The Happy Earth Bird

With the encouragement of the writer/publisher of the book I've been illustrating, I've created a print of a detail from one of the pages. I call him, "Happy Earth Bird." You'll see him again once the book is available, but for now, you can find him in my Society6 shop here. He's available as a print, a t-shirt or a onesie. Keep checking back for more sneak peeks of this upcoming book!

Creating a new character and sequence, and the Tomie dePaola contest

Yesterday was the deadline for the 2014 Tomie dePaola contest. I learned a lot from participating in the last Tomie contest, and I decided to submit to this one as well.

The assignment was "to create a six-panel sequence that has a beginning, middle and an end that is obvious, featuring a character of your own invention. It can be funny, sad, dramatic or ordinary, but interesting and with lots of invention and finesse, and depicting emotion in 4 to 6 frames."

While I could have done more with the background, and with adding more details, I had many new ideas by working on this. My five year old son felt very strongly that the bird would not fly away forever, and we made up several stories of what they might do together next.

A quick DIY tie for my kid

My family and I are traveling to Florida today to attend my niece's high school graduation. I realized a couple of days ago that I had forgotten to get my son anything fancy to wear to the ceremony. So I made a quick scan of the dress that I'll be wearing, created a tie template in InDesign, and printed the design on iron-on paper. Voila! A new tie to match my dress. What do you think?

My first editorial illustration

I've had a growing curiosity about editorial illustration, and I was excited when Lilla Rogers assigned a magazine ad for this month's MATS Bootcamp class. We were asked to create a full-page, magazine illustration to coincide with this article on meditation, titled "How to Meditate: A Primer for People Who Don't Like to Meditate."

I wanted to convey a person who was unable to immerse themselves in meditation, amongst others who seemed to do it so easily. This was my final submission:

Your comments and suggestions are always welcome!

Last-minute underwater mural for a Brooklyn school and mural design for a team

NY Cares contacted me a couple of days ago, asking if I could quickly sketch a mural for a local school in Brooklyn. Because I live in Croton now, it would have been almost impossible for me to sketch an 18 foot mural on-site in the allotted time. So we agreed that I would design the mural, and leave it to someone else to project and sketch it out on the canvas. As always with NY Cares, a group of volunteers will paint the sketched mural.

Here are my sketches and final design (if I get any pictures, I will post the finished painted piece):

When I first started designing murals for NY Cares in 2004, I had no idea how to create something that could be painted successfully by a third party. My designs were too complicated, using complex shading or foreshortened images that weren't understandable to a group of volunteers. Or, my sketches were too vague and gestural, and the volunteers were unable to decipher my drawings well enough to paint them accurately.

As I have learned to keep my mural layouts simple and clear, I find that the experience for the volunteers is a heck of a lot less overwhelming, and they seem to walk away feeling excited and proud of the final work.

One of my more successful experiences was with a team of volunteers from Crossfit718. Because of the legibility of my drawing and the simplicity of the colors and shapes, these women were able to paint with enthusiasm. They got it. Their attitudes were positive, and they did an outstanding job.

Here are a couple of shots of that completed mural, and one of me adding some finishing touches.

Your questions, comments and suggestions are always welcome. Thanks for stopping by!

A Mother's Day note card for you.

I created this little card a couple of days ago for my mom and my husband's mom. To my great joy, it printed out on watercolor paper beautifully, and I was able to send them out on time.

If you'd like to download a copy of this little note card, I've created a printable page with crop marks and fold lines. You can either download this PNG below, or you can email me at kendrasred(at)gmail(dot)com, and I will send you a hi-res PDF.

Let me know if you have any questions. Enjoy!

Back to watercolor

Today, I challenged myself to make art using an uncomfortable medium. All types of traditional painting has proven a challenge for me the past few years, so I broke out the watercolors and watercolor pens to see if I could loosen up a bit. Below is a doll I painted, based on an upcoming assignment for my class with Lilla Rogers, plus a couple bird paintings. I ended up really enjoying myself, and I think I'll watercolor tomorrow as well.