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I did eat this one and it was to die for.
Polychromos on board, the usual

What else is there to talk about today? Not much.
My first rose is blooming, which is cool. A red one. Don't ask me what variety. All I know them by is their color. I have a lot, and I didn't plant any of them, so I'm clueless.
The weather is sort of grey, and the air has that feeling like something is about to happen... like we're all just waiting. I kept getting up and looking out the window today, for what, I don't know.
Maybe I just have the "working all alone too many days in a row with no one to talk to" thing going on, and I'm going a little nuts. Yes! I think that's it.

But my "Magic, Witchcraft and Religion" class is on tonight (on cable, from Sacramento State University). I now know how actual zombies are created, and what the whole lore is behind vampires. Plus a lot of other cool stuff. The teacher is this guy, and he's great.

Maybe I'll pick out one more truffle, just one, to nibble on while I sharpen my brain. Chocolate is good for you, you know.

Today I'll let you into my studio to look at how I organize my colored pencils.
I will warn you that this is one area where I'm a little... fussy. If you have an aversion to things that are too organized or orderly or color coordinated, BEWARE!
You may want to turn back now.

First up we have the Polychromos, which are my favorites and what I use the most, by far. By FAR. (I gave you the link to the manufacturer's site, but they don't have the best price, don't buy them from there! ~ scroll to the bottom of this post for cheaper places.)
I have 3 tins of them ~ 2 are the 120 set, 1 is the 72 set.

What I did was take out all the pencils in all 3 sets and reorganize them according to color.


They're not organized by number. Its just visual for my own amusement.
I open them out like this, but with some overlap, on my drawing table when I'm working.



There are gaps in the tins here, especially the browns, since I'm using some of those right now on my chocolate pieces, and have them somewhere else, handy (I'll show you farther down).



In addition to the ones in tins I have boxes full of 'extras', colors I use a lot of or need for specific pieces. I have lots and lots of black, white and ivory, and now a lot of browns, plus other colors that I've needed extras of for some past project. I have all these in a drawer in my art supply cupboard, and have them labelled like this so I know what's in the box.



There are more than this. Its obscene how many I have. If you ever need a color and the art supply stores say they're out of stock, its probably my fault.
I don't have any of the discontinued Soft Black though. I know who has them all but I'm not saying.

~~~~~~~~~

Next up are my Prismacolors.
I found these plastic storage boxes at the art supply store ages ago and they work pretty well. You can adjust the little 'spacers' however you like; so I made a long section for newer pencils and a short section for stubbier bits.

I divided them all up, sort of, by 'reds' or warm colors, and 'blues' or cooler colors. (Although I just noticed a couple of greens have jumped their way over into the warm bin.)



This is by no means a scientific sorting. Its just sort of 'good enough', and when I need a certain color I can find it OK.
I don't use Prismas very much any more. I bought these way back, and some of them are ancient.



I also have some very interesting odd pencils which I'm sure are collector's items!
There's a Whitman, a Venus, and a "Koh-I-Noor" Polycolor.
And check out that little 2-headed striped number. I think I've had that since about the 4th grade. I used to have a whole set, not sure what happened to the rest of them. I never use that pencil; I just have it as a link to the past. I can't bear to throw it out.



I have one other plastic bin for just regular graphite pencils.



And here's my handy-dandy Tool Turn-about for all the pencils that are either in use on a project, or ones that I haven't "filed" yet. This thing is great, because it keeps the pencils in one spot and keeps them from rolling off the table.



I also have tins of: Coloursoft, Inktense, Graphitints, and watercolor pencils. I just keep them in their original tins, nothing fancy.

I'm really disciplined about keeping these babies organized. I re-file them all after each project. The rest of my studio may be a disaster, but my pencils are always in pretty good shape.
I think if there was a fire (god forbid), after my cats I'd save my pencils.

Here are the 3 main places online I use to order pencils and other supplies:
Dick Blick
Daniel Smith
Jerry's Artarama
Go to each site and sign up to get emailed specials and sales sent to you. You can save a bundle that way!
(As I'm writing this, Polychromo prices vary wildly: Jerry's has them for $1.69, Daniel Smith for $1.39 and Dick Blick for $.95! If you buy them from the manufacturer's site they're $2.69 each!!!! Yikes. But the prices fluctuate, and sometimes the "tin" price will be cheaper at a place that has the open stock for more. So be sure to check around when you're shopping. And there are more places than this, just google "art supplies".)

That's all for today~

Mmmm. If you think these are tempting to look at, you should be staring at them live and smelling them like I am while I'm drawing!
This one's also 5 x 7, done with Polychromos on illustration board.

This morning started off great with the FedEx man dropping off my package of newly ordered pencils from Dick Blick.


I figured I'd better stock up on my browns if I'm going to be doing this whole chocolate series.


Hey, I don't mess around. I said I stocked up.
That's my sophisticated labeling system: drafting tape with the color written in Sharpie marker. This way I can look in the drawer and see what I have easily. These are all my backups after I use up the couple or three I have in my tins (which are all organized according to color... maybe I'll do a post about that next week.)


This afternoon I took a trip to Barnes and Noble, and sitting there on the shelf in the children's book section, just for me, was this gorgeous book:


"The Chocolate Cat", written by Sue Stainton and illustrated by Anne Mortimer. (I hope they won't mind me posting this image here since I'm linking to them on Amazon.)
Anne Mortimer's illustrations are AMAZING. I've been a big fan of hers for a long time, and have several of the books she's illustrated. She's especially known for her cats. You can almost smell the chocolate on every page, its just the most gorgeous thing!!!!!! This low res image doesn't do it justice at all. She works in watercolor, and the illustrations are all very detailed and lush and must take her more hours than I can imagine (well no, I can imagine.)

What a treat to look forward to drooling over in bed tonight!

All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

Well that was weird. Blogger was just dead for I don't know how long. Did you notice?

But its OK now, and here I am.

So like the title says, this is a blueberry truffle.
5 x 7 on illustration board, Polychromos
Not for sale. Yet.

I haven't figured out what I want to do with these. I might make a series, what'ya think? But then do I sell them on ebay, have a show someplace and do them that way, wait until I have a whole "set" and sell them to See's to hang on their corporate wall? We'll see.

This is just what I felt like doing. When left to my own devices, and when I don't have an assignment I have to do, or specs to fulfill, or anything like that; when I'm just doing something for myself, I tend to do a straight on, presentational view of things. Like this.

This is a little bit larger than life. The truffle is twice the size it is in real life, which makes it interesting. I drew it from life, no photo reference. Then when I was finished with the "whole" truffle, I cut it in half and did the cross section. It was fun to not even know what the inside looked like until I opened it up!
And no, I haven't eaten it yet.

I used a whole bunch of colors, and didn't know where I was going with this until I got started. It ended up being very rendered, but I didn't use any solvents, just did lots and lots of layers. It took a while, but I enjoyed it.

Yes, I think I'll do more.
~~~~~
This brings up another thought. Sometimes when I know I want to do a new project or piece, I don't know what kind of piece to do. Do you do that? Since I work in different areas or fields of illustration, I have trouble deciding who I want to be as an artist at times.

Should I do a children's book piece and make it about kids eating chocolate?
Should I be a "weird" fine artist and do the truffles tied up with yarn? (I came very very close to doing that)
Should I do something "design-ey" that can be used for licensing somehow?
Should I do (fill in the blank)?

I came up with about a hundred clever ideas. Then they'd seem unclever and just forced after I let them incubate a while. It was driving me nuts. So I settled on just doing a straight rendering, and felt better once I'd made up my mind.
~~~~~~~

And I can NOT get used to this bloody time change (for you not in the US, we are now on Daylight Saving Time which means we had to set our clocks ahead one hour Sunday morning, hence, losing one hour of sleep. Except for people in Arizona I think. Its all just mental.)
Are we all tired and cranky and "off"? I'm guessing so.

2.5 x 3.5
Derwent Coloursoft on board
ebay

I like this! This is Coloursoft's "brown black" color. Its almost as soft as the Derwent Drawing pencil, but noooooot quiiiiite. Close though.
They're still not Polychromos, but they're pretty good.
And I like this color. I want to do a couple more then do a final "side by side" thing to compare.

I sure wish I had my CPSA lightfast book so I'd know which ones were lightfast. If anyone who does know wants to tell me, I'm all ears (thanks to Katherine I already know the Poly black is good, which is a relief). I have a feeling most or all of these muted colors will be OK. Notice though I'm not testing Graphitints because somewhere I heard they were fugitive. Again, if anyone knows for sure and feels like sharing...

To see all the Yarn pieces in this series side-by-side, please go here. Or visit my ebay store to see which are available for sale.
All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

SOLD


2.5 x 3.5
Polychromo pencil on board

I'm back to my Polychromos! That last one, the Cretacolor, just irked me enough that I had to go back to my faves. You know how when you go on vacation and sleep in hotels and try all new things, then you come home and sleep in your own bed and go "Ahhhhhhh"...well that's how my Polychromos feel to me.

I did this with just the Dark Sepia one.
You can hardly tell that's a pear underneath all that yarn, but yep, its there.

So check this out: (click it to make it bigger)


Look at how greenish the Polychromo sepia looks compared to the others!
My favorite "non black" here is the Chocolate Derwent Drawing pencil, by far.
I do like the Cretacolor Dark Sepia COLOR, but hate working with the pencil.
My favorite pencils to work with are still the Polychromos, but I can deal with the Derwent.

There's one more I want to try before the jury is all in. I need to do some Coloursofts and see what I can do with those, then I'll make my decision.

To see all the Yarn pieces in this series side-by-side, please go here. Or visit my ebay store to see which are available for sale.
All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

2.5 x 3.5
Coloursofts and Polychromos on board
on ebay

I know I said I was going to do black and whites. And I am! I just had to do this first.

Yesterday was such a contrast to the day before, with the terrible storm and wind and rain and all. The sky was blue, and there were these amazing gigantic fluffy clouds all over. They were still kind of ominous, with grey underbellies, but they also had the most beautiful pinks and lavender colors in them. I just had to do a little piece about them. Or try, anyway.

I don't do as well with pastelly colors for some reason. It probably looks OK to you, but I fussed with it a lot. I'm not a pastel person. I like grey and taupe and black and cream and olive and plum and...well, you get the idea. Even as a kid. (Although I was forced to have a pink bedroom. Well, at least until I got up the nerve to ask my parents to let me paint one wall blue-violet (the rest was white) which they thought was the height of teenage rebellion, and which they also thought gave them lots of "cool" points for allowing me to do. Enough said.)

Anyway, this is my little homage to the "post-storm sky".
And I find that the Polychromos work well with just about every other type of pencil. I like to start with the Coloursofts or Graphitints and then do some Polychromo on top.

To see all the Yarn pieces in this series side-by-side, please go here. Or visit my ebay store to see which are available for sale.
All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

2.5 x 3.5
Graphitints and Polychromos on illustration board
ebay auction

There's a stand of Italian Cypress tress in the yard behind me. All Winter I've been watching them bend and sway in the wind. Its kind of mesmerizing some days, others its scary. So anyways, I finally decided to use them as inspiration for a yarn piece.

I started with Graphitints then filled in more with Polychromos. I like using the two together.

This last week I didn't get much done. Well, I did, but it was nothing I could blog about. And I didn't have time to do any yarn. Or anything else for myself. I was cranky!

Next up is a series of tests about "black and white", or more specifically, "monochromatic" pieces, done with different greys, sepias, blacks etc. I'm doing a piece that will be in black and white, but want to warm it up some. I'm not sure I want to use sepia. I know the Polychromo "soft blacks" are impossible to find now, so that's out. I love my usual Polychromo regular black (like the yarn in the last post), but its a very cold black. I just want to explore some options. So hopefully in the next couple of days I'll have something to show.
Stay tuned!

To see all the Yarn pieces in this series side-by-side, please go here. Or visit my ebay store to see which are available for sale.
All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

SOLD

2 - ACEO sized pieces (so, altogether its 2.5 x 7)
Polychromos on bristol board

Bloody ants, I swear. I also knitted an homage to them, and blathered on about my traumatic experience here.

I accidentally used 400 series bristol board instead of 500 series illustration board because when I pulled a new piece to cut, I pulled the wrong thing. But it didn't matter. There aren't too many layers, and the bristol had just enough tooth.

Tomorrow is another day, hopefully ant-free! (and thanks anyway Wendy Edelson for the tip about using cinnamon or cayenne, which worked for a while, but when they're set on an invasion, nothing will stop them...)

To see all the Yarn pieces in this series side-by-side, please go here. Or visit my ebay store to see which are available for sale.
All images and content herein are © Paula Pertile and may not be used or reproduced without permission.

by Contributing Editor, Maurene J. Hinds

One of the best ways to enliven nonfiction is by “borrowing” techniques used in fiction. This includes, when appropriate, opening with a high-action scene, building suspense, using plenty of “showing” description, and including dialogue to break-up the narrative. The only caveat is that actions and dialogue must be “true,” in that it accurately (word for word in the case of direct quotes) portrays events or people. What if you are not writing a biography or historical piece? You can still use these techniques by interviewing professionals, showing people in action, and determining an interesting point of view from which to write about your subject.

Kids love to learn about topics that interest them. For writers, this is good news, because it can often be “easier” to sell nonfiction than fiction–easier in the sense that many editors are looking for quality nonfiction. However, this also means that it is a competitive market, and only the best nonfiction writing will sell. You can make your nonfiction stand out by incorporating the techniques mentioned above, among other things (choosing and focusing on a specific, interesting topic also helps!).

Just as you need some type of “hook,” in fiction, so too should you use one in nonfiction. Even if your topic follows some type of chronology, consider opening with a significant event, fascinating fact, high-action event, or unique dialogue. Bring the reader in and then fill-in the details. What is an exception to this approach? Younger readers require more structure than older readers, in which case beginning in the middle of your story might not work. Straight chronologies work better for younger readers.

Use the idea of beginnings, middles, and ends as you craft your nonfiction piece. Just as fiction builds to the climax of the story, so too can you arrange your information in a way that builds to an interesting ending. Are you writing about a real-life mystery? Consider dropping clues along the way so your reader can try to solve the problem.

What if you are not sure of the best structure for your work? In many ways, you have more flexibility with nonfiction in that you can structure your piece in a way that best fits your material. Perhaps including the most exciting information first, rather than last, works best for your topic. Maybe the middle of your piece is full of action, which you then lead the reader out of to explain the significance. No matter how you structure your piece, remember that it needs to have some type of logical order (remember that bit about young readers?). As always, keep your reader in mind.

Dialogue is a great way to add interest to nonfiction while also breaking up longer sections of text. If you are writing a historical event or biography, search for actual words said by the people involved. If you cannot find this, you might be able to quote a newspaper article or some other source from the same period. If no quotes are available, or if you are writing a different type of piece, consider including excerpts from interviews. Experts add authenticity to your work, and some interesting quotes from experts can add that special, human touch.

As you develop your piece, look for ways to make the writing as interesting and “alive” as possible. Kids do not like to wade through dry, stale facts any more than (many) adults do. Think of ways to put those facts into context. Show the significance of the information, and present it in forms that kids can relate to. If you use the many ways to add sparkle to your nonfiction, you will help increase your chances of publication while providing fun, fascinating reads for your audience.

Yikes! We’d meant to post this special edition of Book Bites for Kids earlier in the week, but we had some technical difficulties.

NWFCC contributing editor and children’s author Maurene J. Hinds

Listen as children’s writer, and contributing editor here at the NWFCC, Maurene J. Hinds talks with Book Bites for Kids host, Suzanne Lieurance, about her newest nonfiction book, Fighting the AIDS and HIV Epidemic.

Maurene also offers tips for how other children’s writers can get book contracts with children’s educational publishers.