Project In Progress: #Owl Art

Hello!

I've been busy lately getting ready for the holiday season. "ALREADY?!?!" you say. Yes, already!

Firstly, I have been ordering prints of my work, matting and packaging them, so I may sell them in time for Christmas! I have plans to do a special Art Sale and Show at the family restaurant for November, and I'm just working out the details how I'm going to go about it. I will also be uploading images of my prints online at my online print store through Society6.com, here on my own little shop: http://society6.com/mlcillustration

Secondly, I have been busy creating new calendars for 2013, also for sale here at the family business. I don't know if I'll be making it available to order online in my Cafe Press shop (http://www.cafepress.com/mlcillustration) however, I shall let you know if I do! It will be featuring all of the art I still haven't displayed in last year's calendar, so it isn't new stuff... but it's new stuff to many customers who really haven't seen my art yet.

And Thirdly... Originally, I wanted 2013's calendar to have all new owl art... but stuff has been going on at home lately that has kept me out of the studio. I still want to finish the art for next year, though! So here are a few snapshots of what I'm working on right now:

Art Copyright 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

Art Copyright 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

Art Copyright 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

Art Copyright 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

Art Copyright 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

As you might notice, I'm starting to play around with colored inks! It's quite fun, and although I've got a good idea how I want to complete each painting, actually accomplishing what is in my Mind's Eye is going to be pretty difficult. So I've got a challenge ahead of me!

New #owl Sketches!

As the summer is coming to a close, it suddenly hit me that the holidays will soon be upon us, and I thought, "UH OH."

Because it was in my plans to have a calendar full of new art for 2013! I haven't created anything frame-worthy for a while due to working on Little Raindrop's book, so it sort of feels like I haven't accomplished much this year. 

Now I'm scrambling to get twelve new pieces done in time...and hopefully done well! 

In the meantime, I've been ordering mats and prints of my work so I can sell them starting in November. I'll be getting my Society6 store ready for online orders as well. I'm not good with the shipping/post office thing, so I'll leave that up to them. And I should probably clean up my CafePress shop, too...

Here are some of the sketches I've done so far, (the good, the bad, and the ehhhh):

There is a theme to this new calendar... but I won't tell you what it is! It's going to be a surprise! (And I don't mean the obvious!)

ttfn!

Character Art: Little Raindrop's Friends!

I've been sketching up some new friends for Little Raindrop to meet as he goes along on his journey through the water cycle!

Art © 2012 Melanie Linden Chan

Art © 2012 Melanie Linden Chan 

I'm sure there will be more to come, eventually! These guys might change a little bit too as I work on the story, but these are the first sketches of the group so far.

I got this awesome book called "A Drop of Water" by Walter Wick, and it not only has lots of water and science facts, but it also had awesome microscopic photos of actual snowflakes! So you'll notice on the second page of sketches I began with learning how to draw some of these snowflakes. And then I thought of how I would like to draw them in the cartoon style, and then what they would look like as water droplets! So hopefully their unique faces and other characteristics help viewers see the difference between each drop!

My personal favorite is the big guy with the giant brow. He looks like a tough guy! (But he's more like a teddy bear.)

Oh, and I've also drawn up Little Raindrop's parents, who may or may not turn up in the story... and a special other character that you'll just have to read about when the book is done!

 

Thanks for reading! :D

Three Halloween Kittens!

Our latest project in Children's Book Illustration III was to pick a short story provided and illustrate a full page bleed and it's opposite text page with a spot illustration. I chose the story of the Three Little Kittens, (you know, they lost their mittens, and they began to cry...).

My first question was this: why were the kittens wearing mittens?
Because it is Halloween, of course, and the mittens are part of their costumes! And I went with the happy scene after they found their mittens and put them back on. :)

Just as we did with the last project, we did three double spread layouts, character sketches, and a final image. I'm not fully finished painting the piece, and I also will touch it up with colored pencil, but I'll share what I've got so far!

And then I did an ink under painting, and then watercolor painting...

checked my values via desaturation...

...and then I got nervous about covering the whole thing in my dark blue for the night, 

so I tried it out on Photoshop first...

And thank goodness for Photoshop! I went back and worked in the darks, and now I'm finishing up on the watercolors before I begin any colored pencil. 

Whew! I think it's time for bed now! I'll post ya laters, gators!

~Melanie

Holiday Card Sketches

Hi Again!

I am also working on a Christmas card design that includes all EIGHT of the client's pets. (The newest kitten has not yet been drawn.) Yep, home certainly is where the fur flies! Here are my sketches of the animals, plus I tooled around with colors and layout ideas. I'll show you the rest once I ink and paint the piece!

Modeled after the real fireplace in their home.

And some color compositions... 

 I personally like the last one best. The first one isn't bad! But it's up to the customer what they want on their card, so we shall see which style they pick!

Alrighty then, off to the next project...

Feelin' Sketchy!

Hullo Hullo!

Been SUPER busy working on multiple projects at once! With homework, and commissions, and Little Raindrop stuff, I haven't been staying on top of my blogging. But it's too late at night for my weary eyes to mix colors and such, so here's what I've been up to:

Little Raindrop, Ocean Habitat Sketching:

Little Raindrop, Chapter One Sketching:

And in my next post I'll share with you my Holiday Card commission! Yay! (See you in 5 minutes!)

Little Raindrop: Character Art

Hi there!

Today I focused on narrowing down Little Raindrop's character design. The author and I are deciding whether to use the big round eyes or the little oval pupil thingies for the final character. This was a good exercise for me anyhow, because it gave me the opportunity to explore LR's emotions, and I also found a great little animation blog that features some excellent character art.

So these were my original LR sketches:

And these are what I came up with today:

I'm sure you'll notice it took me a bit of time to loosen up, but I finally did and then that's when LR started to have a mind of his own! I'm also working on a few more characters that LR interacts with, but those aren't nearly as developed, simple as these characters are.

And I don't know if I'm just slow, or if this is normal, but those sheets of characters took me 3 hours! However, those hours are worth it for a solid character foundation. :)

Off to sketch some more! Ttfn!
~Melanie