Eclair - Children's Book Illustration

I haven't been doing much personal illustration because a lot has been going on in my life the past 6 months. Not the least of which is that I'm now illustrating a children's book series by M. Weidenbenner. The first book is called Eclair Goes to Stella's and it's about a little girl whose parents need to leave her and her sister with their grandmother, Stella, for a while. Clair is super-duper, not-at-all psyched about this and tries everything she can to get out of it. But, Grandma's farm has it's perks, so she may yet be swayed.

It's not finished yet, but when it's available on Amazon I will certainly be posting a link.

Goldie Locks

Hand Colored with Ink & Colored Pencil

My latest ooak listing. I hope to have some more up tomorrow. The fact is I have a BUNCH of these in my apartment, I just haven't gotten around to editing the photos yet. They all have bright, colored envelopes to go with them, that have sticky closures (no gross glue taste!) and of course they're all adorable.

I did a show back in December where I had a pretty good crowd of girls standing around carefully trying to select the very best of my business cards to take home. Which was a nice distraction while their mom's were mouthing their orders over the little girl's heads!

But of course the guys weren't as excited. One dad looked at a card similar to this one and said, "It's all about the hair isn't it?" His tone implied he'd rather have his team lose the super bowl every year for the rest of his life than deal with my art on his walls, but his wife seemed interested!

To Write Love On Her Arms

 I was told on an etsy thread that this Friday is To Write Love On Her Arms day (I kind of don't think it is officially since there's nothing on the official TWLOHA site for Friday except a thing at Remuda Ranch) and it seemed like a good theme for some art work.  Clearly I'm still going ultra literal. I'm no good with metaphor.

I've had a lot of friends who have struggled with depression and various addictions. I've struggled with depression myself. Years ago when I first saw a To Write Love On Her Arms t-shirt, I knew immediately, without explanation, what it was about.

Of course I went online to find out more - and at that point there was mostly just a story online about the girl, Renee, who they started To Write Love On Her Arms for - and it was kind of confusing to figure out what TWLOHA was doing exactly. But they've grown since then and I can't help but be impressed with their mission to bring hope to people who can't see any.

And I think that hope grows with the awareness they've raised. One of the things I remember about being a teenager is how even kids who weren't coming from particularly bad situations could struggle with depression. It affects all kinds of people, but if we never talk about it it's just that much harder to deal with.

Though this post is written in support of TWLOHA this blog is not associated with TWLOHA in any way.

Curly Girls

These were just little practice doodles for an illustration of the little girl with the little curl in the middle of her forehead. The one on the left is minorly based on a girl in an old cocoa advertisement  and the one on the right is somewhat based off Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz.

I just love the ruffled collar and apron on this girl. And her sweet face, which I can't really duplicate in my style of drawing.
 But I didn't want her to have just plain braids, I really wanted to emphasize the curly hair, so looked to Dorothy's style (from about the same era) for how to do those curls.

For my day job I do a lot of period illustrations (1930s-1940s mostly). I have (on loan) a battered primer from the 30s that I use to get an idea of the clothing and I also rely on  blogs dedicated to old advertisements and photos. Beauty Is A Thing of the Past has all kinds of great photos from hair dressers magazines that are fantastic in figuring out how to style hair. And Found In Mom's Basement is a terrific source of vintage advertising. I've learned a lot doing these illustrations.

I've also done a ton of Amish illustrations. If you're ever up in Shipshewana, IN you can look out for the Childhood Chuckles, Farmyard Funnies & Thoughts with Thelma book series. The first two are collections of stories sent in by (mostly) Amish people and the Thelma series is a series of stories by a local Amish wife and mother who lives on a diary farm.

All of this is great fun and I adore it. But sometimes you just want to draw something modern.

Clay Chic's Bad Hair Day Earring's

I designed this curly haired girl for Clay Chic's Bad Hair Day Earrings. She makes these huge sterling earrings that are so stunning no one will be looking at your hair. She'll be making hang tags with this image on them.

All images on this blog are property of Melody DuVal. Please do not use with-out permission.

Waiting

My computer has the personality of a moody teenager. Sometimes it's a hard worker, eager to help. Other times, for no apparent reason, it turns surly and refuses to do one thing.

During these times I doodle. Sometimes my doodles are my more interesting art. I don't have to play it safe, get the angles and perspective right. I just draw what I want.

This was drawn in pencil, so it didn't scan very well, but layering some colors on top of the line art and playing with the blending mode in photoshop brought out more of the details.

That's one thing about pencil, you get all these nice, fine, wispy details, but they're not much good for a finished project. You lose them once you've neatly inked the drawing in.

Of course, some times you see them brought out on purpose. A few years back Hot Topic had a great "Alice in Wonderland" shirt that had sketches from the Disney film of Alice tumbling down the rabbit hole. And recently, in Target, there were plates, cups, etc. that had sketches of Alice and other animated film characters (all Disney). I loved the sketches, though I didn't care for the added art the designer used to "complete" the work.

Upgrade?

Signs your computer is too slow. When you have time to sketch and ink multiple characters while you're waiting for your real work to finish saving.

I didn't put a lot into coloring these, clearly, but I thought a little color might be nice after so many pencil sketches.

Quick Sketches

Drawing the people around you always elicits a certain amount of paranoia. People know you sketch. They know you sketch people. They also know you've glanced at them no fewer than ten times in the past 60 seconds.

Fortunately there are some settings when, no matter how positive they are they're being sketched - they just can't do anything about it. Classes. Ceremonies. Waiting Rooms. They can't leave. Confronting you is awkward. Tada! Sketch subject!

Any Given Sunday

When I was a little girl some pastors used to tell my mother that I shouldn't be drawing in church or that if I was drawing it should be about the sermon. Apparently my mom thought that could get awkward ("So, how did you illustrate Song of Solomon, Melody?") or difficult ("Well now, that's an nice drawing of predestination, but I think your propitiation could use some more shading."). Or maybe she just thought that dealing with an antsy six year old might keep her from listening very well.

In any case, she didn't make me stop.

Over the years I went from doodling on the back or in the margins of bulletins to sneaking in my own blank paper to brazenly carrying in my sketchbook along with my bible.  Maybe some people think I'm not paying attention, but I can only tell them what I have told every teacher in my life.

It helps me focus.

If I don't draw my mind wanders, drawing keeps me grounded in the here and now. And as you can see, it doesn't keep me from note-taking either.