I think they are all great, and your character is developing well. You should keep the initial sketches handy, as I think the first character in the 2nd row will be a fantastic Hero, just incase one of the future assignments in this set calls
for drawing him/her.

Here is a sketch of my lamp assignment so far. I think the table needs to be straightened out a bit when I get to that point. Do the items look like they go together? Should I make the end of the scroll chunkier? I want to make the first ball bigger and flat-ish, but i am afraid to loose the detail of the end of the paper. Can you guess whose table this is?

I think it looks great so far. The only thing I can think of is to maybe make the dark bushes in the bottom corners a bit taller to fill in that empty space around the characters. Or just crop it a bit. But I like it how it is now, with the people slightly off center.

@miranda-hoover I think it looks great. I wouldn't worry about making the wold look concerned, he looks like he is playing with the young yeti and the two of them are having some unsupervised fun.

Hi,
This is my assignment for the PROPS workshop. It is almost finished. Just adding shading and highlights. Thanks to those who commented on my sketch. Please let me know what you think! Those who have watched the videos for this course, please let me know if you think it works with the assignment.
Thank you!