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I Love The City  © Kathy Weller  • See Etsy listing here

Do you LOVE the city? I do!

This one's near and dear to my heart! I love the city! This little lady reminds me of "That Girl"� a young lady just itching to make her way in the world—and especially itching to make her mark in the Big City! It makes me reminisce for that feeling of being young, unencumbered, fancy-free and having enough independence AND enough guts to go ANYWHERE and do ANYTHING you desire, to explore, push yourself and see how far you can go! Oh, the twenties are wasted... what else? The twenties! Ha! But that's another blog post, right? Hey I am no longer twenty, but speaking from my heart, I can tell you that I personally feel this "can-do"attitude almost every day! (A little wisdom does help with that. ;) Getting older is not ALL that bad! )

Anyhow, I know many rural and suburbanite friends who thrive out in the 'burbs and in rural areas. Different strokes for different folks! I can completely understand the draw of the fresh air, wide open spaces and nature and all that comes along with it. I really do enjoy that from time to time! But, I gotta be honest... five or so days in remote rurality, and I'm clawing, c-l-a-w-i-n-g I tell you, to get back to where I thrive the best- THE CITY!  Lucky for me, my husband Matt and I are on the same page with this! We are both city-dwellers, forever and ever!

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• Fri, 14:32: RT @AALBooks: RT @_JessicaLove Eeek! B&N has a bindup of all three of Markus Zusak's Wolfe books including Underdog! MUST HAVE! http://t ...
• Fri, 14:39: I have just created a new list titled 'Agents' using TweetDeck, adding new ones daily. Follow it here: @annawritedraw/agents
• Sat, 11:58: #poetry #contest Deadline 8/31: "To the Lighthouse" $1000&Publication Prize:A Room Of Her Own:Women Artists and Writers http://t.co/OtKPVrn

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A fake woodcut made with the ukiyoe app for iPhone. As a confirmed woodcut nut, this tickles my "conceptual" buds. 

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LEE & LOW BOOKS, award-winning publisher of children’s books, is pleased to announce the twelfth annual NEW VOICES AWARD. The Award will be given for a children’s picture book manuscript by a writer of color. The Award winner receives a cash grant of $1000 and our standard publication contract, including our basic advance and royalties for a first time author. An Honor Award winner will receive a cash grant of $500.

As a New Voices Honor winner myself, I want to encourage aspiring writers to enter this contest. So often I receive emails from writers of color, asking me how to get published. They ask for the names of my editors who might publish their stories, or agents who will help them find an editor. One lady recently promised that if I gave her an opening into publishing, she’d do the same for someone else once she got published. But as a new author myself, I don’t hold a magic key to the publishing industry that I can simply loan out to aspiring writers. What I can do is give advice.

My advice: Read a lot. Write everyday. Polish (revise) your stories. Learn as much as you can about the children’s publishing industry. And if you’ve written a book that fits the guidelines of Lee & Low Books New Voices Award, enter the contest, by all means. I did, and my book will publish next spring.

Hurry! The deadline is September 30, 2011.

– Don Tate

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Alina Chau

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I’ve attended my fair share of foreign animation festivals over the years, and have always bemoaned the lack of Los Angeles industry artists at these gatherings. In Annecy artists from throughout Europe’s animation industry show up, in Ottawa a sizable lot from the New York and Toronto industry attend, but artists from Los Angeles have been conspicuously absent at every animation festival I’ve ever attended. There might be a few stragglers, but undoubtedly they’ll be outnumbered by the LA-based development and creative execs, who pounce on any opportunity for a free “business” trip.

The apathy of LA industry artists is historical. During the legendary 1967 Montreal animation expo, which was one of the great all-time gatherings of animation talent, only one Disney animator who had worked on Dumbo and was still employed at the company, took the time to attend the screening of that film. It was, of course, the studio’s most creatively curious artist, Ward Kimball.

This all leads up to some positively encouraging news. Browsing through the schedule for the upcoming Ottawa International Animation Festival, I noticed that not only are Adventure Time and Flapjack being shown in competition screenings , the creators of both shows—Pen Ward (top photo, left) and Thurop Van Orman (r.)—will attend and participate in a discussion about their work. This interaction between Los Angeles animators and the much larger world of animation beyond the San Fernando Valley doesn’t happen nearly often enough. Considering how relatively inexpensive it is to attend one of these festivals versus the mind-expanding benefits of meeting like-minded artists and seeing innovative new animation, I’m surprised that more studios don’t encourage and finance these trips for their employees. It would certainly be a wiser investment than shipping a cartload of executives to each festival.

The appearance of Ward and Van Orman isn’t the only TV-centric event at Ottawa either. Aaron Augenblick (top photo, center) who runs Brooklyn-based Augenblick Studios (Superjail!, Wonder Showzen, Ugly Americans) will be presenting a retrospective of his work. The program isn’t exclusively TV-related, but Augenblick is best known nowadays for his studio’s consistently high quality TV output, which is no small accomplishment.

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Cartoon Brew: Leading the Animation Conversation | Permalink | No comment | Post tags: Aaron Augenblick, Ottawa International Animation Festival, Pen Ward, Thurop van Orman

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That title sounds dirty, admittedly, but all I'm doing is adjusting this thing so that I have a wee bit more room for my posts, particularly any images I might include. And since I'm not the most technically savvy viking out there (are there any at all?), this thing might look a tad wonky for a bit.

Your patience will be rewarded. Mostly by me not pillaging your village. Hang tight.

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Sand castles in the dwindling dog days of summer.

I hope everyone is staying safe out there!

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http://pingszoo.bigcartel.com/product/two-tigers

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Who knew there was a whole "genre" of fish-bowl bookends out there? If you're into fish, they're kinda groovy from The Well Dressed Home and Chimpfeet!

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That title sounds dirty, admittedly, but all I'm doing is adjusting this thing so that I have a wee bit more room for my posts, particularly any images I might include. And since I'm not the most technically savvy viking out there (are there any at all?), this thing might look a tad wonky for a bit.

Your patience will be rewarded. Mostly by me not pillaging your village. Hang tight.

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This one has always been one of my favorite illustrations - no special reason why I just always liked the idea. It's fun when you think of an illustration and it pretty much comes out the way you planned. I think maybe it's also because when you think of someone wearing multiple faces it usually has a negative connotation but this illustration is playful. What do you think?

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Making Critter Toys



Today I started work on several Critter Action Figures. You may remember I've been tossing this idea around for a while and even created a Zonkey Action Figure. Well, I thought it was time to start production on the line.



All Critter action figures have to be measured first to make sure they will fit into their packages. of course, i haven't found the right packaging materials yet but i am still hunting...



Getting a little low on spray paint... then again having not worked all summer i'm also getting rather low on funds. Luckily payday is coming soon.. and really, the pesky mortgage company can wait, right?



So a few Critters were created today. This is a Geep. It's a mix between a goat and a sheep.



This is a cat. It's a mix between a cat and another cat. Or maybe it's a snow leopard. That sound more majestic!

.

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Aw man, isn't this the cutest little snail you ever saw?



Stuart's finished hiking the Capital Ring around London, so he took me along on the first leg of the London LOOP (which stands for London Outer Orbital Path). Walking through Crayford Marshes, we hit every kind of weather you can imagine, short of hurricanes. The cloud display was impressive, it was a proper English-style bank holiday kind of outing.




A lot of the landscape was fairly industrial, but I'm rather partial to dockland rubble. Here a tractor and a Hillman Imp pose dramatically in front of the Dartford Crossing (a huge bridge over the Thames, east of central London).







I never really get away from children's books. Here's an odd sign I saw in a particularly scrappy bit of the docklands.



The Narnia sign sat just over these hoardings:



I love the textures you get on old containers when they get a bit weather-beaten.





Here's the sky over the River Darent, just before the heavens opened.



Thank goodness for ponchos.

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We still have copies of my book: "The first in line, from the sketchbooks of Mattias Adolfsson" (160 pages 48$ with world wide shipping) you can order it by sending a mail to the publisher: order@sanatorium.se, or I have some for sale over at my Etsy shop. To see more of the book in this post

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One Arm Point Remote Community School,
Our World: Bardi Jaawi, Life at Ardiyooloon
Magabala Books, 2010.

Ages 8-11

Our World: Bardi Jaawa Life at Ardiyooloon is a stunning, encyclopaedic book that welcomes readers into the remote indigenous Australian community of Bardi Jaawi people at Ardiyooloon a.k.a One Arm Point, at the top of the Dampier Peninsula in the north-west of Western Australia. One hundred and fifteen children from the One Arm Point Remote Community School, along with their School Culture Team, School Staff, and Community Elders, as well as others from the local community, all came together to create this unique document of their culture and environment.

Colourful photographs show the children engaged in the many outdoor activities that form part of their curriculum, including camping and bushcraft. The book is filled with eye-catching artwork by the children, from illustrations for the traditional stories scattered throughout, to an identity parade of local “Saltwater Creatures”. The community’s connection with the sea is very strong. Many of the activities revolve around fishing, from catching to eating the fish. The variety of activities covered is reflected in the headings for each double-page spread, ranging from “Our History” to “Fish Poisoning and Spearing” to “Bardi Jaawi Seasons” (there are six seasons in the Bardi Jaawi calendar). And along the way, there’s “How to Dress a Snake Bite” with the check box “If you survive, you have done this right” – let’s hope so, then!

At the beginning, a colourful series of maps gradually hones in on Ardiyooloon, right down to One Arm Point Remote Community School itself. The Bardi pronunciation guide is useful since relevant Bardi words and their English translations are to be found encircling most pages, with a complementary English-Bardi wordlist at the end. The “Bardi Family Ties” section also teaches the Bardi words for all the different family relationships. Interestingly, birrii means both mother and aunt on the mother’s side; and gooloo means both father and uncle on the father’s side.

The obvious effort and enthusiasm that have gone into the project of putting Our World together have certainly paid off. As well as enjoying their visit to Ardiyooloon, readers will perhaps feel inspired both to try out some of the activities, adapted to their own surroundings, and to create a parallel record of their own communities and school lives. Congratulations to all involved, children and adults alike, in producing such a captivating book.

Marjorie Coughlan
August 2011

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Artist Karl Kopinski has just completed a painting of one of the most challenging subjects imaginable: historically accurate equestrian battle subjects. 


This paintings depicts the First Lifeguards counter attacking the 4th cuirassiers at the battle of Waterloo 1815. The painting went through innumerable pencil and color sketch stages.




He says: “I first started the painting over 3 years ago, but due to my workload I could only manage to work on it sporadically, which became quite frustrating, although it did allow me to do quite a lot of preparatory work for most of the figures. I spent a lot of time looking at the great French military painters, Meissonier, Detaille and deNeuville."


“I also had to do an awful lot of research into uniform details, I managed to get a lot of help including a friend of mine who is a Saville Row tailor and also an expert on Napoleonic tailoring, I also managed to borrow a helmet and cuirass from a similar period along with a very well made reproduction uniform of the period.”


Karl Kopinski's website
Books: L'Armee Francaise: An Illustrated History of the French Army, 1790-1885
Ernest Meissonier: Retrospective : Musee des beaux-arts de Lyon, 25 mars-27 juin 1993 (French Edition)
Ernst Meissonier and Art for the French Bourgeoisie: Master in his Genre

  

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