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So I've been working on my story again FINALLY.
I've had this concept in mind since the beginning of 2013! I was full of hope and excitement, eager to get my ideas down on paper. As an illustrator, I was quick to jump to the layout first, immediately trying to visualize my story. Once I got a rough draft of my layout and the overall story arc., I had to work on the real writing...... I was stuck, I've never considered myself as a writer and the best I could do was writing descriptive paragraphs, rather than a proper manuscript.
Very soon, I was busy again teaching or doing other projects and I started setting my story aside. This lasted for about a year. SHAME! I KNOW! Lesson learned: NEVER set aside a difficult personal project. The fact that there isn't a concrete deadline makes it that much harder to pick it back up again
So during the break from teaching last month, I finally got around to designing my main characters. Bubo the owl and Bella the Racoon. (And yes, those are also names of my cats!) I did a lot of doodles everywhere and those painted designs are what i'm going to settle with. Still debating whether I should stick to the top left feather pattern or the top right for Bubo. Bella is all set.
For your amusement, here's Bella DANCING!
Finally I got this outta my brain! Early last year, I was commissioned to do this poster to promote reading. Sadly, it got killed. I really liked these thumbnails I've created (of course those weren't chosen by the clients), and has wanted to finish the piece off ever since. Finally got around to paint it the last few days, the result:
Yes, I combined the two since I couldn't decide which one.
Thanks for stopping by! If you like to get more updates of sketches, preliminary work and cats.
This is a winter Promo I did for my art rep. I did this in watercolor and a bit of digital. Ordered the postcards early last week, should be getting it in the mail soon! If you want a free postcard of this illustration, please like my facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/isabellakungillustrations
Thank you for following and a HAPPY HOLIDAY to you!
A new illustration of a poem! The target audience is 2 months to 2 years, so I decided to keep it really really simple. The trickiest part is trying to depict a sneeze without it looking too violent or gross, since the poem described a sneeze as a breeze. Heres the color comps I tried out, with votes from my friends and critique group, the one of the right was chosen.
Heres a iphone pic of it close up,
Below is the color accurate scanned version :)
ahhhhhHHHH CHOO!
Last week, I went on an interview With William Sonoma, knowing that they probably like some seasonal or pattern work, I created these 2 sample pieces to show them along with my regular portfolio.
Don't you just love the colors of Autumn?
On top of that I also reworked the background on my Fruit Tart painting.
Thanks for stopping by!
Demo for my watercolor class, showing them examples of how to use collage in their artwork.
Top: Work in Progress and sketch
Bottom : Finished fresh today!
Last week I painted this pig as a demo for my watercolor class:
I loved how smug he turned out! So I decided to make a character out of him......lil suit, smoking a pipe and glasses, did the trick! Here he is now:
I used watercolor, color pencil and digitally collaged them together as they were done on separate pieces of paper. When trying out different fonts and phrases, I realized no one I knew know the word "BOSH"! It means nonsense or foolish or unacceptable behavior.
I debated about changing it to something like "Don't be Ridiculous" or "Poppycock", but the tone and feel of "BOSH" just sounds so perfect to me. I think it suits that reaction of total disregard, annoyance and arrogance. My husband just convinced me that I don't need to change or dumb down for the audience, they should get that tone. Plus, it does make the piggy sound more like of a selfish elitist. So I kept it.
Wonder why that word came so naturally to me, is it a british thing?
Maybe I still gotz some good old hong kong british chingurish in me :)
This is dedicated to my big brother Jimmy, it's his birthday this upcoming Friday!
We have a 7 year age difference and we sort of grew apart when he left to study abroad in America when he was 17 years old (and I was only 10). It wasn't until my wedding when he flew all the way from Austin to SF, that we became reacquainted. We actually have a lot more similarities than I once thought. Unfortunately I don't remember much from my childhood, we had the standard older/younger sibling teasing and fighting relationship. But one thing I remember most is that I used to sit on his lap and watch him play PC games all the time. Diablo was one of them.
Even though we aren't the closest sibling in the world, I'm still very proud and glad to have him as my big brother. Happy Birthday Jimmy!
After another 4 months, Sammy book #2 is finally completed!
While I'm not particularly religious, I have nothing against religion. Sammy is a curious and dedicated little boy that tries every which way to truly understand God, Jesus and his believe. It was a delight to work with B&H publishing, thanks to Dan Lynch, Diana, Tom Blackaby and Rick Osborne.
Here is a sneak peak!
Book 1 and book 2 side by side
I think this took about 3 hours tops?
Yikes it's been a bit more than a month since I last posted. Sorry about that. Whenever I get busy I just drop everything else. I'm very grateful for a patient husband and friends that are willing to bare with me for periods of time where I don't do anything but work and sleep/eat.
These last 2.5 months has been the most intense work schedule I've ever experienced! I was averaging about 10 hours of work a day (no weekends!) while dealing with an insane sleep schedule.
I am accustomed to the night owl lifestyle since I work with so much focus at night. With a pressing freelance deadline and teaching a full part time hours, it was no time for me to adjust to an earlier sleeping habit. One of my class on Monday and Thursday required me to get up at 7 am, so sometimes if I worked on my freelance till 6am I just ended up staying up and head to class. On top of that I was having my first experience teaching online, and that took up sooooo much of my time! Long story short, it is simply not for me, I do not have the ability to let go and devote less time and energy to my online class. Plus I really enjoy the connection I have with onsite student, as well as chatting and catching up with other faculties.
Usually I work on teaching and emailing during the day, at night I focus on my freelance work. I made much progress on the Sammy book #2: Finished all the line drawings, made the revisions and have completed 1/3 of the color so far. Unfortunately can't post any of that yet, but here is an ink demo of an Owl I did for my AE: Intro to Illustration students. I made copies and gave them out at the end of the semester. They were a great group of kids, some are so talented and hardworking! They gave me the sweetest Birthday card, orchestrated by the sweetest coworker Yuka.
Right now i'm wrapping up the semester, one more day left, after I submit the final grade then I'm done with teaching for the Summer. All I have planned for the next 3 weeks is just finish the rest of my freelance project and finally, FINALLY, catch up on some sleep and social life. :)
Boy! Its been a while since I last posted! I am so bad blogging...
Life have been so hectic lately, many new changes and opportunities!
I'm teaching more at Academy of Art University this summer semester. So I have been very busy preparing for my classes. On top of that I am working on my second Sammy book. This time it is titled "Sammy Experiences Jesus". Speak of which, I just noticed the first book is published!! I can't wait to get my copy.
http://kids.bhpublishinggroup.com/products/sammy-experiences-god/
Unfortunately, with my new work load, I had to hand in my 2 weeks notice at the Art studio (for kids/teens). I'm going to miss those kids.
In other news, The illustration Directory of 3X3 magazine is online now! So honored to be selected. I'm waiting for my copy in the mail. Please go to this link and check out the other artists!
http://www.3x3directory.com/children.html
Sadly I don't have much new work to show, most of my freelance work is still under NDA and I haven't got much spare time to do any personal work.... I miss that, can't wait to work on some of my own stuff once the I finish up some of my projects. For now, here are some Plein Air studies. I definitely need more practice!
It's been awhile since I painted live models. I forgot how much fun it is!! You can see so much details and so many variety of color when painting live, especially in the shadows. All of that information gets lost in photos. The other thing thats great about painting live is that you get to train yourself to make quick decisions. Most of my work is done in my studio, and every illustration I've painted had a value or color study done ahead of time, solving all the issues I may have before starting my final piece.
Here is a photo of me painting next the THE Bill Sanchez!
That was probably workshop was probably the highlight of these last few weeks. (Thanks George!)
Other than that I've been busy teaching and working on a flyer for the Institute of Reading Development. I can't post anything about the flyer just yet due to NDA. Though I can show you some of my student's work. They just completed their animal project. I'm very proud! Some of them have no previous experience in painting at all.
This week project is an simple environment project using watercolor and collage. Can't wait to see their final results. :)
Yay! My rebranding / makeover project is finally complete! This was a personal project I've been thinking about for a long long time. I finally got the chance to tackle it this year and I'm really happy with the results. Heres where the process started:
I redesigned my entire printed portfolio with this idea in mind: little spot illustrations of kids reading on every 2 pages of the portfolio, which all of the spots will then compile into a frame for my title page. One of the spots will be used on my business card. The fabric cover with the tied ribbon DIY look was suggested by a good friend Shawna Chan. (Thanks girl!!).
This project took much longer than I've ever expected, about 2 months from the very beginning. I didn't realize that even for such a simple design and theme, it can take so much to make it just right. I must of gone through the whole thing 4 to 5 times nudging and changing font settings, and as you can see from previous blog posts, it took me forever to just decide on the title font. I am so glad I did not go into graphic design! A BIG thank you to my wonderful critique group, Arthur, Sara, Yuki for giving my your honest opinions and helpful suggestions!
After all the design work is completed, came my most dreaded process: printing and color matching. Thank you Dax for teaching me, the prints came out great! Then I cut and crafted the whole thing in one night in order to make it for a mixer at Chronicles.
Heres a few snaps of the business cards and portfolio:
Lastly, it was redesigning my website to match. My dear huzzband put together all my newly designed fiels and put together my website in just a few days! My hero!
Here is a screenshot of the new website:
Please come visit and check out the rest of the site:
Hope you all like the new look and thanks for dropping by!
Thank you all for voting your preferences! Interestingly, so far the votes is split about 50/50. So I'll try this again with the 2 fonts in the finalized versions:
I was really frustrated last week when I finally got around to do my 1st test print. I realized the dimensions stated on the label of my portfolio was WRONG. I had to go back and nudge the heck out of 30 pages, I almost wanted to call and complain, but......"ain't nobody got time for that!"
Also these are the new business card designs, I have 2 different front versions, as well as 2 back versions. I've tried with the 2 fonts for all of them. Which combination do you all prefer?
I like the top font better for the front of the card, but the bottom font better for the simpler back of the card. This has turned out to be the most split decision I've ever had to made!
5:30 am already? I guess I should stop starting at these and sleep on it for now.
Heyoooo!
So first things first! Here is the properly scanned Fruit Tart painting I did few weeks ago as promised.
Whats up lately? Got really busy lately preparing for teaching and tutoring for the new Spring semester at Academy of Art University. While on the side, since Early January, I've been working on reinventing the layout/presentation of my portfolio! Here is a sneak of my title page:
I'm still undecided on the title font. Down to these last 2 choices, after eliminating 3 other fonts with the help of a few friends. I will be delighted to hear your preference! This personal project of mine is definitely turning our to be much more work than I've anticipated. The concept alone took me forever to finalize. Turns out when it comes to personal work, I tend to over-thinking things and being indecisive, sometimes less is more! All of those little spots/drawings around my Title will also appear through out my portfolio. I would also redesign my website as well as business card with this theme unifying my "brand".
I'm almost done with the layout. Next week comes my most dreaded stage...PRINTING. This time not only do have to battle with my printer (which often thinks there is a paper jam, instead it is just thicker paper that it suppose to accept) and color correcting, I also have have have to make sure it prints exactly where it should, and not half an inch towards the bottom because the printer moved it up too much.
Hope I get this all done before March when my next project starts! crossing my fingers!
After a much needed break last December, I'm excited to start the new year! I decided to finally put my foot down and work on redesigning the layout of my printed portfolio and website. New year new look right? I realized last year I hesitated a lot in starting, partially because I was busy, but when i did have the free time, I kept changing my concept time and time again, and hence never really started.
When January rolled around. I decided I've had it and returned the 2nd idea I had wayyyyy back. So far so good, I promise I will blog about it when its ready! ;)
On the other hand heres a food painting and full fig charcoal drawings I did this month. I absolutely looooveee painting food! must do more of that soon!
Work in progress~
This is just a crappy Iphone photo of my finished painting. I'll post the better scanned version later:
I did this charcoal drawing because I needed to get approved for foundation tutoring, sadly I did not digitally archive a lot of my student work in charcoal. Though it was nice to revisit this medium, reminds me of the good O' student days
This year I had the pleasure of working for the ESL department in AAU to teach a Basic Watercolor class for a wide range of students from different countries, different artistic background and age. It was great fun and my students were all really sweet. Here are some demo that I've done in class:
1st Demo for all the watercolor techniques
Most of these are about done in an hour, sometimes a little more if I get to touch up on themevery now and then throughout the class
This is the last demo I did at the end of the semester. Took about 3 hours.
It was great meeting every single one of you! :)
As promised, here is the X'mas promo that I did this year :)
Merry X'mas!!
I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday Season and a Happy New Year!!
I am so so so so so so SO SO sorry about not posting for almost 3 months!! I am terrible about blogging and promotion to begin with and when facing multiple deadlines, that is one of the first things I neglect. The up side to all this is that now I have plenty to up date you about.
So what have I been up to these last 3 months or so?
Mostly, I've been finishing up my latest book called "Sammy Experiences God". Here is the cover and a few interior pages. Written by Tom Blackaby and Rick Osborne
Some interiors sneak peaks!
Yes, these are all digital and not my usual watercolors. This project really gave me the opportunity to practice painting in Photoshop. I usually paint in the program Corel Painter and only use Photoshop as a adjustment/ editing/ cleaning up tool. Though this time I really took the time and reorganized my brushes, tried out a bunch of new ones and painted this whole project in Photoshop.
While working on this project, I taught part-time at Academy of art University and continued at my position teaching at East art studio for kids 5 to high school. I started teaching an ESL Basic Watercolor class this semester and it has been a lot of fun. I will post some of my 1 hour demos here next week.
BTW, remember I was exhibiting at APE this year in October? Here are some pictures of that weekend:
It was great sharing booths with my friends and catching up with other friends/artists that I haven't seen for a long time. Too bad I didn't get much of a chance to wonder around and check out what other artists are showing/selling. Time passed by toooo fast! Then in November, I went back to Hong Kong and introduced my hometown to my husband for the very first time. It was a lot of fun but ended up being one of the most exhausting trips. Being a tourist takes so much out of you! And I found out the hard way that you can never really get any work done while travelling. The phrase when it rains it pours proves to be truer each year. Though at least I am done with all client work for the year and yayyyy for finally getting some sleep!
Next week, I'll post up my X'mas promo and scans of the 1 hour demos I did for class. So stay tuned!
Oh! and yesterday I found out I've been featured on this french blog:
http://pussycatdreams.centerblog.net/rub-illustrations-divers-artistes-serie-d-.html
Hello Peeps!
Suanita's Little Gallery is presenting MUNSTERS vs ADDAMS!! This is an online show with works from would wide artists inspired by both TV shows. The opening date is October 8th, 2012 at:
so mark your calendars!
This is the piece I created for the show. Titled: "Pure Love". I honestly cannot think of another TV couple more in love than Morticia and Gomez. This time I chose to use Charcoal and Acrylic on Watercolor paper, I want it to have that old school poster feel to it.
I also took a chance and tired a new method that created the crumbled paper texture for the background. The trick is to use ceramic wrap! After I painted the red background I waited till its half dry (if its too wet the paint will just bleed everywhere), and gently place the ceramic warp on top, then I quickly pinched and pulled here and there to get a pattern I liked. I let it sit for another 15 mins before pulling the ceramic wrap off, letting the paint take shape as well as seep into the paper more. Don't let the wrap stay too long or I'm afraid the paint will seal it to the paper when it completely dries.
And there you have it, enjoy!
I've finally completed my lastest book, "Stanley's Tails of love" last week! The artwork has been sent to the printers and it should be published sometime next year! Can't wait! I had a lot of fun with this project. Tried a few new techniques and really pushed myself use time more resourcefully. For example, I'll try to paint spots with similar elements at the same time, so that I will not need to remix the same colors from scratch again and again.
This book is about a sweet young Golden Retriever named Stanley going on his 1st adventure as a volunteer! "Stanley Tails of Love" introduces kids to the concept of volunteering, as well as promoting adoption to help many animals in need. To find out more about this book and its case, please visit their website :
www.stanleystailsoflove.com
With the permission of the wonderful author Lori Schneider,
here are the cover and a few interior pages as a teaser! Enjoy ;)
Once again, I'm sorry I haven't been updating much, I'm just not that great with blogging! Though I have been insanely busy lately: 2 freelance projects (one just completed), 2 part-time teaching jobs, small painting for a gallery and APE preparation......
"When it rains, it pours" That phrase has been true time and time again.
And whats that? APE? YES, you heard right, the Alternative Press Expo is right around the corner.
A few friends and I Arthur Lin, Lois Wang, Yuki Yamagata will be there! Come Stop by tables 607 and 608, under our new name "Honey Honey"
Sorry I haven't been posting much new work lately, I'm trying to finish up my current project "Stanley's Tails of Love" and should be done sometime in August. Meanwhile my agent is going through the negotiating process with a new potential project. Back to digital on this new one! Can't wait to show you all my new book once its done! :)
So.................. I got in the 3x3 children's show!!! My "Chicken Little" piece got into Children’s Illustration Unpublished section. Very excited, can't wait to receive the directory. Yay!! :DHere is the link to the list of winners! Congrats to all the artists!
Lastly, "Peter Pan & Wendy", the ONLINE show opening is on the 24th of July at Susanita's Little Gallery. 29 artworks by 26 artists from all around the world created a very stunning show!
Thanks to Rebecca England and little Selah for a wonder experience!
Here is some sample art for a potential medical illustration gig I was approached with earlier this year. Unfortunately, the project didn't plan out, but it was sure pretty fun to paint bones!
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Aww, it's so cute what your students did! I can't believe it -- we really need to catch up lol! I love it though, you're doing the right thing, even if it's hard :) Good luck, Izzy Bella! <3