Nora Thompson

Sketchbook Project 2012—Frankenstein in color #sketchbookproject

2012-02-13T15:00:00.000-05:00

Here's the finished Frankenstein page of my Sketchbook Project. This is the center spread, so what you're seeing down the middle is the tied-off end of the string from where I bound the book.

Another green Frank.

The only reason I can think of that my Frankensteins are green is because Herman had a bit of a greenish tint to him when The Munsters were in color. I used to be a big Munsters fan when I was little.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Frankenstein sketch #sketchbookproject

2012-02-09T14:59:00.000-05:00

Here's the next page in my Sketchbook Project for the Art House Co-op and the Brooklyn Art Library. This illustration marks the center spread which means he's also standing on the halfway-through-the-sketchbook page.

If you missed what this little project is all about, here's the post that explains all the details.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Baseball in color #sketchbookproject

2012-02-06T14:58:00.000-05:00

And here's that little baseball player dude in color (for the Sketchbook Project 2012 sketchbook). He's wearing red and white, of course, because those were my high school's colors.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Baseball sketch #sketchbookproject

2012-02-02T14:57:00.000-05:00

Here's my next sketch in my Sketchbook Project sketchbook. He's a baseball player (duh). I wasn't sure at first if I should put a name on his back or not. I've sort of decided he plays for a high school team, so I'm going to leave the name off.

I can't scream this loud enough: "I'M PROUD OF JACK GANTOS!!!"

2012-01-30T14:11:00.000-05:00

O.K. Well. There you go.

A little background, shall we?

I was working afternoon shift in Greensburg, Pennsylvania (noon-8 pm) quite a number of years ago, when I ran across some announcement somewhere that a kid's writer would be giving a free talk at our local college where I happened to be enrolled as a student. He was there to talk to the Masters in Writing Popular Fiction students, but the talk was free and open to the public.

I left work early that evening. Shh. Please don't tell.

The writer was someone I had never heard of (yet), but he came with some accolades, including a Newbery Honor for a book titled Joey Pigza Loses Control. At the time I wasn't a big reader of kid's books, and I was clueless as to who this guy was, let's just be honest.

The writer, of course, was Jack Gantos, and he turned out to be an absolutely amazing story teller. He wore a mic on his shirt throughout our little talk, displayed his writing (and, apparently, doodling) journals on a large screen behind the stage he was romping over and didn't stand still for one tiny minute. Turns out, he was a local boy. Born in Mount Pleasant, PA (me, too), grew up in Norvelt (until he was seven) and his mother still lived in Greensburg and just happened to be sitting right next to me.

***As an aside, I visit my dad every other Sunday, and Mount Pleasant and Norvelt are two small towns that happen to be part of the drive between my house and his.***

Let's just say Jack Gantos left an impression on me that evening that I'll probably never forget.

Fast forward to last Monday.

Every year the American Library Association awards some very prestigious honors for kid's books, with the two highest prizes being The John Newbery Medal and the Randolph Caldecott Medal. The Newbery goes to a writer and the Caldecott goes to an illustrator, and both are considered the highest awards that can be won by a writer or illustrator in the United States. Runners-up get Newbery or Caldecott Honors.

Last Monday the ALA announced the Newbery winners, and this time, Jack Gantos went home with the top prize for a book he wrote titled, Dead End in Norvelt. It's historical fiction about our very own little town of Norvelt. It's terribly fun to read by someone who recognizes the places and history that he mentions in the book: Frick Hospital (where I was born and where the one and only wall mural I've ever painted is located—please don't tell anyone, it's a really embarrassing piece of work), Mount Pleasant, Kecksburg (and the "UFO" landing there), Hecla (which is so small, it's hard to find a link to the right one), and the list goes on.

I got all teary-eyed when I'd heard that he had won, but adding to that that the book he won for was about my little corner of Southwestern Pennsylvania just made my day. And my month. I'm feeling a little pride for one of our own making it—and where he came from—big.

If you ever have the chance to see Jack Gantos speak publicly, don't hesitate for one second. You have to go. Trust me.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Elephant in color #sketchbookproject

2012-01-25T14:53:00.000-05:00

Here's the next page in my Sketchbook Project 2012 sketchbook.
It's an elephant. With wrinkles.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Elephant sketch #sketchbookproject

2012-01-21T14:44:00.000-05:00

The next page in my Sketchbook Project sketchbook is a little tubby elephant. O.K. Maybe he's a big tubby elephant, but in the sketchbook he's actually quite small as elephants go. He has folds, of course, because "Stitches and Folds" is my theme.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Butler in color #sketchbookproject

2012-01-18T14:39:00.000-05:00

Here's the second page (not including the title page) of my Sketchbook Project 2012. He's a butler. With a towel. Click the image to see it biggie-sized.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Harley in color #sketchbookproject

2012-01-09T14:30:00.000-05:00

O.K. Admittedly I'm running a bit on the late side with this one. I signed up for the Sketchbook Project 2012 months (and months) ago but, unlike the usual get-it-finished-way-before-it's-due me, I'm getting the color done on these pages way too last minute for my blood pressure (it's due Jan. 31). I would include the link for the project, but right now they're signing people up for the Sketchbook Project Limited Edition, and I can't find a link anymore for the regular Sketchbook Project 2012.

So here you go. The first color page (after the cover and title page, of course) finished and stamped with "done". I posted the sketch for this little guy last August. Apparently, at the time I named him Harley so I guess we'll have to go with that.

Say "hello" to Harley.

Sketchbook Project 2012—Title Page #sketchbookproject

2011-12-22T16:18:00.000-05:00

The next page in my Sketchbook Project sketchbook is inside the front cover and the title page (you didn't think I wouldn't have a title page, did you?). And here's the post with the cover image (and an explanation about the Sketchbook Project, if you don't already know what it's about).

Sketchbook Project 2012 #sketchbookproject

2011-12-19T14:31:00.000-05:00

Next year (next month!) I'll be participating in the wildly successful Sketchbook Project, put together by the Art House Co-op and the Brooklyn Art Library. I know, I know, I sure waited a long time to jump on the wagon, but at least I'm not falling off of it. I posted my first sketch in an earlier post.

The Sketchbook Project works like this:

I order a sketchbook from the Art House Co-op
They send a sketchbook specifically for me, with a bar code on the back identifying me and my sketchbook
I draw in said sketchbook (this seems to be the part that's taking the longest)
I send the sketchbook back to the Art House Co-op
They scan all the pages of my sketchbook and include them in their digital library and post them on their site
They gather up all the sketchbooks from this collection (this collection being 2012) and take them on tour around the country starting in April
After the tour, the sketchbooks are cataloged as a permanent fixture of the Brooklyn Art Library, available for patrons around the world to enjoy (hopefully)
Every time someone "checks out" my sketchbook it will be logged through the bar code on the back, and I can check my stats in real time online or through text messages
That's it

We had to pick "themes" for the sketchbooks, and the one I picked was Stitches and Folds. I thought I could do something cool with that idea. My first page from the sketchbook is actually the cover, and here it is (ta-da):

Each image will include some sort of stitch or fold (in the drawing of it, not an actual stitch or fold, which I played around with and discovered didn't work so well) opposite a page with a song lyric that I think goes well with the image.

I rebound (rebinded?) my sketchbook (you're allowed as long as you follow their rules) with some toothier paper (theirs was too smooth and too white), so the stitching on the spine is mine (and part of my theme).

Due Jan. 31, 2012.

What was I thinking?

A Little Like Shaun Tan

2011-12-03T18:32:00.001-05:00

A few weeks ago I finally made my way to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. I wasn't there to visit the place, although we have plans of returning next year for actual Gettysburg reasons. So much history. I feel so attracted to something there.

But this post isn't supposed to be about Gettysburg.

I hauled my butt across half the state for an SCBWI conference, and yeah, I came home with lots of thoughts to think loudly about. But I'll attempt to narrow those thoughts down to just one: Jordan Brown.

I had a manuscript critique with Jordan, a Senior Editor at Walden Pond Press and Balzer + Bray, imprints of HarperCollins Children's Books. The story I had written was a short story I had finished for a fiction writing class I took about eight years ago (has it been that long?). My professor at the time loved it, and in his comments at the end wrote, "Get it published."

And yet.

The story wasn't long enough. I knew it wouldn't make a complete book. But, being an illustrator—and pictures are easier for me than words—I had the brilliant idea (I thought, at the time) to pad the short story with pictures to make it long enough. Maybe even convert it into a graphic novel (Mr. Punch-style). Yeah. A graphic novel. Then the words would be at a minimum, and I could tell a lot of the story just using images.

Yeah. Images.

But Jordan didn't really agree.

He was thinking more along the lines of, say, a novel.

"You mean those things with all the words?"

"Those things with all the words."

But there was something in the story he had latched onto. Something he didn't want me to lose as I was writing more. Something he likened to...

Shaun Tan.

Shaun Tan? Really? How could he know?

What he liked about what I had written was all the stuff I hadn't written. How you didn't know when or where the story was taking place. Was it in the past? Or the future? Or was it even on this planet?

He totally got it.

He said it seemed like I was working in the sort of space that Shaun Tan occupies (not bad company to be in), but a very difficult one to break into (not what I wanted to hear).

It wasn't until I read this article in the Guardian today (and written by Neil Gaiman, no less) that I realized how right Jordan was. The paring things down. The fictional landscape. The far future, the distant past.

I had decided before I left the conference to take Jordan's advice and write the whole thing as a novel. He even suggested I take a look at A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, not just for the loss of the protagonist's mother, but also (as I figured out when I got the book) for the illustrations. They're beautiful. I thought, yeah, writing all those words is going to take a while, but I can supplement all those words with some really cool pictures.

Pictures. My comfort food.

But as soon as I finished the book that little doubt devil started spewing into my brain again, and I started growing doubt shoots. Doubts about all those words. A Monster Calls was good. It was really, really good. And heavy (in a deep sense, not in a weight one). Can I really write something as relevant as that? Why am I doubting my writing? Why am I dragging my feet with this story?

What am I afraid of?

I won't be able to start writing for a few days anyway, so in the small spurts of time I have until then, I've decided to absorb a little Shaun Tan. The Rabbits. Tales from Outer Suburbia. The Lost Thing. I'm hoping in the time we spend together Shaun will help me find the confidence I'm thinking must be lurking around here somewhere.

And then after that, if I've been good, I can get back to the pictures.

Surviving a weekend

2011-11-17T19:05:00.001-05:00

So I managed to survive the SCBWI conference in Gettysburg over the weekend. Gettysburg is such a fantastic place. I'd never been there, and can't wait to go back. The history is heart-wrenching. I went on a ghost tour. I bought a bullet. I found a picture book in the same shop as the bullet only to see that it had been illustrated by someone I've admired for years. And then I met that very illustrator at the conference (more on him in another post). I cried during E.B. Lewis' keynote speech. An agent saw my portfolio and asked to meet me. What a whirlwind. So many new people, so many new friends, so much to think about.

And so much more to do.

As you can probably tell, I survived my manuscript critique with Jordan Brown (see my misgivings here in an earlier post). He was, despite my fears, terribly helpful and encouraging. I only wish I could have had a recording of everything he said because, of course, I didn't take notes. He was excited and hopeful about my book idea, which made me excited and hopeful about my book idea.

Now the uphill climb begins.

Turns out I tend to make friends easier with editors at these conferences than I do art directors and agents. Not sure why that is. The problem with that is that editors want me to write stuff (ugh!). Pictures aren't good enough; they aren't happy until they've pushed me over that ugly, word-laden hill.

So I guess I'm heading toward the next step in my children's book career. Thanks to Jordan Brown, my next move will be at my computer keyboard writing a novel.

Yes, a novel.

Apparently short stories don't have enough words. Now I have even more of those steep, torturous word-hills to climb.

Did I mention "ugh!"?

I can do this. Nobody's ever croaked from writing a novel, have they?

Someone please tell me I can do this.

More Vlad Hot Cocoa

2011-10-24T13:37:00.000-04:00

In May I finished an illustration for a drink mix directory that was published by the Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators in August. I called it Dancing in the Moonlight, and I had that old King Harvest song in my head the entire time.

(As an aside, just try and listen to that song and then get it out of your head. Not gonna happen. I had to download it.)

The illustration was part of the exhibit that PSI put together at Gallerie Chiz in Shadyside, and it will be in another exhibit starting in November at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh.

But I had an idea.

Next month I'm attending the Tri-Regional SCBWI conference in Gettysburg. They're going to do something called "First Looks" where illustrators send in three related images to possibly be included as part of a panel discussion. The images will be projected for everyone at the conference to see (no pressure there), and the panel (editors, agents and an art director) will offer their first responses to the images.

I really didn't have anything finished that I thought would be good enough, so I decided to create two new images to go with Dancing in the Moonlight.The images I've posted here are the sketches for those two images.

Due Nov. 1.

And now if you'll excuse me, I have some painting to do.

This should make me a happy camper

2011-10-15T20:43:00.000-04:00

I have to admit, I haven't been creating much in the world of illustration lately. I've been focused pretty intently on getting my book out (in a few weeks, my pretties), painting a few Rots (just finished Buster on Wednesday) and getting organized for the fall SCBWI conference coming up next month in Gettysburg.

Yeah. About that conference. This year I decided to jump in the ring and get the text of a graphic novel idea I wrote a while back critiqued by one of the faculty. Our regional advisor is totally pushing me toward an editor named Jordan Brown. She says he would "love" the kind of stuff I do and she thinks we would get along "fabulously".

(By the way, where do periods fall in relation to quotation marks these days? Inside or outside?)

So I'm asking to be placed with Mr. Brown, and my fingers are kind of crossed.

Kind of.

I've been following along with Gris Grimly's blogging about the new three volume book he's been working on for the past few years. He's tackling Frankenstein and, as usual, his work is phenomenal. Beautiful. Inspiring.

Makes me want to crawl in a hole somewhere and start crocheting lap robes for a living.

His latest post isn't helping.

Turns out the editor for his Frankenstein books? Yeah. Jordan Brown. I'm torn between jumping for joy and crawling under a rock to take up residence with the isopods. If Jordan Brown has somebody like Gris Grimly in his back pocket, does somebody like me really have much of a chance?

I'm finding my rock as we speak.

Ouchy.

I finally saw North by Northwest

2011-09-15T21:06:00.000-04:00

So I finally had a chance to see the Hitchcock classic North by Northwest a couple of nights ago, and I noticed some things. Not necessarily things that had anything to do with the plot or the directing or the acting.

Things I noticed:

People were skinnier in 1959. Or, Hitchcock only hired actors who were. I'm thinking a little of both.
Movies were longer in 1959. Over two hours for this one.
Martin Landau was very handsome when he was a young man. Martin Landau was once a young man. Martin Landau was skinny when he was a young man.
James Mason was young once but, apparently, he's always been classy. And skinny.
Now that we don't do it anymore, smoking in public looks really, really stupid.
Eva Marie Saint was young once, but at 35 could never pass for 26. Sorry.
They had bus stops in the middle of nowhere in 1959. How, exactly, was a rider expected to get to and from?
Cary Grant's character's initials are R.O.T., which I find amusing.
People were able to fall in love instantly in 1959, in spite of knowing nothing about each other. Or, people watching movies in 1959 were more ready to embrace the concept.
The kissing scene between Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint would pass for a G rating today, but it still made my dad uncomfortable having to watch it in a room with me.

I have to admit, I wanted to see the movie mostly for the house at the end that looked an awful lot like Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater (where I work), but is not, in fact, Fallingwater (see the article by Sandy McClendon on jetsetmodern.com). We've had rumors going around at work that Hitchcock wanted to use Fallingwater, but wasn't permitted to do so. I haven't found anything on the Internet to confirm or deny those rumors, but I have found where he wasn't allowed to film at the United Nations building so he used hidden cameras and filmed anyway.

Also, Fallingwater doesn't need steel beams to hold up its cantilevers. We use post-tensioning instead.

September 11 has nothing to do with September 11

2011-09-11T08:07:00.000-04:00

Ten years ago on September 11, 2001, my step daughter turned 21 years old. She was young. She was 21. She had planned on spending her birthday drinking with friends. But that evening the bars were closed, for reasons beyond any 21-year-old's control.

And suddenly it's ten years later. So much has happened.

And so much has changed.

This morning my husband and I will be heading to the cemetery. New York and D.C. and Shanksville will be crowded with people looking for...something. A little bit of comforting, maybe.

We'll be heading toward a small lake near a gazebo in Delmont, to a single plot of earth, far away from the crowds. And we'll have each other.

Happy birthday, Lauren.

#SketchbookProject: Harley sketch

2011-08-21T10:43:00.003-04:00

I signed up to participate in Art House Co-op's 2012 Sketchbook Project and picked the theme, "Stitches and folds." I've been sketching some of the pages while I'm at work, and here's the first sketch I decided to add color to. (I'll post the color version when it's finished.) I wanted to have some character sewing something, and I tried to come up with someone you would expect least. His name is Harley.

Starting From Chicken Scratch

2011-07-16T20:35:00.002-04:00

So I've been contemplating lately what my next move will be regarding my illustration career. As I blogged earlier, I don't think the direction I was heading was quite the right direction I should be. It's kind of hard to keep doing what you're doing when what you're doing isn't doing anything. Isn't that the definition of madness? Spinning your wheels and expecting a different result?

My mailing list since 2005 has been directed toward picture book publishers, and there aren't too many No, Davids or Frog Belly Rat Bones out there. And you know what? That's fine. I'm not sure I'm understanding the logic, but I respect the decision, and I'm free to move on.

This morning I bought a Kindle copy of the 2011 Artist's and Graphic Designer's Market book. It's been a while since I had a copy (looks like 2007 was the last), and I wanted to get a version that didn't leave me with a dead tree in a few years. So I'm Kindle-ing this one.

I've decided my mailing list is getting a do-over, and I'm starting with the Market book I bought this morning. When the 2012 Children's Writer's and Illustrator's Market book comes out in September, I'll sift through that one, too. I'm going to look for publishers for older kids this time, and book covers and maybe posters and agents and such.

I still love, love, love picture books, but I've resigned myself into accepting that if I ever get one published it will likely be independent of a major house. And I'm fine with that, too. I'll be doing it because I love creating and pulling ideas out of my butt, and that satisfaction can happen no matter who pays for the final outcome.

Yesterday I went for a bike ride (Rockwood, PA to Garrett, PA on the Great Allegheny Passage). I took a picture while I was riding, so I have an excuse for the blurry. Lots of thoughts in my head, including the one I shared above.

And here's another one:

You need to get out more.
You need to move more.
The more you move more,
the more oxygen gets sucked into your little brain,
and the more thoughts can get thought out of your butt.

Think your own thoughts. Paint your own pictures. Live your own life.

The Death of...@GrisGrimly?

2011-05-21T19:48:00.034-04:00

If a major publisher can do this to Gris Grimly, what might a lesser publisher potentially do with someone like me?

http://grisgrimly.blogspot.com/2011/05/death-ofme.html

If you know anything about Mr. Grimly's art (and if you don't, take a look: http://www.madcreator.com/index.cfm), you know his palette is muted, earthtoned and perfectly suited to his work.

I'm not sure of any details other than those relayed through the above blog post, but I'm wondering where the breakdown occurred. If someone had a problem with the color, why wasn't the artist approached and given the opportunity to make compromises and any color adjustments himself? Who did make the changes? Who O.K.'d them? And why would they think it was perfectly fine to do that?

I'm not sure what happens if I purchase this book. Am I supporting Gris Grimly? Or am I supporting the person at Random House who decided to "fix" his work without his input or acknowledgement?

As an artist, how do you handle a situation like this? Do you have any rights? Is this something that needs to be addressed in the contract? And if so, why is something like this even an issue that needs to be debated?

Dancing in the Moonlight: Complete

2011-05-04T13:16:00.001-04:00

Here's the color version of the sketch I posted last week. I think he turned out pretty good, but I've been looking at him for so long I'm not sure anymore. He's getting some positive feedback, so I'm thinking he might be O.K.

He'll be heading for a drink mix directory which will go out to art directors later this year. Fingers crossed on this one.

Dancing in the Moonlight

2011-04-27T19:50:00.000-04:00

So you remember that Frankenstein hot cocoa idea I was doing for the Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators drink mix directory?

Yeah. It wasn't really working for me, so I canned the idea and started over. I dreaded having to sit down and work on it for some reason. I still might use it somewhere someday, but right now it just isn't happening.

I decided to stick with the hot cocoa idea though. I was thinking a lot of people drink hot chocolate in the evening before bed, and it would look pretty cool to have chocolate dripping off the teeth of a vampire, right? I also thought he should have some friends to enjoy it with.

But evening for a vampire is about the time when the party's just getting started, and I wanted to make sure I showed that. He'll be wearing printed pjs (not sure yet what the print will be) along with his bunny slippers, and everybody's dancing to that old King Harvest song. You know, the one I can't seem to get out of my head now that I've started this thing.

Desperately Seeking Tim Burton

2011-03-29T16:30:00.000-04:00

Dear Mr. Burton,

I've found myself in a desperate rut, the likes of which you've managed to retrieve me from in the past, and I'm hoping you will be available again sometime soon.

January a year ago, I made a trek to the Museum of Modern Art, specifically to view your work on display there. I bought a membership just so I wouldn't have to stand in line with all the other saps who had to wait to get in.

The rooms that housed your exhibit were terribly crowded; I'm sure we were well beyond the building's fire code. Sardines, as it were. But I managed to see everything, just to make sure I didn't miss anything that might later turn out to be something I would have liked to have seen.

After I squeezed my way through all the rooms I took a breather. I bought some stuff. I ate some stuff and, in spite of the sardine thing, I decided I needed to get myself back in the middle of that exhibit.

So I did.

This time I knew exactly what I needed to see again, so I jumped out of the line that snaked around the rooms and headed straight for the drawings.

The drawings, as you know, were watercolor outlined in pen, so there was really nothing out of the ordinary there. Using the media in that way was nothing new, and had never been a source of inspiration for me. So that couldn't really have been the attraction.

Why was I still there? Why couldn't I take my eyes off these images? Why were these images so much better than what I conjured in my own sketchbooks?

I think what sucked me back into those rooms and set my sparks flying was that unrestrained childlike imagination. How does an artist allow himself to let everything fly out the window like that? The caricatures were well beyond caricatures. Arms and legs and tails and horns and whatever other body parts that could conceivably be conceived as a body part were attached to shapes that weren't really bodies until simulated body parts had been attached.

But you knew that.

Stripes and checkerboards and spirals and dipping horizons added to my acute sense of instability, and all I could do was stand in front of them and try to soak in as much as my little brain could soak in, in the hopes that some day that freedom would spew out in my own work.

On the train ride home I drew. Over the next few months I drew some more. I was inspired and ready to take on my own sketchbook demons and wrestle them into something I could proudly show the world.

Things seep away over time, however. It's been another year, and I seem to have lost that thing. That permission you had given me to create outrageousnous. Those weird images that had been crisscrossing around in my head. And, ultimately, the hope that somewhere down the line it would all be worth it.

Dear Tim (do you mind if I call you Tim?), please send me a sign. Something. Anything. Something to get me back on track. Something to help me find my monsters. I'm afraid right now they're lost, and I'm also afraid they're scared. And hungry. I know I am. I desperately need to bring them home.

Please help me bring them back home.

Signed,

Nora

P.S. Thank you kindly for allowing my family to give me your art book last Christmas, and I'm eagerly awaiting your and Danny's CD box set, as my Alice in Wonderland soundtrack is quite possibly wearing thin.

Frankenstein Hot Cocoa Steampunk Sketcheroo

2011-03-24T20:31:00.000-04:00

I'll be participating in the Pittsburgh Society of Illustrator's mixed drink directory later this year, and I wanted to mash Frankenstein up with a little steampunk. My recipe will be for hot cocoa, and this is the sketch I came up with. Thanks once again to Harpers Ferry, WV, and their great collection of stone buildings and textures that have yet to let me down.

"The Lost Thing" or "How Shaun Tan Helped Me Find What Went Missing"

2011-03-21T15:30:00.000-04:00

This is going to take a while, so I apologize right up front, and I thank you for seeing it through to the end, if you do. Let's start by stating the instigation for this post:

Shaun Tan is changing my career.

There. I said it, now it's out there, and now I have to find the nerve to follow it through.

This all started the day I bought Shaun Tan's book Tales from Outer Suburbia last year, mostly for the illustrations (as usual), but also because I'd been working on a book of short stories of my own, and I wanted to see how somebody else tackled that kind of project.

Having Suburbia and a library borrow of his The Arrival as my only Shaun Tan interactions, I dragged family to see the Oscar-Nominated Animation Shorts at a local movie theater last month. The Lost Thing was one of the nominees (and eventual Oscar winner) and was based on Shaun's Australian-released children's* book of the same name. Shaun also worked for years on the movie.

*The word "children's" is a little dodgy here. The book will be forced into the children's section of bookstores because, cleary, no adult would be caught with a book filled with *gasp* pictures.

I bought the 15-minute short from iTunes within the week (sorry, no direct URL to the movie on iTunes). I pre-ordered his book Lost and Found which was released a few days later and included three of his early picture books, one of which was The Lost Thing.

I tweeted about our movie night. I tweeted about the Oscar win. I tweeted about iTunes. I tweeted about Lost and Found. Suffice it to say, the movie lingered in my little brain longer than expected. Evidently, something had happened over those few days that was making that little brain do some thinking.

I thought about my own career, and I thought about where I might have lost it.

My own Lost Thing.

I checked my checklist:

I work hard (kid's illustrations, The Rots, one of many books in the works).
I brand each aspect of my professional life as professionally as I can (see the sites above and below).
I promote myself (this blog, The Rots' blog, my book blog, I'm on Facebook, I'm on Twitter, I send out promotional postcards religiously).
I promote others.
I try to be a good little small-business marketer (see everything above).
I follow advice when it comes from multiple, knowledgable sources (art directors, editors and agents).
I make changes that those sources seem to think are necessary.

I've heard a lot of advice through the years about what editors and art directors are looking for in an illustrator. I'm a member of SCBWI, and I attend the local conferences. Before I go on, I just want to say that I know these are only opinions and guidelines, and if my work is good, it's just a matter of finding the right editor/art director/project that will take me on, regardless of whether the work followed the advice given. I know that. I understand that. But when the work isn't coming in and the same advice is (again and again), it may be time to think about making some changes.

This is Stanley. He is the image I used on the first postcard I sent out with the style I could finally call mine. My initial portfolio and book submissions were similar.

I was told by two editors that they were concerned my characters weren't cute enough.

I was told by a fellow illustrator that I needed to think along the lines of three-year-olds and clowns. "And smiles," he said. "Not creepy."

I was told by an art director that she could only use my work for scary stories.

I was told by another art director that he couldn't use my work, but to send him updates anyway because "you never know." (That publishing company released a book of poetry less than two years later using an illustrator who's work was very similar to mine, but who's pedigree included working for Disney.)

At a conference in NYC during an open question session with a couple of art directors, one answered the question, "What are you looking for in a submission?" with:

"Don't send me people with googly eyes, big heads, small bodies and little skinny legs."

Our portfolios had been open for preview earlier in the day. You can't make this stuff up.

I made the changes. I concentrated on cuter. My heads got smaller, along with my eyes, which also evened themselves out and eventually constricted to pupils. I drew clowns. I made new samples and avoided the scary. My people were smiling. I kept up with the promotions. I sent new samples every three months. I tried to keep my attitude positive.

And yet.

Why was I not getting the work?

I posed the question to an editor. "I love it!" she said. "But this would be a hard sell."

I posed the question to an agent. "It's the economy," he said. "Just keep doing what you're doing."

I posed the question to an art director that same day. "It's the economy," she repeated. "You're doing everything right."

I rewrote some of my "adult" short stories to make them more "accessible" to a younger audience, based on things I had read and heard at conferences:

I made my kids the protagonists.
I made my kids solve the problems.
I kept my picture book submissions to 32 printer-friendly pages.
I consciously made an effort to create unusual perspectives and action in my illustration samples.
I added pages to my Web site to show I knew how to develop a character and create sequential imagery.

But more than anything I took the edge off my illustrations.

And yet.

Enter Shaun Tan.

Lost and Found is just beautiful. It breaks the rules because it can. It breaks the rules because Hatchett Australia and Arthur A. Levine gave Shaun Tan a chance to break the rules. And Shaun Tan got the chance to break the rules because he created beautiful images and wrote from the heart.

I know. There's that other piece of advice that gets thrown around a lot. But what if beautiful images and writing from the heart stomps all over the other rules?

The Lost Thing actually shows men smoking! Not once, but three times! Smoking! The horror!

The first of the three stories is resolved by a tree, and the third story isn't really resolved at all. But the kids! Aren't the kids supposed to be who make everything alright?

All three stories in the Lost and Found collection have themes that would surely be considered adult-oriented. Right? Maybe older kids, but certainly not those three-year-old clown lovers. (How many kids would really understand the sign, "State-sponsored thought for the day: LET THE MARKET DECIDE"?)

And those illustrations? Where are all the action shots? Where are all the in-your-face pay-attention-to-me page compositions? What's to keep the attention of these attention-deficit children?

That's when I took a look back over the last few years to see what happened. When did I change? When did I stop illustrating for me?

I took a(nother) long, deep breath and asked, "Where did I go?"

I had lost my Me somewhere.

My funny. My style. My twisted sense of humor. The Me that made my illustrations mine. My ideas had been squashed by 32 pages of cute. Of action. Of advice. Of opinions.

Shaun Tan's advice to illustrators:

"Think about the things in yourself that are different to everybody else. And don’t think of those as a disability or something negative, but think of it as a positive attribute. Whatever it is that makes you unique, that’s what people are interested in."

Really? I so need this to be true.

I want to make a beautiful book that happens to be loaded with illustrations. A book with pictures. Why are picture books only geared toward kids? I buy kid's books all the time. For me. I buy them for the pictures. My collection of picture books are alphabetized by illustrator.

I want to make the beautiful books I see in my head, the ones that most publishers won't touch, the ones that may or may not contain kids, where the kid may or may not be the protagonist, that may or may not be scary, that may or may not have an adult sneaking a smoke in somewhere. The ones that may or may not depict clowns as the creepy nightmares they really are.

So I guess at this point I'm on my own.

I'm going to revisit some old picture books I had given up on. They had been poked and prodded and reinvented to the point I didn't recognize them anymore. My original vision had been lost in my attempt to make them conform.

I'm going to continue with my Hairy Eyeballs project, but I'm not going to hold my breath for a publisher. I've submitted the book to an editor I met at a conference who definitely seems the type who would go for this sort of twisted idea of a thing, but I'll completely understand when she tells me she isn't interested. After the book is rejected in a few months, it will be my baby again, and I've no plans on submitting it elsewhere. I know people who will help me with the editing. I've already designed the book. I have a following of close to 3,800 people on Facebook as of this writing who think my twisted little characters really are cute (their word, not mine). But more than anything, I don't feel the need to be accepted by the mainstream publishing world anymore.

I'm ready to make the books I've always wanted to make.

It's time.

So it's very likely at this point I'm the only one still here. But that doesn't really matter right now, because this post was just for me.

And now, thanks to a lost thing, my creativity is again, too.

Robot guitar man

2011-02-28T16:03:00.003-05:00

This was a drawing I made at work one day, and I wasn't really sure what to do with him at the time. Since then, I figured out a way to squeeze him into the book I've been working on, and here he is, "spruced up" a bit to fit with the other stories in the book.

Spinach has as much iron as watermelon

2011-02-17T16:24:00.000-05:00

Here's why you have to actually proofread (and don't assume spell check is good enough).

Whoever wrote out the results of an 1870 (or 1890, depending on where you get your information) German study misplaced a decimal point one spot to the right of where it was supposed to be and gave spinach ten times the iron than it actually had. It was written out by hand, so we can almost forgive the guy.

The bad part? It wasn't until 1937 that some other German dudes discovered the typo and fixed it. But even then, it wasn't really pointed out to the public until the British Medical Journal republished the study in 1981. Too late. Popeye debuted as a supporting character in Thimble Theatre in 1929, and has been hyping cans of spinach since. And actually, spinach eating jumped 33% between 1931 and 1936 in the U.S. which supposedly saved the spinach industry.

So all the kids who grew up being forced to eat their spinach can thank a cartoon and a typo.

Zombie tooth

2011-02-14T20:45:00.000-05:00

I've had root canals before, so this one wasn't bothering me all that much. I never really understood what all the bad press was about. Yeah, it was inconvenient, expensive, took a long time (try holding your mouth open wide for an hour and see what I mean) and took more than one trip, but I never really experienced major pain or side effects or anything. I was a little cranky going in because all of the above, but still.

This time I had to go to a root canal specialist. I won't get into the whole story (short version: the dentist before mine didn't finish the original root canal in this tooth properly), but there was some curving going around in there, and my dentist shooed me on.

Let me back up and say that the only reason I found out that the first root canal wasn't finished properly was because the crown that other dentist had attached (also improperly) to the tooth came off.

Let me back up a wee bit further and say I had just finished a month-long root canal on a different tooth four days before said crown came off.

So I started out not a happy camper.

Anyway, my nubbins of a tooth looked zombie-ish to me. I even thought I could hear it's little voice yelling, "brrrraaaaaaaaiiiiiinnnnns," but I wasn't certain about that. I won't scare you with an actual photo (pretty gross in there), but I will show you the x-ray. I think you can figure out which one's the zombie.

And all that other work? Yeah, that's from grinding my teeth at night. But I digress...

By the way, it took a full week to recover from the first part of this root canal. First came the pain, which bypassed anything my pain prescription could handle. Then came the swelling. I already have a problem with the roots of my teeth pushing up into my sinuses on a normal day, but the swelling caused major allergy-type symptoms (obnoxious nose-running, sneezing, itching, you get the idea). Not only that, even when I wasn't trying to eat I kept biting the inside of my cheek.

I go back to get the root canal finished on Thursday. Then I get to go to a periodontist to get part of my gums removed. Then I get to go back to my regular dentist for the final tooth restoration.

Oh, and I'm paying for this without insurance on an illustrator's bank account.

I think this is what they mean by "root canal."

Other than that, everything's going just fine.

O.K. The snow can be done now

2011-02-13T16:30:00.000-05:00

I'm finished with winter.

We've endured snow on the ground almost every day since the beginning of December, and the time I've set aside for winter months has officially run its course. The sunny days and beautiful blue skies will only dupe the senses for so long when the temperature refuses to go high enough to melt the white stuff.

I'm tired of running on a treadmill with my iPod staring at boxes in the basement.

I want to ride my bicycle. On a trail. Outside. In shorts.

I want to walk in the woods.

I want to eat ice cream.

Blogging combo

2011-02-08T17:38:00.002-05:00

I've been trying to keep way, way too many blogs in the air at the same time, and for all the right reasons I'm in the process of combining as many as I can. So my graphic design/editorial illustration/fine art blog posts from a different blog are now integrated into and between the posts in this blog.

And you probably didn't even notice.

I hope things don't get too mushy, but if you're feeling they are, please let me know. I'm going to keep the old graphic design blog in place while I wait on feedback, so I can always separate everything again in the future.

In the meantime, I'm trying to figure out what to call the blog and how to integrate my graphic design/fine art brands (somewhat serious) with my kid's illustration brand (not so much), which isn't the easiest thing to do. I might play around with a few ideas before something actually feels right for me so, you know, comments are always helpful.

Small violinist, big room

2011-01-22T15:03:00.000-05:00

Meet Nick.

He's trying to be my next postcard image. We'll see how that goes after he gets some color.

P.S. The horn player's name is Clarice.

The gift of a Web site: Priceless

2011-01-20T16:50:00.000-05:00

So for Christmas, the present I gave that made the biggest splash was a Web site I built for my husband. He's a potter, a sculptor and a painter, and the site was designed to showcase his work. The gift included a domain name and perpetual updates. He's never had a Web site before and was so impressed with the idea that I could have gotten anything I wanted for about a week.

In hindsight, I realize I should have taken more advantage.

He spent the next few days taking new photos of our studio space along with shots of some pottery he had been working on. He also spent a good bit of time looking up information including titles, sizes and exhibit information. Some of the portfolio pieces I had initially marked with dummy text like $priceless and with sizes like really"xbig" which didn't really fly.

I included a lot of dummy text all over the site. It was meant to be funny on Christmas morning, but then replaced with information my husband was supposed to give me later. And the idea did spur multiple readings and a lot of out-loud laughing, which was the whole point of not using "Lorem ipsum" everywhere.

What I wasn't ready for was how much he liked that silly dummy text. He liked it so much that he chose to keep the bulk of it on the site. As is. He said if people couldn't handle his sense of humor, that wasn't his problem. I protested at first, but eventually gave in, and we ended up keeping all the references to beer and how much his wife totally rocks.

Really, I'm just the designer. Who am I to argue?

Napkin doodles @ Leo's

2011-01-18T14:03:00.001-05:00

This is Space Boy.

I drew him on my napkin at Leo's Pub & Grille, Mount Pleasant, PA.

He says not all space boys are from Mars.

Things I'm learning about myself while cleaning

2011-01-16T19:04:00.000-05:00

I started a massive throwing out of (what is turning out to be) the junk in our office space, and I'm finding out some things about myself as I go.

First of all, until the last few years I didn't feel I had actually created an illustration until I held it in my hands, so I printed out everything I did, and sometimes in several copies. What, exactly, did I need those for anyway? Now I have a huge stack of illustration pages that are waiting to be recycled sitting illustration-side-down at my printer. The rest are in a box until there's room on the stack.

Second, my mother typically bought things in relative bulk just because it's cheaper, especially if whatever it is you're buying isn't going to go bad anytime soon (like in your lifetime). The problem I seem have with that theory is the "isn't going to go bad" part. I bought stuff that wouldn't go bad physically, but that went terribly bad personally, digitally, stylistically...

I went and got married in the middle of this career which, of course, is a good thing, except for all the business cards that state otherwise.
Shortly after I ordered a new batch of promo postcards—and shortly before I received the shipment—we changed from a street address to a post office box.
Somewhere in the middle of all these things I changed my illustration style.
And as if that weren't enough, I also updated both my graphic design and illustration branding.

So domain names and contact information all needed to be updated which now means, along with the old business cards, I need to throw out any old postcards that I could have used as handouts.

I also spent a good bit of money to participate in a directory that the Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators sent out which included giving me a stack of 500 tear sheets of my page to use as self-promotional pieces. With my old name. And old contact information. And old style. Those pages were printed on glossy paper, so I can't even recycle the backs of them in our printer. Another stack for File 13.

And third, add to all of this the fact that computers and their programs have a half-life of around 13.7 days, so after they've sucked in their last breath, you're the one left holding the coasters. Yes, that says "Windows 95."

What a waste.

What have we learned?

I don't need to print things out unless I need to.
It isn't necessary to take advantage of printer deals that offer twice as many of something for just $3 more.
My husband is stuck with me, if only for the sake of the environment.

Napkin doodles @ Dino's Part 2

2011-01-14T15:01:00.003-05:00

This is Giant.

I drew him on my napkin at Dino's Restaurant in Latrobe, PA.

He doesn't like when you refer to him as "jolly."

Napkin doodles @ Dino's

2011-01-09T17:00:00.001-05:00

This is Ted.

I drew him on my napkin at Dino's Restaurant in Latrobe, PA.

He says "hi."

Gingerbread Men-At-Work

2010-12-24T14:00:00.002-05:00

Illustrators I Greatly Admire: Exhibit E

2010-12-21T16:33:00.012-05:00

AnnaLaura Cantone

I first came across AnnaLaura Cantone's illustrations a while back as I flipped through a Houghton Mifflin Kids catalog and found Prudence and Moxie by Deborah Noyes. The combination of the illustrator's looseness and her confidence in her mark making made me rip the page out to explore her work a little further.

Of course the page went in the pile, as pages tend to do. I finally found that catalog page as I was cleaning our office space last week, and I took a minute to see if I could find more of her illustrations.

Her Web site looks as though it's under construction, but the animations that run on the front page are awfully cute. After some more searching I found a LiveJournal page with a ton of her illustrations, but no real explanation of what I was looking at (not in English, anyway) except for the few self-explanatory book jacket images.

I've bookmarked the blog page and will be returning periodically when I need to remember where I want my illustrations to be. Loose. Confident. Quirky without apologies. Definitely worth another look.

Dear Fall: If I had appreciated you more, would you have stayed?

2010-12-19T16:29:00.000-05:00

(The trail photo is from September, taken while riding my bike on the Great Allegheny Passage.)

I'm already tired of the snow. And the winter. And the scraping of the car every time I want to go somewhere. And the gloves that you can't use to do anything except keep warm. And it really isn't even winter yet for another two days.

I'm not sure I can survive three more months of this! Steaming cups of hot chocolate, now that's what I'm talking about.

We've had one day this month above freezing, so until that day the snow just kept hanging around with no way to melt away.

Oh, and the day it was above freezing? Yeah, all day freezing rain. It was the front edge of a nasty storm that dropped another seven + inches of snow on us overnight (please see ruler picture to the right). So the freezing rain froze, and the snow piled beautifully on top. No, seriously, it was beautiful. (Just take a look at the ruler picture. The trees? In the background? See? I told you.)

Maybe I didn't appreciate the other seasons enough. Maybe I complained about the humidity one time too many. Maybe I sat at my computer too much instead of going outside.

Why can't spring and fall last as long as summer and winter?

On the bright side: After Tuesday, the days start getting longer, and then winter will have to hit the road.

Tuesday.

6:38 PM.

"Steampunk Heidi" is finished!

2010-12-08T20:08:00.000-05:00

I think I'm finally finished with this one; I really don't know what else I can do with her.

I'm about to send her off to Tomie dePaola, and we'll find out on January 3 what he thinks.

"Steampunk Heidi" color #1

2010-11-29T19:35:00.000-05:00

Here's the latest on Heidi.

The background texture is a combination of a watercolor texture I painted a while back and a photo of my concrete driveway. I tinted the watercolor a reddish tan to help with the steampunk look, and the driveway layer I left as gray.

"Steampunk Heidi" sketch for Tomie

2010-11-24T19:08:00.003-05:00

Starting this year, SCBWI is taking over sponsorship of the Tomie dePaola Award, although Tomie will still be choosing the winner. I'm not expecting much of a look from Mr. dePaola, but it does give me a subject for my next postcard.

They're looking for an illustration based on the opening paragraphs of the classic Heidi by Johanna Spyri. Tomie claims he wants to see "an image, a style, a vision that I've never seen before!" (exclamation mark included) I'm having my doubts that that's entirely true, but I'm going to enter anyway.

This is the sketch I came up with:

I wanted to add a little bit of my own twist to the illustration by giving her a steampunk attitude. The timeframe would be right-ish, and the goggles were especially helpful for a reflection of the Alps.

Addendum: As an aside, here are the scrap paper thumbnail ideas I was playing with. I guess technically I went with #2.

If I've ever said anything bad about Steve Jobs, I want to take it back now

2010-11-17T17:18:00.000-05:00

Right.

So my MacBook belched up a huge hair ball, and decided now would be a good time to never, ever allow itself to go through that whole "Start Up" bull again. After some pleading on my part, it decided to let me sneak in through the Safe start mode, so I backed up anything I could get and could possibly ever use on a computer again.

That's when it realized I was eating it's brains.

It complained my OS reinstall DVD had fingerprints. (It didn't.) Then it ate said OS reinstall DVD and laughed, "Neener, neener." Then it totally deleted the idea that it had ever even contained a hard drive to boot from.

All this in less than 24 hours.

So.

I called our local Apple Store last evening, and the nice young man (Benji) scheduled me for an appointment this morning. And, well, my laptop isn't all that new. O.K. Fine, it's like four years old now. So, so totally out of warranty.

Me: Crap. I'm so not going to be able to afford this...

Walked into the Apple store this morning and, after drooling over the iPads, I finally got a sit-down with my own personal Genius Bartender, Mike.

Mike: I don't know if we still have Tiger on our Network. Would you like to upgrade to Leopard?

(Me: Crap. I'm so not going to be able to afford this...)

Mike: (Plugs in magical "Network." Plugs in computer. Ejects DVD--huh?) This should take about five minutes.

(15 minutes later...)

Mike: O.K. You're good to go.

Seriously? I sat as still as I possibly could for a few seconds so as not to draw attention to myself and the fact that I hadn't paid them. For anything.

I closed the lid and looked around to see if anyone was watching me leaving with a new operating system on a newly serviced laptop.

Apple employee as I snuck out the door: Have a nice day!

But the no-longer-under-warranty bill. The Tiger-to-Leopard upgrade. Do they know where I live? Are they going to accost me at a later date? When I'm sleeping?

I'm thinking I don't think so. I'm thinking this is what I paid for when I bought the thing in the first place. I'm thinking Steve Jobs must have figured out how to take a flying leap over his old buddy Bill.

Thank you, Mr. Jobs. That's not sarcasm. I really mean it this time. I will recommend your stuff. Apple products for everyone!

P.S. And thanks for giving me iWork (which I paid for the last time) for free in Leopard.
P.P.S. And thanks extra for employing Mike who resuscitated my little digital corner of the world.

Now to reinstall absolutely everything.

#WPaSCBWI 2010 Fall Conference

2010-11-07T14:30:00.000-05:00

One week from today—save the date.

The Western Pennsylvania chapter of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators will be hosting their annual conference at the Greentree Radisson in Pittsburgh next weekend, and I'll be speaking about social networking.

First, the info:

Practical Solutions for Tough Times

Friday, November 12

Pre-Conference Event

(You must also attend the conference)

7pm–10pm

Reception and cash bar followed by informal round-table critiquing.

Bring a 5-page manuscript to read aloud.

Saturday, November 13

Conference

8am–5:30pm

Faculty include:

Emma Dryden Dryden Books
Rachel Abrams HarperCollin's Children's Books
Deborah Vetter Cicada and Cricket magazines
Quinlan Lee agent, Adams Literary

Second, the details:

I'll be leading two workshops titled Social Networking—I Don't Wanna! The first one (session B-2) from 11:30-12:15 will be geared toward a general audience, mostly writers. The second one (session C-4) is scheduled for 3:15-4:00 and will be geared toward illustrators, but I will also accommodate anyone who may have missed the first session.

I have the presentation set up to answer attendee-specific questions including:

Why do I have to social network?
Where do I start?
What do I say?
When am I supposed to do this?
How do I get it right?

I'll also include tips on how to use social media creatively along with listings of online tools and sites to get you started. I've started a new blog that I'll be using throughout the conference (technology permitting) with info and tips from the speakers. I'll also be tweeting images on twitter, with the search hashtag: #WPaSCBWI.

Once I get the presentation finished, I will upload it here:
http://www.nora-thompson.com/wpascbwi.html

B&W Becca

2010-10-21T19:14:00.000-04:00

I finished the black and white "Becca" illustration for the back of my latest postcard, and here she is. The color version for the front of the postcard can be seen in the last blog post.

New kid's illustration preview

2010-10-14T19:42:00.000-04:00

As promised, here's the finished version of "Becca," the sketch for which I included in my previous post.

The biggest change from the sketch was curving the top of the castle wall. I think it gave it a little more of a disorienting kind of edge.

Another small change was with the dragon's tail. His name is Draco, first of all. And he isn't as tough as he tries to make himself out to be. (I've sketched out the image that will be going on the back of the postcard which will explain what I mean. You'll have to check back in a few days to see that one when it's finished.) As for the tail; I changed it. No biggie.

O.K. Fine. I'm back.

2010-10-04T15:14:00.000-04:00

After a brief four-month-or-so hiatus, I found the encouragement I needed to keep plugging (thanks to Cliff Knecht and Cricket A.D. Karen Kohn). So I'm back, and I've got some work to do.

First up, I have a postcard to get painted and mailed, and I've uploaded the sketch for it to the right over there. The girl's name is Becca. When I get the color version finished, I'll post it here.

Matthew Carter a 2010 MacArthur Fellow

2010-09-28T19:58:00.000-04:00

Here's a guy you have likely been reading for years and didn't even know it. Read about Matthew Carter's becoming a $500,000 MacArthur Fellow here. Carter has been designing typefaces for something like 50 years, and he worked as a punchcutter when first starting out, and later kept right up with technology by designing faces digitally.

You know that tiny type they use in the phone book? Take a look. It would look kind of funky if you used it as a regular face or big for display type because it was designed for a different purpose. The ink on the presses would fill in the counters of the letters (the spaces inside letters like the lowercase "e"), especially on absorbent paper like they use for phone books. Carter created extra pointy spaces in the counters to allow the ink to spread and still be readable.

And you know Microsoft's Verdana and Georgia? Yep. Carter's. Designed to be legible, even at small sizes on computer screens. He also designed Tahoma.

Carter was featured in the full-length film Helvetica where he explained the theory behind his job. He wants you to read and not take any notice the font carrying the message. If you do that, then he believes he's done his job well. So you've probably read his work your entire life, but never even noticed.

Mega storm damage

2010-09-23T19:43:00.000-04:00

And on last day of summer.

Some neighbors lost some huge trees from the storm that rolled through late yesterday afternoon. I happened to catch this lady taking photos of the damage this morning. Sad part is, they had had a beautiful tree-lined driveway and removed most of those trees last year (you can still see one of the stumps still there). They had all been huge like this one.

Another tree covered the entire road and took a powerline with it.

Sasauge Muffing

2010-09-18T16:06:00.000-04:00

Don't quit your day job.

1. A "sasauge" is not the same as a "sausage" in this part of the country, as far as I know.

2. I guess you need to reverse the number "1" to accommodate all the dyslexic customers? O.K. I understand.

3. (My personal #1 grammatical pet peeve:) Everyday is usually an adjective and means "common" or "usual." Maybe your "Everyday Menu" or your "Everyday Sausage." But if you mean the $1 deal happens "every single day," please, please use two words.

Stepping down from soap box. Please, carry on.

Some cloudy clouds

2010-09-10T19:48:00.000-04:00

An evening walking in Ligonier, PA, taken with my cell phone.

Uh, yeah that's a snake

2010-09-05T15:28:00.000-04:00

So I grew up in the country surrounded by woods, and we had snakes. I never really got used to that. I live a little less in the country now, in a spot that is being surrounded by development. Little by little, the natural habitat of the animals that live around us is being taken away.

We've always allowed our property to grow as wild as possible, first for privacy and second for wildlife. We've encountered opposum, ground hogs, raccoon, deer, squirrels, chipmunks, a weasel, (possibly) a black bear and many, many species of birds. But until this summer we had never seen a snake.

I guess it was only a matter of time.

I didn't see or get a shot of the bigger garter snake we had had on our property earlier this summer, but I'm thinking that one might have been a mom. The one I did see and get shots of was just a little guy, sunning himself on the concrete around our outdoor building. He let me take the close-up above which makes him look bigger than he really was. The photo below gives a better comparison. He was only about as big around as a pencil.

And, as was tradition when I was growing up, his name is Charlie.

R.I.P. Glenn Pavone

2010-08-31T18:34:00.000-04:00

I was saddened and sorry over the weekend to hear the news of Glenn Pavone's passing. For those of you who aren't familiar with Pittsburgh music, Glenn was probably the best guitarist many of us had ever heard in the area.

No exaggeration.

I once saw him tuning his guitar in the middle of a solo. On that same night, I saw him placing an order with a waitress while in the middle of another solo. He was the kind of guy who made it look easy.

The picture I've included here was one I took in 1994, somewhere around the time The Cyclones had released their first album, Twist This.

To get an idea of what he was capable of, take a listen:

Mr. Pavone was 52 and will be sorely missed.

Convoluted painting

2010-08-23T18:31:00.000-04:00

I finished a new painting a few weeks ago, and I wasn't all that satisfied with how it turned out at first. But I put it aside, and now that I'm looking at it with fresh eyes, I think I can deal with it. It's called "Drop Away," and I painted it with acrylic and mixed media on canvas, 36"x24". The story behind what it means is the most convoluted of any of the paintings I've done for the series so far, which would explain why the painting itself is the most convoluted of any of the paintings I've done for the series so far.

Bad, bad kerning

2010-07-22T14:39:00.000-04:00

If you're carving it in stone...

Killer Birds

2010-07-05T12:47:00.000-04:00

We have a hiking boot birdhouse (see top inset) that has attracted house wrens every summer since we first hung it a few years ago. It's just in the shape of a boot (child-size), so I'm not entirely sure what's attracting them. This spring, we successfully hatched (and launched) a full nest, and within days of their departure, the nest was being rebuilt and, apparently, reloaded.

Turns out house wrens aren't as cute as they look.

I had just come back from a run when I saw a commotion in the nest not typical of what we had seen with previous occupations. I walked over and asked what they were doing (literally, I said, "What are you doing?"), and one of two birds flew out. The second one clung to the side of the birdhouse, and just stared at me (me standing less than a foot away). I could see the end of its beak was wet, and at least one egg partially hanging out of the entryway (exitway?). That second bird flew off, so I was able to get a good look inside.

Mass murder.

Within a few hours, somebody or other had returned and tossed what was left of the eggs out onto the concrete of the porch floor (see bottom inset). Interestingly, this isn't the first time this has happened. We're thinking it's all a territorial dispute, and it may be gang-related.

The sad part is the bird (or birds) that keep returning to look in the nest and cry on top of the house, refusing to go in. The good news is, our second birdhouse--which hasn't been occupied since the fall I cleaned out a baby bird skeleton--is showing signs of activity.

Keri Smith

2010-06-16T07:56:00.000-04:00

When I want to feel like an incompetent, underworked artist, I visit Keri Smith's Web site.

TTFN

2010-06-15T15:26:00.001-04:00

If you've read my last entry, you already know about the frustration yada yada.

After some soul searching and decision-making, I've decided to allow the kid's illustration part of my life to take a back burner. I'm finding it difficult to justify pouring money and time into a part of my career that has no intentions of going anywhere anytime soon.

I'm still working on books I've been writing and illustrating aimed toward kids, but creating more self-promotional illustrations feels like a waste of time right now. My next promo postcard and newsletter is scheduled for August, and I'll see how I feel about sending either when the time comes.

I'm not planning on more entries in this blog in the near future (although you never know what might come up), but you can still follow my other blogs:

The Rots
Hairy Eyeballs
Thompson Graphx/Fine art

So as Tigger says TTFN: Ta ta for now.

Not bothering to bother

2010-06-07T15:58:00.000-04:00

I admit it: I've been shirking my kid's illustration duties lately.

When frustration and discouragement sets in, it's hard to keep banging your head against the wall. It just feels so good when you stop. I've been leaning lately in a direction where I am getting positive feedback, and where I don't feel like what I'm creating is getting sucked into the oblivion.

I won't post details here. This is, after all, available for anyone to see who has an Internet connection. I will, however, point you in the current direction of my attention:

http://www.facebook.com/slightly.irreverently.twisted
http://www.zazzle.com/the_rots*
http://www.squidoo.com/the_rots
http://www.the-rots.com

Mexican Restaurant likes the signage

2010-05-28T18:39:00.000-04:00

I finished the first of several signs I'll be working on for a Mexican Restaurant located inside Westmoreland Mall. Their name is Madres Mexican, and they specialize in build-your-own orders.

This one will be 96"x30" when it's biggie-sized. Yeah. Pretty big file.

Gris Grimly's Frankenstein in progress

2010-05-17T15:04:00.000-04:00

I've been keeping track of Gris Grimly's career since I happened to find his book Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery and Madness in our local Barnes & Noble a few years back. He's a prolific illustrator. I'm not sure how else to describe his work. He's incredibly gifted and has determined ideas of how his books should look.

I'm terribly envious of his abilities. Can you tell?

Last July he started a blog to share progression of his new book, Frankenstein. He's been uploading images both in-progress and complete, and keeping his readers up-to-date with meetings with his editor and art director. In his latest entry, he posted a page that he wasn't satisfied with and also the pages he illustrated to replace it. I saved both images so I could compare the differences side-by-side, and the subtle detail changes are stunning. To me, anyway.

He's changed the color dramatically, which he mentions in the post, but he also made other, more subtle changes to hand positions, compositions and faces that have me taking a step back.

When I look at the original page, I see nothing wrong with it. As an illustrator, I would have been happy with the result, considered it finished, and moved on to the next page.

Maybe that's why he has the book deal. I'm not sure I have that extra "something" to boost my illustrations from self-promotion to an actual contract. I'd like to think working harder might do the trick, but I'm not sure how much harder I can work. Working harder doesn't give you that "something," and if I don't have it by now, I doubt I'll ever have it.

I am looking forward to Frankenstein; I've loved all his books. They're very enjoyable, as long as I look at them without comparing my own work to the talent in front of me.

Bear scat?

2010-05-07T18:55:00.000-04:00

I'm thinking this wasn't the neighbor's cat.

We found two similar piles within a few yards of each other in our front yard. The second one was close to a line of empty (except for the leftover dirt) potted plant containers which were lined up along a wall of our small outdoor building. A couple of the containers had been tipped over, and one was broken in half.

I know, I know, this probably isn't what you typically expect to see on a blog, but we weren't sure what neighbor left this for us. We've done some research, and we're thinking black bear. We checked around the property and didn't find any kind of territory markings on the trees, but we've found bark scraped off before. We're thinking he was looking for grubs behind the pots.

The bright circle toward the bottom center is a quarter I put in for size comparison. I think the droppings are pretty impressive, no matter what left them.

And now that I think about it, I haven't seen the neighbor's cat around lately.

Newsletter coming this month

2010-05-04T15:32:00.001-04:00

As you may have seen at the top of this blog, I'll be changing over to a professional newsletter generator beginning this month. When I first started sending newsletters, I used the generator that CafePress made available to shop owners, but over the past year or so I've gotten a little fed up with their system. Using their interface was more of a hassle than it was worth, and the end results never looked all that great anyway. So I decided to jump ship.

I've signed up with MailChimp to send future newsletters, and so far the experience has been better than expected. I'm able to control the graphics, the fonts and the layout which I wasn't able to do before, and I have to say, it looks a whole lot better. I'm working on the Spring edition right now, and I'll be sending it out sometime over the next few weeks.

If you would like to subscribe or if you were a subscriber with the CafePress version of the newsletter and need to re-subscribe, use this link. Newsletters go out quarterly, so I won't be inundating your inbox. You always have the option to remove your name from the mailing list at the bottom of each newsletter edition, on the "Newsletter" page of my site or through this link.

nornie.com

2010-04-16T19:04:00.000-04:00

I think I forgot to mention it here before, but I try to keep my different art lives separate so as not to frighten the children. I've built a Web site that has the links to all of them though, and it's here: www.nornie.com. If you're old enough and you can handle the shock, you can take a look at what I do when I'm not designing or fine arting. It keeps me out of trouble, mostly.

Even though all my sites are different, I try to keep a similar feel through each one. I use different fonts and different colors, but I've created a grungy background that has found its way through all of them. It helps me get rid of that corporate "I like to follow the rules" kind of feel because I'm not a corporation and I don't like to follow the rules. At least not as far as art goes.

Nornie was the nickname my dad gave me before I was old enough to understand what a nickname was. Apparently I didn't like it, and I guess I told him so. But it stuck and now it's mine. Thanks, Dad.

iFrank in Technicolor

2010-04-11T16:20:00.001-04:00

Here's a little guy I just painted this afternoon. I did a version of him earlier that was a take on the iPod commercials and was originally posted on The Rots blog.

Hiking the Laurel Highlands

2010-04-01T19:05:00.000-04:00

Went for an absolutely gorgeous walk on the Laurel Highlands Trail today. I love the spot here where the trail runs in and around a maze of massive boulders. The best way to wind your way out the other side is just following the blazes.

It's been above freezing for a couple weeks now (and reached 80 degrees this afternoon!), but the area received so much snowfall in February that the spots between the boulders that don't get much sun are holding onto their last bits of winter.

More illustrations for Jack & Jill

2010-03-31T15:16:00.006-04:00

I did a few more spot illustrations for Jack and Jill's March/April issue, and I'll post a couple of them here. The illustrations were part of their Earth Day article that suggested things kids could do to "go green."

First, they encouraged kids to open a window when the weather was warm enough. I had to play with the "wind" a little bit before I was satisfied. It needed to be transparent enough to show the window behind, but opaque enough to be able to see it in the places where the background was white.

They also encouraged kids to throw their trash away in cans rather than littering.

The throwing trash picture wasn't the only spot where I had to draw hands for this issue. I hung out at the small cafe in our local grocery store one morning and just sat and drew different angles of my hand to give the art director and editors a choice to pick from.

They ended up picking #2.

Illustrations for Jack & Jill Magazine

2010-03-27T14:39:00.060-04:00

Here are a few more of the illustrations I did for Jack and Jill's March/April issue. These ones were spots that were scattered in and around some "how to go green for Earth Day" suggestions.

This first one encouraged kids to ride their bikes to school. I played with that iconic "school zone" street sign showing kids walking to school by adding a bike rider to the mix.

This one explained the importance of turning off the lights when you leave a room. I worked on some of these while I was on an Amtrak train to Philadelphia with my laptop and a 4"x6" Wacom tablet. The setup worked out surprisingly well.

And this last one suggested bringing your lunch to school in a reusable bag. I just pictured one of those ones with the canvas strap and Velcro closure, and I added a retro 60s flower shape so it could be used by either girls or boys.

New business card design

2010-03-23T15:42:00.000-04:00

I've finally redesigned some new business cards for the graphic design offshoot of my freelance work (the white cards below). I had redesigned my Web site over a couple years ago, but until now I've been using the old business cards with all the old fonts and graphics and abrasive attitude (the black card to the right). I guess I thought I could use them up or something. The problem was, I wasn't handing them out at all. They just weren't where I was coming from anymore.

That was dumb.

So I've updated the new cards with my new branding, and I designed the back of the cards to mimic my Web site's navigation and portfolio rollover buttons.

And I'm also finally in the position where I can get the cards printed on recycled paper (and did), which satisfies me a great deal.

Jack and Jill Magazine

2010-03-22T15:07:00.018-04:00

Jack and Jill's March/April issue is out, and here is one of the illustrations I did for it.

All the illustrations were for an article about going green for Earth Day (April 22). I painted one big illustration (the one here), and a bunch of smaller ones (I'll post those over the next few days).

Crocuses

2010-03-20T14:47:00.000-04:00

Crocuses snuck out of the ground while I was watching the snow melt and flood the yard.

Less than a day after this picture, our local bunnies ate every one of these down to the stem. It looked like a baby lawnmower went through.

"Read" poster illustration

2010-03-13T15:16:00.002-05:00

I've only gotten so far as a sketch for my next "Read" illustration, but here it is.

The idea was mostly for the teachers and librarians who are using my previous "Read" illustration in their classrooms and libraries. I wanted to gear this one toward those "reluctant reader" types (boys).

I'll be painting the whole thing in Painter, and uploading it for posters and note cards on Zazzle and CafePress when I'm finished.

Paintings I did 20 years ago

2010-03-07T18:30:00.000-05:00

I've posted a few scans of paintings I did around 15 and 20 years ago as a photo album on Facebook. If you've seen the scans of drawings from around that time, you'll know these were all finished before I went back to school for art.

I used to use really tiny brushes at the time, and it took me forever to finish a painting. The first image in the album is 9"x12", and it took me around 58 hours to complete it.

I don't do that anymore.

My illustrations on somebody else's blog!

2010-03-06T13:31:00.003-05:00

Isn't it the coolest thing when you run across your work on the Internet in a place where you didn't put it?

I was doing some site submissions to Google when I ran across a blog from last September that shared some of my work, and the blog wasn't mine. It belongs to Jennifer Daniels, a Brooklyn-based graphic designer and illustrator. Take a look at some of her work. Looks like a very talented lady!

On the blog, she says she likes the way I show the sketch of an illustration right alongside the final version of the piece on my Web site. You can see what she's talking about on one of my online sketchbook pages. If you drag your cursor back and forth across the arrows, you can see before-after-before-after. Even I think it's still fun to do.

Drawings I did 20 years ago

2010-03-03T13:06:00.000-05:00

I've scanned in photos I found of some old drawings I did a long, long time ago. These are way before I ever went back to school for art, so everything you see in this album was self-taught.

You can tell I was still tight with my lines and basing everything on realism, but you have to get that part down before you should ever try to move on. I didn't know that at the time; I was just feeling my way, and I think art school came along to loosen me up at just the right time.

You can see more current drawings at www.norathompson.us. Click on the "portfolio" link on the left and then "drawings" right below.

Animal tracks in the snow

2010-03-02T11:15:00.001-05:00

As you probably know, those of us in the northeast got wolloped three times (so far) this winter with buckets of snow. It's always cool to get up in the morning and see what's been in the yard overnight. Because we try to keep our property as natural as possible, we tend to attract the wildlife that used to call this area home. And the neighborhood's domesticated life seems to find it attractive, too.

This time I took a few shots of some of the tracks our visitors left behind.

A friendly bird made his way the whole way up to our back door stoop. We've seen a bunch of different species at our bird feeder this winter:

Northern Cardinals
Black-capped Chickadees
Bluejays
Mourning Doves
Dark-eyed Juncos
Tufted Titmouses (Titmice?) and
House Finches

One of our many bunnies who make their summer nests in the bushes in our front yard.

We also have a lot of white-tailed deer wandering through all year long. They like the crabapples and any new tree or plant growth we have going. When we find a sapling we'd like to keep, we have to protect it with a wire fence until it's big enough that the deer won't destroy it.

This is likely our neighbor's cat. He's black and a very funny hunter; he never catches anything. He does the crouching down and wiggling his butt thing and then he pounces. Within a few seconds he emerges from the tall grass and walks away as if he meant to miss.

This one we're still working on. We do have skunks, but they would still be hibernating right now. We've seen a weasle run through the yard once, so we're expecting this was him (or possibly a friend). The track was about the size of a cat's track, but the five toes makes it very distinctive.

We're not too sure about this one.

New business card design

2010-02-27T18:30:00.000-05:00

I've been working on a lot of graphic design projects for Adventure Foods (based in Ohiopyle, Pennsylvania) including Firefly Chocolates, their shop at Westmoreland Mall in Greensburg. We wanted their business cards to reflect the same look and feel we've already established for this arm of the company, specifically the posters and signage I had designed for previous projects.

These images show the front and back of their new cards.

Dexter in color

2010-02-26T15:57:00.001-05:00

I finished Dexter (here's the sketch), and he turned out somewhat close to what I originally had in mind. I was hoping for more dramatic lighting, but that seemed to leave him too dark in the shadows, so I lightened him and the whole scene up a little.

The glowing green and purple colors took some getting used to since most of what I do uses colors that are closer to earth tones than flourescents. But I knew I had to do it, so I put the painting aside for a couple weeks, hoping it would look better later. When I finally came back to it, the color didn't seem as garish as when I had left it.

I like him enough that I'll probably use him for my next postcard promotional mailing in May.

You can click on the image to see him larger.

New photography portfolio images

2010-02-20T08:18:00.000-05:00

I've updated my photography portfolio with several more landscape images and photos from Banning No. 3 Mine. Click on "portfolio" and choose "photography." These are all silver gelatin prints, made the old-fashioned way with film, chemicals, paper, dodging and burning.

My portfolio site URL: http://www.norathompson.us

Banning No. 3 Mine operated just outside Van Meter, PA and is off the Yough River bike trail, part of the Great Allegheny Passage. You can read in more detail about the Darr Mine history and explosion at http://patheoldminer.rootsweb.ancestry.com/darr.html

Rough sketch for kid's illustration

2010-02-18T17:13:00.001-05:00

I so lied about making you wait. Here's the sketch of Dexter in the setting I came up with for him. He's in just a little bit of trouble, but I think he'll be O.K.

His puppy's name is Poindexter.

New banner design for Etsy shop

2010-02-12T19:44:00.000-05:00

Here's a new banner I designed recently for The Dreaming Owl's Etsy shop, along with the matching identity icon. The Dreaming Owl sells handmade mittens, scarves, jewelry, bookmarks and purses, and requested a banner to reflect the shop's personality. We went with this hand drawn and stylized owl and banner.

Sneak peek at a new sketch for a promo illustration

2010-02-11T19:10:00.000-05:00

Everybody, meet Dexter.

He got here because of a doodle that was originally meant just for me. I started drawing one night, and consciously convinced myself not to censor. I finished him and turned the page, but I found that I kept turning the pages back to take another look. I couldn't figure out what it was, but he kept getting cuter every time, so I decided to do something about it.

The biggest problem I had was trying to figure out what he was looking at, and it took a long time before I finally finished a sketch of the scene. I had lots of ideas, but I liked him so much, I didn't want him to get hurt in the process of telling his story.

And, oh yeah, sorry. You'll have to wait until I finish him in color to see how that turned out. I'll post him after the digital paint dries.

Lots (and lots) of snow

2010-02-07T07:22:00.000-05:00

It must be February.

Yesterday we got more snow in one snowfall than we've had in the last 17 years. The unofficial estimate in the backyard would be around 18 inches, but it snowed more after that.

Earlier this winter, we had a January that didn't get above freezing until late in the month, so the snow we were getting just kept piling and piling. This is an image of our birdfeeder from that January stretch of weather.

Newsletter subscriptions to the Nora Thompson Illustrations Newsletter

2010-02-06T17:46:00.002-05:00

I will be upgrading to a professional newsletter client prior to the next newsletter cycle, and I need current subscribers to re-submit their information. I don't have access to email information, so I'm not able to transfer from one mailing list to another.

And if you're not yet a subscriber, feel free to jump in at any time! Newsletters are scheduled quarterly throughout the year.

Electronic kid's illustration portfolio

2010-02-03T12:19:00.004-05:00

I've put together an electronic portfolio on issuu.com (relatively easy!) to send out to those great publishers who are looking to go green (way to go!). Issue makes your pdf look like you're flipping through a portfolio (or magazine) right there on your computer screen.

Molly Leach

2010-01-27T20:11:00.000-05:00

Few designers actually get recognition in the world of book publishing, but thankfully Molly Leach seems to be getting at least a little of it.

Molly is the brilliant designing mind behind many children's books including The Stinky Cheese Man. We're used to books breaking the rules these days, but The Stinky Cheese Man expanded the boundaries of what was considered acceptable in children's book publishing at the time (1992). She rearranged where parts of the book were traditionally placed; she melted type (pre-computer enhanced); she ran text off the page; she used several different fonts on a single page; she used extreme type sizes. The list goes on and on.

Probably the most important thing to remember about her work is that everything happens for a reason. Yes, it looks really cool when it's finished, but it certainly isn't random. (Please see some specifics in the Horn Book link provided below.)

The interesting part of the story of The Stinky Cheese Man is the fact that she is the wife of Lane Smith, the illustrator, so they were able to work on the look of the book together. Until Jon Scieszka (the author) presented the text he had written to publishers accompanied by both Smith's illustrations and Leach's design, he was turned away. The March/April 1998 issue of The Horn Book contains an article written by Scieszka that illustrates this specific situation as well as how the design of a book helps relay its message.

Barnes and Noble sat both Leach and Smith down for a short video interview which they posted on their site. I've shown it to my typography classes, and I've embedded it here.

Illustrators I Greatly Admire: Exhibit D

2010-01-22T18:54:00.004-05:00

Lane Smith

My first encounter with Lane Smith's illustrations was because of my kids. Through their book club at school, they bought The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs as told to Jon Scieszka. And then they made me sit still and look at the illustrations.

Those darn kids.

When they thought themselves too old too keep the book, they gave it to me. It was the paperback version, and is well worn. I just received the hardback from Amazon two days ago, and I'm oogling all over again.

Of course, Smith and his wife, graphic designer Molly Leach (unfortunately, no "official" Web site for her work), broke the mold of how a kid's book was allowed to be told in The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales. It's hard to mention Smith's work without a nod to Ms. Leach. Both are fantastic. Both are inspirational. And both make me oogle.

Barnes and Noble made a video of the couple's process and posted it on their site. I've embedded it here for convenience.

The Bald Soprano=Tim Burton @ the MoMA?

2010-01-13T19:08:00.000-05:00

The Tim Burton exhibit at the MoMA included a free, take-home brochure that I promptly and eagerly grabbed up last Thursday. The evening prior, I and my fellow museum goers had a bite to eat at a firehouse-turned-brewery in Philadelphia. In the entrance space, you could peruse various postcards and announcements for upcoming local events, and one in particular caught my eye. It was a large postcard for "The Bald Soprano," all in line art with a spiral on the front and hand-written text on both sides. I mentioned that it reminded me of Tim Burton, and so I took a copy for myself.

When I returned home with both the postcard and the MoMA brochure, I soon realized I wasn't far off in my initial assessment at the restaurant.

I've included here both the front cover of the Tim Burton exhibit brochure, and the front image on the postcard I picked up last week at the firehouse.

Strikingly similar.

Alma

2009-12-31T17:35:00.002-05:00

Here's a beautiful video by Rodrigo Blaas. Just beautiful.

Alma from Rodrigo Blaas on Vimeo.

British un-things

2009-12-15T10:09:00.000-05:00

Have you noticed the books out semi-lately with "un" things as main characters?

The Raw Shark Texts by Steven Hall, published in 2007 (un-Space and the Un-Space Exploration Committee)
Un Lun Dun by China Miéville, also published in 2007 (Un-London and pretty much everything else)
And not quite, but along those same lines: Coraline by Neil Gaiman, published in 2002 (Coraline had an "other" mother)

The link between them might be in the water; all of the authors are currently living in or were originally from England. That and, whether you like the books or not, critics have widely agreed that at the very least these authors have created unique worlds and ideas and display incredible imagination in their writing.

Illustrators I Greatly Admire: Exhibit C

2009-12-13T19:02:00.005-05:00

Gris Grimly.

Incredible talent, this guy.

Currently working on Frankenstein, and has set up a blog to share his progress. First noticed him through his Edgar Allan Poe book, Tales of Mystery and Madness, published by Atheneum Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.

Keri Smith

2009-12-11T19:11:00.000-05:00

For any creative type who needs a little humor and a gentle nudge in a productive direction, take a look at Keri Smith's Web site. For the most fun and a lot of creative ideas, choose the "Play" link, and don't forget to check out her portfolio while you're there.

Great work, great ideas and a great inspiration to the creative community.

Illustrators I Greatly Admire

2009-12-09T18:45:00.008-05:00

Exhibit B:
Pablo Bernasconi

I first became aware of Mr. Bernasconi's work in The Wizard the Ugly and the Book of Shame. That one was published by Bloomsbury. Fantastic collage-type abilities and great characters. I wonder if people kept telling him he would scare the children. And I wonder if, even though they told him that, he kept doing what he was doing anyway.

There's a lesson here.

Firefly Chocolates @ the Mall

2009-12-06T16:34:00.000-05:00

My friends down at the Firefly have opened a new shop at Westmoreland Mall in Greensburg, and they've included more of my signage. All the posters hanging in the shop were also part of our branding campaign. Included here are both the outside signage as it was designed, and a shot of the shop from the mall interior.

Illustrators I Greatly Admire

2009-12-05T19:34:00.008-05:00

Take a look at Kirill Chelushkin's work, represented by Shannon Associates.

First came upon his illustrations in The Elves and the Shoemaker as retold by John Cech and published by Sterling Publishing in New York.

Incredible work.

Snow @ twilight

2009-12-05T18:35:00.000-05:00

Our first-ish snow of the season of any consequence.

Twitter

2009-12-04T17:16:00.000-05:00

Finally moving on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/NoraThompson

Combination of all the work I do: fine art, kid's illustration, graphic design and The Rots©. Kind of a daily updating of my working life.

Jack & Jill

2009-12-01T08:12:00.006-05:00

Here are a few of the spots I did for Jack and Jill's November/December issue. I have to be a little more careful about the colors next time; they printed pretty dark. And I have no excuse...I used to work for a newspaper, and I know how things print on absorbant paper like that! Never forget to learn.

Women in Art 2009

2009-10-30T20:56:00.000-04:00

I had two pieces juried in to the 2009 Women in Art exhibit at Harlan Gallery, Seton Hill University, Greensburg, PA. Titles: Thirteen (shown here) and Eleven (shown below, bottom). Both are in the portfolio section of my fine art Web site: www.norathompson.us. The show runs November 1 through November 22.

Fairview Elementary

2009-10-27T17:07:00.006-04:00

As many of you know, by day I'm a guide at Frank Lloyd Wright's iconic masterpiece, Fallingwater, near Mill Run, Pennsylvania. A couple of weeks ago I had the privilege of playing tour guide to some great students from Fox Chapel's Fairview Elementary, and they were fantastic! They were telling me about organic architecture!

This is us at the end of the tour, and yes, one of them even bought a copy of Yikes! at the museum shop.

Just want them to know, they can come back anytime!