I got a nice surprise over the weekend. I found out that a book I illustrated,
Picnic at Camp Shalom, which was published last year by Kar-Ben Publishing, has been selected by The PJ Library as one of their 2012 selections! They have done a special publishing of the book and it will be mailed to all their 6 year-old participants this summer.
The PJ Library is an award-winning program, funded by local philanthropists and the Harold Grinspoon Foundation. The PJ Library sends out high-quality Jewish children's books and music to families across North America on a monthly basis....for free! You can find out more about The PJ Library
here.
Below is one of my favorite spreads from the book with Sara and Carly finding out how much they have in common on their first night at summer camp. The PBJunkies did an interview last year with the author, Jacqueline Jules, which you can read
here.
Happy camping!
©2011 Deborah Melmon
©2010 Deborah Melmon
Since I am on big deadline for work, I thought I would multi-task and post my Illustration Friday post here on the PBJunkies blog. The IF topic is "duet" and I couldn't help think about Sarah and Carly from Picnic at Camp Shalom. Ok, ok, I'm sure you're all hung over from our celebration last week of this book, but like I said, I'm on a deadline and saw the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone and took it :)
In the story, Sarah and Carly have a misunderstanding and are not getting along. But, unfortunately, they are thrown together during music practice to sing a duet together. I had a lot of fun creating the tension between these two with their body language and expression.
Although I can't really show you what I'm working on right now for my deadline next week, it is a very fun project. I'm illustrating a picture book for Parragon UK. The book is actually coming out in two versions - one for broad distribution, and an exclusive version for Marks & Spencer, which is a large department store in the UK.
The covers of the book are different, but the interiors will be similar, if not the same. It is a combination of my art on photographic backgrounds. I am putting the backgrounds together with high-resoluation images from a stock photo company and super-imposing my ink and watercolor illustrations of the characters on the backgrounds using photoshop. It's actually quite fun working this way.
Have a great weekend everyone and thanks for stopping by this week!
In February of 2010, I got an email from Kar-Ben Publishing asking if I was available to illustrate a picture book for them. This was great news as I had just been on a huge marketing push to get new work. I had revamped my website, researched publishers that were suited to my style and sent out about 75 packets with my art samples. Looked like something was working!
The art director said "Picnic at Camp Shalom" was the story about two girls at a summer camp. She had seen this sample on my website and thought it would be the perfect style for their book:
She told me the book was on a fast track to make a publishing deadline. Manuscript to me on March 1st, sketches due on April 1st, and final art on May 15th. Gulp. Was this even possible? Was I crazy to think I could illustrate a 32-page book in six weeks? Well, I was going to find out. I got to work!
The first thing I did was research on the internet. I pulled photos of summer camps, cabins, kids, lakes, swimming docks, etc. I really liked the feel of this photo of these two girls. Here was Carly and Sara!
I also had to go back to my childhood to remember my own summer camp experiences and what it was like to sleep in sleeping bags and bunkbeds. I found this great photo which I used as reference in one of the illustrations.
Have you ever met someone you instantly had a connection with? Well, this is what happened to Carly and Sara. In the story, they first meet on the swim dock and notice they have the same bathing suit on. From then on they are best friends. I wanted the girls to be easily recognizable as their own person, but also have a feeling of similarity. They were the same age, had lots in common, and would soon learn they had some of the same problems.
11 Comments on How I Painted a Picture Book in Six Weeks, last added: 3/27/2011
I'm a big believer in reading all types of books to my child. Despite being just 2, Miles and I read anything from board books, to non-fiction early readers and, of course, picture books on all subjects.
Picnic at Camp Shalom offers a lot to my young reader, even if he's not quite the intended audience! I give a lot of credit to Deb for including so many beautiful woodland animals, character features, and other camp details that give us things to find and laugh about. She made a bird pooping on a little camper boy's hat - you know that earned some big belly laughs! Deb also did a wonderful job with consistency - something that Miles is VERY mindful of. If you spoke of, then showed him a beaded necklace in one spread, he wants to see it again. Nice work Deb. We find something new every time we read it, and I can't wait til he's old enough to understand the big 'twist' ending to the story of two very charming girls' friendship.
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Congratulations. This illustration is adorable!
Thanks so much Patti!
Add you should also be proud that PJ Library in Palm Beach, implemented by the Commission for Jewish Education, has worked with our local JCC Camp Shalom to use the book as part of its programming with campers :)
Thank you Palm Beach for that!! :)