Animals

I've realized I haven't done much zoo scenes, but I've drawn plenty of animals. I actually prefer drawing them than humans. Here is a recent self promotion piece I did.

I did this piece for an Illustration Friday a few months ago. I added a border, a little background and some more shading, but kept it black and white.

Animal Clay Collage

I've never actually illustrated a zoo I don't think. Maybe I did one that was line art once, that sound a little familiar. Anyway, here are some animals. This was a thank you gift for my agent on our one year anniversary. I gave her the original framed in a red shadowbox.

Zoo

I've been trying out some different painting techniques using both Photoshop and Painter this morning and it just so happens that my doodles go with this week's topic of zoo. These were done completely in Photoshop starting with a medium gray background.

Zoo

Bring the zoo home with you!

Quote

To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.
-Joseph Chilton Pearce

quotes

I love quotes about encouragement and success. I actually listed several here once. I think my "life" quote would have to be:

"When much is given, much is expected" from Luke 12:48. It reminds me why I am the way I am and why I tend to keep on working, thinking and doing for bigger and better even when I'm exhausted. I even have it on a bracelet that I wear 24/7.

Inspiring quote

Goals in writing are dreams with deadlines.
- Brian Tracy

Green

This guy is miffed that the Easter bunny is moving in on his holiday this year. I just got a new 4x6" Wacom tablet and created this character to try it out. The small active area is going to take a little getting used to but it's not too bad. Now with my laptop and my little wacom tablet I'm seriously mobile.

Paula's Green

A St. Patrick's Day contribution as well as befitting our topic this week--Green!

Holli's Green

I tend to use green a lot in my work as backgrounds. I love using lime green with different shades and textures. My junk-a-doodles work is "green" but in a different way. Instead of throwing bits and pieces away, I recycle them into my work. Go green!

Green - sea turtle

I love painting animals, this one is a green sea turtle. When I'm painting realistic animals I try to get the details right so that they look the way they should. Then since I'm a children's illustrator, I tweak their face expressions just a little bit so that they look friendly.

Green

I love green, and I've noticed that the illustrations I'm most happy with all have something in common: they all have a lot of green in them. Green has always been one of my favorite colors.

Jannie's Flowers

For this week's topic, flowers-Here is a piece I did for TIME Magazine for Kids.

Flower

Our theme this week for our blog is "Flower/Flowers". The above is an adult greeting card design I did for Ronnie Sellers/RSVP cards a number of months ago. Not in my usual style, is it? I've been focusing on line work this last year but previous to that, I had done a lot of jobs with collage and mixed media. Over the last decade-plus, I experimented around for a style that would be enjoyable, creative and marketable, and ultimately (or at this point in time), I'm back to my initial style of humorous line work.

I still get jobs for collage and mixed-media, and this card is one of them. I do enjoy working in collage and pushing paint around (in this case, digital paint), so jobs like this are a nice break from my primary style.

Flowering branch

Eastern bluebird

This illustration reminds me of Spring too, I love drawing blossoming trees. This piece was done with pen & ink with an old-fashioned nib, I find it creates a nice variety in the thickness of line.

Flowers

Last week I picked the first flower of the year. I'm waiting for springtime, so I thought it would be a good idea to show you some flowers this week. This is an illustration I did for a postcard for SOS Children's Villages Norway.