Picture Book Text - Kitten in the Orchestra

So! I've finally decided that I'll be doing my 'kitten in the orchestra' story for my picture book. I've rewritten the text so that it's shorter and more straightforward. 

Ahem. This is Kitten in the Orchestra featuring Maas the kitten and his friend Amalie. Please take your seats and enjoy.

Maas poked his head into the dark room. It looked empty. Where was Amalie?

---

There were all sorts of interesting things in the room. Bouncing across the floor, Maas found something long and smooth. A contrabass.

---

He walked further, finding sets of smaller, similar instruments.

Groups of cellos. Several violas.

---

An entire forest of violins, with a scattering of woodwinds on the border.

Where was Amalie?

---

Soon Maas came to a towering, graceful harp beside a huge piano. He batted at the strings, and the resulting dust made him sneeze.

(page 5)

---

There were chairs again, topped abandoned trumpets and clarinets. One even had a bass clarinet.

But no Amalie.

---

He looked by the swirling-tubed french horns and spindly trombones. He even checked behind the tympani.

But still no Amalie.

---

Where was she?

---

Tired of searching, Maas settled next to the tuba and blinked back tears. Where was Amalie?

---

Slowly, Maas drifted into sleep. He dreamed he was chasing Amalie through the pages of a concerto.

(page 10)

---

He woke suddenly when someone picked him up.

“There you are, you silly kitty.”

It was Amalie!

---

“I’m so glad I finally found you!” she told him, scratching his ears.

Maas was glad too.

New Collage - Timpanogos Temple Drawing

Working Title: Mount Timp. Temple Collage
Size: 8 and 1/2 by 14 inches
After my success with the Shallan Collage last year, I've decided it's time for another collage project. This time I want to focus on using paper with interesting textures. So far all I've got is the drawing, but I think it's going pretty well. :)


Here's my reference photo:

I'm so excited for this project!

Picture Book Sketches (part 3)

Title: Maas and the Abandoned Orchestra
Size: Each frame is 4 and 1/2 by 3 inches
This week's picture book features a kitten named Maas and his adventures through an abandoned orchestra pit. Writing first worked so well last week that I decided to try it again. My sister suggested I write a story that included plenty of instruments, so I decided to use an orchestra.

This story was fun to draw because of all the proportions. It's one thing to draw an instrument, but another to try and make them the right size. I also enjoyed looking for reference photos of kittens. :P

Whimsical Watercolor - 18th Century Owl

Title: Eighteenth Century Owl

Size: 7 by 5 inches

This week I wanted to do something a little more whimsical. It's been a while since I did something a silly piece. And so I bring you.... A burrowing owl in a powdered wig!

I think where this piece came from was my visit to an aviary earlier this week. It had me thinking about owls, and I really wanted to do a burrowing owl. I've done doodles of animals in different historical clothing before, so when I was looking at pictures of owls I thought "hey, that one looks like he's wearing a cravat and waistcoat" and thus this was born.

I think I like doing goofy little things like this because it's half in your head. I added a powdered wig and some shoe buckles, but the rest I just enhanced. Some of these owls do look almost like they have a necktie, and the way their feathers fade could almost look like an inversely colored vest and trousers. Add white leg feathers to knee high socks and poof! Enter eighteenth century owl.

When I started this piece I was having a lot trouble with defining lines. The whole thing looked kind of muddy. After I decided to switch this piece to be a mixed medium piece, rather than just a watercolor, things started going better. I used black and red pens to help define some boundaries and used some white paint to clean up the highlights (there's no white in watercolor).

More pencil drawings - Meeting Brandon (part 2) and picturebook sketches

Title: Meeting Brandon Sanderson
Size: 10 and 1/2 by 12 inches
Here's the finished version of the pencil portrait I was working on last week. It's my parents and I getting our picture with the most amazing fantasy author of all time: Brandon Sanderson. It was pretty fun to finish this up, and I like how it turned out.

---

Next up is some storyboarding for another possible picturebook.

Working title: Never Lose Your Seven League Boots

Size: frames are roughly 2 and 1/2 by 4 inches

After last week's plot-less story, I decided to start writing first this time. Theoretically, so that I'd actually have a plot this week. I forgot to take into account the fact that every time I try to write dialogue it immediately turns into plot-derailing banter. Every time. So that's why pretty much every frame is of talking.

This plot took some work to come up with. After consulting multiple online plot generators and then ignoring most everything they said, I came up with a story about a grumpy, pen-stealing sprite named Quinn who loses his winged seven league boots. He and his (human) friend Johanna go on a quest to get them. Also, there's vanishing spells and Latin. So yeah.

I think I like this story better than last week's, seeing as there's a plot, but I would have to cut out an awful lot of banter to get anything to happen. I do like the characters though. Banter does that to me.

Starting Pencil Drawings - Picture Book Sketches and Meeting Brandon

Working Title: Meeting Brandon
Size: 11 by 14
This is a drawing I've been wanting to do for a while. It's the time my parents and I met Brandon Sanderson (my favorite author of all time). I decided to draw out where things go, and then start filling in the spaces, like a coloring book. A black and white, non-color coloring book. :P

I decided it would probably be for the best if I started by drawing (filling in? shading?) myself, as my drawing talent usually needs to warm up a bit and only gets better as I go longer. Unfortunately, the picture I'm working from is rather blurry, so it's unclear where exactly my hair ends and my shirt starts. Yup. That could be a problem.

---

These next pictures are from my sketchbook, and are an experiment/rough draft for a picture book I'll hopefully be creating later this year. I'll be playing with several different storylines over the next few weeks, so this is the first of a series.

Working Title: Adventures of Harper - Rough Draft
Size: Each frame is about 2 and 1/2 by 4 inches.
...So the story behind this story is that I wanted an excuse to draw a wombat. And I wanted my protagonist to be a toddler. Those were literally my only criteria. ...Which is why this story currently has no plot.

And the wombat hasn't even really shown up yet.

Anyway, for any and all humans interested in my plot and worldbuilding, this story takes place in southern Australia. My little toddler is named Harper. One day Harper was going on a walk through some (Australian!) woods with her parents when she got noticed a lizard. (A tiny, baby monitor lizard that will one day grow to be somewhere between 8 inches and 10 feet long depending on the species). Distracted, she is left behind by her parents.

Theoretically, next she'll make friends with a giant wombat, and pass the time with him until her rescue.

What will happen next?! Will Harper be lost forever? Will her parents come back looking for her? Will the wombat ever make an appearance?! Tune in next time to Adventures of Harper to find out!

Woodworking Project - Rocking Horse

Title: Wax in Wood

Size: 34 inches tall and 50 inches long

Here's a rocking horse I worked on for a few months in my woodshop class. It involved a lot of sanding and work on the bandsaw. :P

I ended up naming my horse Waxillium Ladrian, after the main character in Alloy of Law. Waxillium goes by 'Wax'; therefore my project is titled Wax in Wood.