SCBWI Conference and School Visit this week!!

A big weekend for me is approaching! I have a SCBWI ( Society of Children's Books Writers and Illustrators) Conference this weekend. I am very excited because it has been at least three or even four years since I attended one. The New Jersey Chapter has seemed to have expanded quite a bit because they added a day. The Friday session will be an illustration intensive where I get to meet the art director fro Sterling Publishers. We were preassigned a project where we were given several choices of narratives in which to illustrate from. The story I chose was from a manuscript Sterling will actually be publishing in the near future titled Cecily Beasily. I wanted to do a montage of Cecily doing all sorts of mischievous things. I had a lot of fun with the background, too. It seems to be that getting hands deep in a messy paint splattering fiesta is my new thing. :) I am very excited to see what the other group of illustrators bring to the table and then actually get a chance to look at the work from the actual illustrator from the upcoming title visualized.

Saturday will be a day full of workshops and seminars. It is also a great networking day because we sit and eat lunch with agents, art directors, editors, and others like me in the industry. I will also be showing my portfolio this day to the art director of Simon and Schuster as well as an agent. There will be a portfolio display this year supplied with our business cards so that when people walk by they can view our work and take a card. I was also asked to bring in a print of one of my best pieces for an art contest they will be holding as well. As if this wasn't enough, SCBWI has us coming back Sunday for a few more workshops, another luncheon, and then followed by a book signing where those of us who have been published can sell books to one another. I am very excited and hope to get a lot of feedback, and hopefully some more insight how to better succeed in this industry.

Just when I couldn't think this weekend can get any more exciting I also have a school visit on Tuesday at an elementary school in Jackson, NJ. I get the opportunity to read my book A Bailar!/ Let's Dance! to three first grade classes. After I do the reading I will be showing them how to make their own maracas and teaching them a few salsa steps. I hope to take some pictures of both events and post them to my blog some time next week :)

Some things are cookin'

I have a few prospects cookin' up, although it is too soon to speak of just yet. I also have a conference coming up soonish which I am excited about for the New Jersey Chapter of SCBWI. This is the first time that I will go to a conference and have to bring a preassigned illustration! I miss those critiques in college. It was so exciting to see that when given the same assignment, endless solutions may arise and in so many colors and styles! So stay tuned!! :)

P.S. Wonderful author/ illustrator Elizabeth Dulemba posted a very entertaining blog contest yesterday. She gave four spots from her various books illustrating her dog Bernie's many appearances in her stories and asked bloggers to figure out which spot came from what book. Well I won and I am going to get a signed copy of Paco and the Giant Chile Plant!!!

NJ SCBWI Conference

I had such a great time at the conference. When I first walked in I registered and then went into the room where everyone was gathering for coffee and waiting for the faculty panel to start speaking. I sit at a table and see this woman flipping through a Sprouts magazine (the NJ Chapter issues out a magazine a few times a year) with my owl painting on the cover!!!! I later found out it was supposed to be a surprise and they announced my name during the intros and I stood and had everyone clap. I was just thinking to myself, what a great way to start your day! All day I felt like a celebrity with people congratulating me and asking about my art. It felt nice, I never had something like this happen to me, almost like winning a contest.

The rest of the conference went quite well. Author Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen gave such a great workshop on how to pace your picture book and how to figure out where you need to cut down on text. She gave her "10 Commandments to a Picture Book Manuscript". That was just great. There were other workshops I attended on promotional pieces for illustrators, behind the scenes of making a book at the publishing house, making a book dummy, and picture book basics. All the information was so helpful. At lunch I sat at a table with 2 agents, 2 authors, and a self publisher. I learned quite a bit about self publishing where I previously was not fond of it and now I think it is just good for certain people, just not everyone. This woman says she published 12 books on her own and makes more money selling them in schools and book signings than she would have if she went through a publishing house. The most memorable thing she said was "Why are we putting our hearts and souls into perfecting a manuscript just to have some 28 year old yuppie with no kids tell us how it needs to be fixed. I finish a book and ask what the children and parents think, they are my advisers."

I had my portfolio critiqued by Patrick Collins, who I already knew was not fond of my work from doing a drop off last summer. Since I had not met him the first time he reviewed my portfolio it was interesting to see where he was coming from especially after I had added some new pieces the second time. He seemed to like my "Ice Cold Trouble" painting the best with the eskimo which interestingly I did after he critiqued me the first time. I also did something called speed pitching where I was put in a line and each of us had 2 minutes to talk to each of 3 editors/agents about our books and get their input. I pitched my "Finding Farah" story but I'm not so sure they were in love with my main character because he is a ferret. I bought some books, one by Sudipta and another by Eileen Spinelli. It was a great and eventful day and Princeton was the best and most beautiful place to hold this conference.