NEW ADDITIONS

Updated my website... reworked the navigation for the whole thing and finally added an ANIMATION/DESIGN page:
http://ajsmith.net/anim.html
and a TECHNICAL ILLUSTRATION page: http://ajsmith.net/tech.html

Author / Illustrator Event at BOOK RACK in Nbpt

Take the train up from Boston or wheel down 93/95 from NH!

Mundane Museum of Boring Grown-Up Tedium

Can you think of anything more boring to kids? Lots of room to stuff in some BORING! ... yawn.

"Jumbonormous" conceptual sketches

visual brainstorming a new picture book project...

submarine

quick illo for the Maine Illustrators' site... which BG looks best?
http://www.maineillustratorscollective.org/

The Year In Review: 2009

It was a different year for me, to say the least. On a personal level, it was a wonderful year with a new house and a new baby (although technically she arrived 12/08). Professionally, things were a bit stagnant, like a lot of areas of our economy. 2006, 2007, 2009 all saw me do very well as a full time freelance illustrator. But after turning down a 6 book deal (because I was Daddy Daycare), I had no book offers come my way all of 2009. Pictured below are some of the jobs and personal projects I dabbled with.

rejected drawings

"fight", "fort" and "flakes"

rejected images from an illustrated icons project i am working on.

Hard Hab-It To Break

I suffer from the unfortunate affliction of being an obsessive hockey fan, particularly a Montreal Canadiens fan. I wish I could stop, sometimes. I have been able (until very recently) to keep my hockey watching urges in check by not ordering cable. I am, however, unable to keep myself from hanging on each review from online bloggers like Apon Basu's daily hab-it http://dailyhab-it.blogspot.com/. In a weak attempt to validate this addiction, I've offered to do a logo design for his site. As such, here are some of the ROUGH first brainstorms:





I want the image to be clear but with a retro NFBC-esque feel.

FINISHED LOGO:

Best Nest

Rough layout sketches for a birds' nest poem.

fun stuff

playing around with some ideas...

and Humpty Dump...

(pretty corny joke but i like how it came out)

opening spread (maybe?) for new "duck" book

For a "Re-imagining the Classics" show in Maine

Newburyport Harbor

sketch Lisa Ann II in the Merimack River. I plan on doing a whole series of these, provided I can find some good brush pens soon.

dog portrait commission color mock-up

rough color:

and final:

Is this a plausible scenario??

Would a 4-5 yr old read (or look at the pictures) of a picture book under the covers with a flashlight (in lieu of sleep)?


I know the idea of a kid with a flashlight under the covers is oft-used prototypical imagery (and that's OK with me) BUT at WHAT age do they do this? I know I did it but I feel like it wasn't until older... I don't know.

I do have to swap out the Mad magazine parody in favor of a picture book (4 yr olds wouldn't be reading mad--wouldn't get the joke)

I have to nail the age logistics.

HELP!

bobcat maze

initial rough drawing:

revised rough:

and final:

A or B?

the only difference is the monster kids in the "background" of the bus.

ducks unlimited

quicky quackies

more old vs new

old


new

monster character sketches

Fooling with some character ideas for two little monster brothers...

old vs new

old (cut paper style--didn't go over so well):


new (digital paint):


too subtle a difference? i toned down and simplified the palette, worried less about line and tried to retain some sketchiness, and blotted in color with bigger brush and generally tried to be looser (like the post below).