LGBT Embrace Cards

Looky, Looky! 

The brand new Embrace Cards website has just gone live!
I was one of two illustrators designing cards for the launch of the brand - which focuses on LGBT greetings cards to include everyone and push for positive change! 

Go and take a look at www.embracecards.com (and hey, why not buy a few?).  They have a fantastic ethos and were wonderful to work with.

Windmills

Hi guys!

Just a quick one to show you my very first toe-dip into making Gif's! 
This was going to (and quite likely will be..) part of a print inspired by my recent trip to Amsterdam.  Yes, yes, I know it's a little cliché with the windmills and all, but what can I say? That's what I saw!

In other news, it looks like there are going to be at least two new book commissions on the horizon for me! I'm very excited and started some spec work today.  I'll tell you more when I can!

Have a gorgeous evening lovely ones x

Amsterdam

Hey everyone!

Boy oh boy do I have some adventures to tell you about!  As you may or may not have heard, last week I spent some time in the beautiful city of Amsterdam in The Netherlands. 

I think it's completely fair to say I was in desperate need of a break. There'd been a few months there without a single day off working on those books, and yes, it does slowly drain your soul after a while (not that I don't love working intensely on lots of children's book commissions!).

So, I needed a re-charge.  For my screen-weary eyes, graphics-tablet-crippled hand, harvested imagination and general body and soul.  What better place than exploring a gorgeous European city full of bicycles and canals!  Plus, the flights were cheap.

Okay, okay, I know - don't worry, I won't bore you with hundreds of touristy snapshots of me and the Mister (well, maybe just the one of us on the pannenkoekenboot!) and every canal view in the city. This is a blog about illustration 

after all, but some of them are just too memory-capturing and lovely to resist. 

Ace warehouse on the North side of the river-right next to the MTV Euro HQ

One thing I think you'll definitely be interested in seeing is these snapshots 

taken from the amazing and humongous Library.  It was definitely near the top of 
places we wanted to visit in Amsterdam, apart from us both being bibliophiles we'd 
been recommended the gorgeous and free view from the top!  I have to say, it was a 
really impressive library.  Not so much in terms of sheer volume of books, but just how 
comfortable and intinuitive it was.  Lovely lighting, seats everywhere, relaxed atmosphere..

Also! We stumbled upon this exhibition of the Dutch editions of 'Little Golden Books'.  

Gorgeous retro illustration, characters and giant books galore!

Yes, that's me; a children's book illustrator, reading a children's book, in a window, in a giant children's book.

We hired some old bicycles to explore the city and ended up getting completely lost (I love being lost) and finding THIS sign!  We'd obviously cycled a lot further north than we anticipated... 

Over that bridge were mile upon mile of gorgeous, flat wetlands.  We navigated through the marshy pathways amidst the rainfall, cycling through tiny, rustic villages with gorgeous houses like these:

and, er, buffalo statues!

We did finally make it back to central Amsterdam that evening - it was a good 30 mile or so bicycle ride though! Adventures are the best.

We spent a lot of time in the gorgeous parks and sitting at the sides of canals - 
watching people go by and snoozing in the sunshine.  
Such perfect places to fill my sketchbook up!

Okay, I'll leave the tales at that for now, come and have a chat if you want to hear more (think jumping on canal boats with an old Clint Eastwood-alike called Hubert, or me getting hit off my bicycle by a crazy cyclist and having to barge into a Dutch bar covered in blood and bruises!).  

You should definitely go to Amsterdam sometime, I think you'll

really like it.  Go and have some adventures, I'll speak to you soon x

Aeroplanes and words

Hi!


I've still been working very, very hard on the three children's books - but things are winding down now.  Snapped by Sam for Octopus Publishing is done and dusted, and the other two for Far Far Away Books are almost finished. Nearly there!


I've spent a few days recently just hanging around waiting for feedback, which, although it left me feeling a little lost, was great for giving me some time to work on personal illustration projects.


Yesterday would've been famed pilot lady Amelia Earhart's 115th birthday, which reminded me that she had been on my list to draw for a very long time indeed.  This is a combo of ink linework, digital colouring and a fair few textures. You can see the work in progress below it too (something I might keep doing more of if you like).

I think Amelia's story is fascinating, I love a good mystery.

I posted this WIP up on Tumblr yesterday asking for a bit of feedback and someone pointed out that they thought the scarf looked like an open chest and heart! Which, although it's quite an morbid perception, I saw once it'd been said - so of course, I've changed it - looks better now right?

This is a quick one I sketched up yesterday for my friends at Creative Boom's third birthday.

Creative Boom is a great site supporting and advising up and coming creative businesses - they've helped me out a lot, so, yeah, they deserved a card I say.

Sorry if this post is a little in-cohesive.  I'm pretty exhausted and in the midst of packing to go to Amsterdam tomorrow afternoon! I'll be coming back with a ton of drawings (hopefully), but there'll be some radio silence for a few days.  Have a good week lovelies!

Let me know what you think of the new illustrations, and keep in touch.

Best of the web

Hi everyone!


I've been more or less chained to my desk working for the past few months, juggling three book commissions as well as a few other bits and bobs at the same time.  It's been great, but a little stressful! I can't wait to show you what I've been working on.


In the midst of all this crazy work, I got some really nice news last week.  Pocketchange shopping blog have included this page in their 'best of the web' section, promoting their choice of blogs they love and websites that their readers may enjoy. Hurray!

Win a signed copy of 'Crumble, Crackle, Burn' texture illustration book!

Good news!


To link in with this month's Creative Tips & Resources article I've written for Ten Paces and Draw, we have something very special to give away...


This month's article is all about using textures and custom brushes in digital illustration.  It's got a ton of pearls of wisdom from some amazing illustrators I've spoken to such as Kali Ciesemier and Andrew Lyons. 


It's also got some very shiny pearls about using your own found textures from designer and author of 'Crumble, Crackle, Burn' Von Glitschka.

Crumble, Crackle... is a great anthology of a variety of illustrator's work, tips and insight into using real world textures in digital illustration.  It's full of lovely visual work paired with a black and white screen of the texture used in that illustration.
The book also comes with a disk brimming with royalty-free texture shots!


So...sound good?

Well - Von has kindly offered us ONE SIGNED COPY to give away!

I do have to say though that, unfortunately, 

this prize can be shipped to the USA only 

sorry international friends! 

Right, so -
- You're interested?                                                    Check
- You've got a delivery address in the US?             Check  
- You've had a nosy at the article ;-) ?                      Check 


Let's go!
This giveaway is run via Rafflecopter and will be open for two weeks (until 12th July)
So just follow the easy options below for multiple entries into one big lucky hat!



a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tattoos and Magical Amulets

Howdy partners.

So, as you may know, I've been out-of-this-world-busy recently working on three separate book commissions at the same time, as well as a few other jobs on the go too.  Yup, no rest for the illustrator. 

However, in the midst of these slightly secretive projects that I can't really show you anything from I've taken some time out to create a few other illustrations just for the pure love of it.

First up - 'Amulet'

So, well yeah, I did say it was for the pure love of it, but this one is also for the Cheltenham Illustration Awards - themed on a collection of amulets and charms.

I ended up feeling really happy with the silhouette and shaping of this one, and general colours too I suppose - that said - I'm not going to let myself get my hopes up (as I usually do).  Luckily the judging for the awards is far enough away that I will hopefully just forget all about it. 

Here's a really scrappy process sketch and some inspiration for the illo.

 With the theme of the illustration - rather than thinking about the amulet as a physical object, I was focusing more on where one might be discovered, and by whom.  From growing up with adventure stories and an active imagination the idea of stumbling across a magical amulet is so tantalising - there's infinite potential for adventures to spin from it, which powers would you get? What would you use them for? How would it affect your life? Pretty exciting! 

Okay, well, second up - this lovely lady stemmed from a very quick slick of the brush with some Indian Ink. Every so often I like to break away from the computer and go a bit wild with ink or paint on paper. It's just refreshing, for your screen-wearied eyes as well as your soul.  Every so often something I really like will appear and I'll take it further into a coloured piece. I particularly enjoyed painting the tattoos on this Miss, definitely something you might see more of - illustrations within illustrations! 


So that's that. Back to work Emmeline, back. to. work. 
Hopefully soon I'll be able to share some of my commissioned work! 


Let me know what you think of these illos, leave me your words.  Speak soon, Emmeline.

ONE WEEK SUPER SALE

I’m having a one week SALE in my illustration shop.

All postcards 80p and sticker sets, like this one above my head, just one pound.

http://emmelineillustration.mysupadupa.com/

Reading in shadows

Well, a very good afternoon to you dear blog reader.


Just another little post for you today.


Yesterday I finished off another illustration, which, like the last one, was started many months ago and resigned to an unmarked folder buried in my freelance files.  It started off as a digital colour test for a painting I was planning to do, I did start the painting but it just ended up that the digital version was working better.  

Now, I'm all for physical painting; the smell, the mess, I love it. But there's absolutely no denying the convenience of the undo button and the millions of editable layers.
Sometimes, it's just a case of not having the time to dedicate to a full painting, which is a shame - but don't worry, I certainly won't give up on it.  In fact, I bought myself some indian drawing ink and have been experimenting with some dry brush painting recently, I'll show you soon I promise.


So, what do you think of this entiiirely digital painting? My only negative thoughts about it were that it maybe ended up more polished than I had intended, the character in particular *shrug*.  I sort of had it in my head that it would somehow link to the last illustration I posted, as a sort of flashback from the previous woman to her youth (note the similarly coloured cities in the background & intense shadowing). However I haven't really developed this story yet and the styles are slightly different.  I really would like to illustrate a graphic novel at some point though (my mister's a dab hand at writing too), so maybe these will be a good platform.


I've had people say that the girl in this looks like me, and I suppose she does a bit.  It's not unusual for my characters to look like me or people I'm close to though, it's just the subconscious influences from the everyday.  I must say though, I would a b s o l u t e l y love to be there, reading right now.  At least I was, in a way, whilst I was creating this illustration.  Imagination is the best form of escapism.




Keep in touch, say hello!


Emmeline 

Guess what! I have a NEW illustration to show you (it's been so long since I could actually show anything, it's all been secretive book work!) I started this months and months ago but got too busy to complete it - until now! (obviously)

It's good to combine interiors/exteriors, lighting and non-facial emotion into one illustration- they're all areas worth practising!


What do you think?
Leave me a comment, yeah?


Short 'n' sweet.


Bye!

The Flyaway Blanket Gold Award

Exciting news!

My very first published children's book The Flyaway Blanket, which was released in November 2011 (written by Alan Peterkin and published by Magination Press) has received it's very own GOLD AWARD for bedtime stories in the Mom's choice awards for picture books!

See the winners list here!

I'm very excited to be able to say I'm a gold-award winning children's book illustrator now, it's fantastic and very encouraging indeed.  There's always the classic case of as your work gets older you don't like it as much, but getting feedback like this really makes me feel proud of how far I've come in the short time I've been working as a freelance illustrator. 

This news has also come at a time when my family has suffered a great loss, and so it's really lovely to have something we can all feel positive about and proud of come our way.

The Mom’s Choice Awards is an international awards program that recognises organisations and creative individuals who produce high-quality, family-friendly media, products, and services. The Gold award is the highest level of acknowledgment from Mom’s Choice Awards and I feel so proud to have been recognised for this in the children's book section!

If you fancy your own copy in paperback or hardback, you can get them in lots and lots of online shops (Waterstones, WHSmiths, Foyles, Sainsburys etc) as well as from the Magination Press website direct.

Get Well Bella

Last week I drew this to cheer up Bella, Hailey Restuccia’s four year old daughter fighting cancer.  Apparently she loves princesses, fairies and all things pink so it was a good reason for me to delve back into some girly drawing!

Sometimes it’s good to take time out to do something lovely for someone you don’t know.