MINNESOTA SCBWI 2008 CONFERENCE

Thanks to a very kind invite from Gayle Huset at Stories For Children Magazine. I attended my first SCBWI Conference held October 2008, in Minnesota.

There's so many words and phrases the conference expressed which relate to my own personal experiences. Hopefully, you're able to make the same connection. How we travel the same road together (Published or Pre-published).

WIN YOUR AUDIENCE!

Focus of the Conference

Lin Oliver, Co-Founder and Executive Director of SCBWI - Amazing Speaker

Discussed the "Bumpy Road to Publication"

Rules to follow;

1- Must define yourself as a Professional- by friends, family, and self.

Investing in yourself, serious about managing spare time and resources, designate a work area

just for you.

2- Learn and practice your craft. DON'T feel like any work is beneath you.

3- Manage goals with deadlines. Determine a "To Do List" every day to accomplish.

4- Be Brave! Get out there! Enter Contests and Grants.

5- Become a part of the community, network, join critique groups, and attend conferences.

ESSENTIAL TO MOTIVATE YOU AND YOUR DREAMS.

6- Courage to stay with your own voice and vision - write or illustrate your own style.

7- Follow your weirdness. Writers have many thoughts processing.

8- Must do your market research and use all the tools and resources.

9- Enjoy your creative life on the road to publication. Keep a Journal of your progress.

10- Success Chart - every small step is an accomplishment.

11- When success happens - help the next one along.

Speaker Lin Oliver's Biography

* Already mentioned she was the Co-Founder and Executive Director of SCBWI.

* Co-Author with Henry Winkler of the New York Times Bestselling Book Series, Hank Zipper. Not

to mention I got an autographed copy of the book.

* New book series, Who Shrunk Daniel Funk?, published by Simon and Schuster.

* Staff Writer for the Beverly Hill Billies Show.

* Film and Television writer-producer, Emmy Award Winning Films, as feature film based on E.B.

White's Classic Novel, The Trumpet of the Swan.

What an amazing speaker of encouragement and entertainment. You need to be there to capture the moment.

Rules to Follow as an Illustrator

1- Concentrate on negative space.

2- Focus on the character - depth or concentration, secondary colors separate from the characters

focus.

3- Narrative within an image.

4- Landscapes and backgrounds fade off - push it back- show depth.

5- Watch shadow lines and 3D dimensional shadows of clothing or fabric.

6- Define aerial perspective.

7- Viewer must be told of what's important.

8- Create an interesting perspective.

9- Consistency with style and strategically placing the style.

10- Size proportion of the human body or animals.

Attended an Illustrator Workshop with Lauren Stringer

Brief Biography of Lauren Stringer

1- Lives in Minneapolis, MN

2- Illustrator of the following Children's Books; "Mud"," Red Rubber Boot Day", "Our Family

Tree", "Winter is the Warmest", "One Night", "Snow", and "Scare Crow".

3- Medium of Choice Paints.

4- Wall becomes her sketches, settings, and story-board.

Illustrator Portfolio Critique with Victoria Jamieson

It was such a privilege to be selected for a 15 minute critique session.

Victoria pointed out my strengths and coached on the areas for improvement.

Also, keep focused on my unique style of art work, and this inspired me.

Biography of Victoria Jamieson

* Designer for Greenwillow Books, an imprint of Harper Collins Publishers.

* Designs YA, Middle Grade, and Picture Book Jackets and Interiors.

* Works with Children's Books.

* Her first book as Author-Illustrator will be published by Bloomsbury in 2009.

Workshop with Art Director Tim Gillner - Boyds Mills Press

Tim Gillner kept us entertained with the "Process of Putting a Book Together".

* Best way to send samples of artwork, POSTCARDS.

* Illustrators need a Website or Blog to display their work.

* Boyds Mills Press is considered conservative and not educational.

* Digital Artwork should be printed in CMYK.

* Great resource http://childrensillustrators.com

* Timing is key with illustration jobs - do to the overwhelming amount of postcards received

daily.

Thanks to all who contributed to the Conference success.

A BIG HUG goes out to Gayle Huset with Stories for Children's Magazine. Gayle's warm and kind face shared with individuals the stories of success of Stories for Children's Magazine, welcomed new members, introduced so many other people, and captured the memories with photos.

Please visit http://storiesforchildrenmagazine.org to hear more about the conference and view photos of the event.

Writing and Illustrating Tips- One Story Or Character Turns Into Two

How often has this happened to you?

A children's story or picture book story you've written changes into two separate stories or takes a whole new direction.

Why? I'm about to share with you. What I've learned to be some of the reasons this occurs. Please keep in mind, I'm a children's writer in progress.

1- The plot is to complicated for a child. For instance, if you have more than one character trying to solve a problem.

2-If there's to many characters in the story. There should only be one main character with minimal interaction with 1-2 other characters.

3-The character should receive absolutely no guidance, as to how to solve the problem in the story.

4-Rhythm of the story or the flow of three's is really important.

5-Story should not reflect dialog only.

How often has this happened to you with illustrations?

Yes, one character or illustration background scene can be transformed into two or more separate characters or background scenes, and even carry over into more than one story.

1-Characters which reference a brother and sister- most generally share certain characteristic traits such as; nationality, eyes, nose and etc.

2-With background scenes- if you complete a full page spread of a city. You can show only the city, then add a car or children playing into the background scene, and tighten the background scene further to reflect only a house with a girl singing in the window.

I've mentioned only a portion of the information gained by being a part of a great critique group, such as the Children's Working Writer's Coaching Club. I hope you've found this information resourceful.

Also, would like to mention that I'm currently working on my first short story. Which I hope to submit to a Children's Magazine in the next couple of weeks, wish me luck.

TIPS OF THE WEEK FOR ILLUSTRATORS AND WRITERS

Did you know writers and illustrators capture movement in a story?
Sure, the approaches maybe different but both achieve the same end result.
The approaches for children's illustrators and children's writers indicated are based on my involvement with Workshops and Critique Groups.

These tips will be passed along to you each week.

TIPS OF THE WEEK FOR ILLUSTRATORS:
Vision the movement of the story-line as you read a manuscript:

1. Search for key words which describe a realistic character such as; young, old, strong, weak, shy or outgoing. Searching for key descriptions will determine the size, shape, facial features, of the character and their movement through the story.
2. Search for key words which describe an animated character such as; legs, arms, wings, transparent, magical and additional body parts.
3. Read the problem and resolution, note key descriptive words of the problem and resolution. Your job is to fill in any gaps left behind with your own unique creative images to maintain the interest of the story-line.
4. Control movement of the story by the chain of events; capture changes of the characters expressions, mood setting, and surrounding environment.
5. All movement should have a smooth transition and be understood.


TIPS OF THE WEEK FOR WRITERS:
Development of movement in a story-line:
1. Show don't tell the story.
2. Strong key words to describe a realistic character or animated character.
3. Explain the problem of the story and the resolution.
4. Smooth transition of when events take place in the story; follow calendar seasons in order, or breakfast, lunch and dinner, and day or night. Always follow a story-line of events.
5. Show the environment surrounding the story-line of events. Whether the story starts outside (describe the weather, location, and activity taking place), then it's lunch-time (describe the smells, tastes, appearance of the kitchen) and finally it's nap-time (describe how the character falls asleep; singing, counting, or watching objects in the room.


Hopefully, you've captured the importance of movement in a story-line. Even though, the methods utilized by an illustrator and a writer may differ. They're still able to achieve the same outcome.

Please be sure to visit next week for additional tips.

Tips of the Week for Illustrators and Writers

Discover how an upcoming writer benefits from prior experiences and methods learned as a Children's Book and Magazine Illustrator. These tips will be passed along to you each week.

TIPS OF THE WEEK FOR ILLUSTRATORS:

When you read through a manuscript:

1. Look for personality traits

2. A specific description of the character(s)

3. Age range for the character(s)

4. Determine whether to approach the story with realistic or whimsical illustrations.

It's beneficial to develop the sketches of the character(s) in the story prior to drawing the story-board. Approval of the character's sketches improves your time management skills and minimizes story-board revisions.

TIPS OF THE WEEK FOR WRITERS:

Development of a Storyline:

1. Develop a character prior to writing a story is beneficial. Interview your character and jot down his or hers responses.

2. Create a list of important facts about the character.

3. Be sure to include strengths and weaknesses of the character.

4. It's important to allow room for the illustrators own interpretation of the character(s).

I hope you found these tips as a writer and illustrator beneficial. Please be sure to return next week for more tips.

Blog by Dawn Phillips

I've taken my first step as a writer of the Writer's Coaching Club by creating a blog.

My focus of this blog is to communicate various writing assignments, and upcoming children's stories written by myself.

I hope you'll join me in this journey. Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Dawn Phillips