kidslit

Co-Pilots Portrait

character sketches, children's illustration, collage, crafty, darwin, digital, inspiration, kidslit, mud pup

CoPilotsWEB

This is one my most unique pieces in my portfolio. It’s the first time I have combined serious digital work with my watercolor work. AND it’s the first time I’ve used shadows in a piece of digital collage work. When I collage freehand, the shadows appear naturally. I am so excited with this new direction. This was such a fun experiment!

Vote for Bo! Just go vote!

autumn, character sketches, darwin, happiness, inspiration, kidslit, mud pup, sketches, watercolor

Today is Election Day. Which means please PLEASE PLEASE go vote! Don’t know who to vote for? Well, there’s always Bo. Trust me, when the results start pouring in, and nerves are high, you may wanna switch over to Cute Animals on Animal Planet later tonight. (Or now, via this live cam of cute kittens).

Here are Darwin and Emma to help inspire:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Darwin and Sandy

autumn, character sketches, darwin, inspiration, kidslit, mud pup, sketches, watercolor

So Hurricane Sandy update – 1 week later …..

I did NOT lose power. No drama, no tragedies here for me in Brookline. In fact, we had such a low percentage of power outages. The same does not go true for my family in Long Island, and for them I feel terrible, and wish that the power comes back as soon as possible.

Since I did not go to work in the office, I had some downtime to reconnect with Darwin a little bit. I had quite a good time putting him in some raincoats and the like. Here are the results:

Doodle Series is Back

character sketches, children's illustration, collage, kidslit, sketches

Especially towards the end of my senior year, one of my favorite past-times became illustrating me and my friends. Cartoons – no. Caricatures – don’t think so. I started calling them ‘Doodles’ when I created them for the team at Pinwheel Books and ever since I’ve been illustrating me and the people in my life. Why I haven’t yet done my parents, I don’t know. But most recently I decided to give my friends in Boston here a try:

Image

From left to right: Lilia, Me, Carmen, and Sonia. It may or may not be finished – I may add a few details here and there, some shiny things, but overall it was a great experience in drawing my friends and getting that likeness for people down.

A few weeks ago I did this one for Pinwheel of our next writer/illustrator Tim:

Image

I think this is one of the first men I’ve ever drawn with such ease.

Who should I draw next? I’m taking suggestions. And as per suggestion by my boss, you can even pay me to illustrate whatever you want via an etsy site in construction!

A Sketch of my Nona

character sketches, children's illustration, grandmas are both italian, happiness, inspiration, italy, kidslit, sketches

I recently came across a really old sketch I had done in preparation for working on some images for my story “My Grandmas are Both Italian”.

This is an image of my Nona – Anita – mixing a bowl of food in the kitchen. She is always cooking us something great, while wearing her famous blue apron. Even though she doesn’t move about the kitchen as fast as she used to, she still has a grin on her face when she’s putting together a meal. There is so much love in her food, and so much love and light in her. She is the epitome of happiness, and I hope one day I can find that sort of contentment in my life.

Her tiramisu and gnocchi are her signature dishes.

This sketch is really light, so I had to play with it in Photoshop a little:

Image

Will you be my co-pilot?

character sketches, kidslit

An idea came to me at the beginning of 2012 that began with the phrase:

Will you be my co-pilot?

I love old fashioned airplanes, aviator caps, and thought I needed a story that focuses on kids and animals living together. And I’m seeing my storytelling taking a more poetic route – embracing telling a story that inspires and motivates the reader while depicting wondrous imagery.
So this concept of finding your confidante, your second-in-command, your best pal, inspired this piece:
with background:
without background: