What are Archetypes, exactly?

I find the subject of archetypes fascinating. The Hero, the Sidekick, the Villain—these are labels—archetypes— we all know. But what are archetypes, exactly? Carl Jung, who came up with the term, used it to describe universal character patterns and imagery, which he believed originated in the collective unconscious. The Hero, the Sidekick and the Villain aren't just labels—they're symbols in a universal language. So as we engage archetypal characters and imagery in our work, we, as artists, writers and the audience, all benefit from this collective understanding!

In addition to exploring and using archetypes in our work, I find it fun to analyze the archetypal characters that I personally can relate to. For example, some archetypes that we, (as KidLit artists), probably can relate to are the Artist, the Storyteller, and the Student (the Mentee!) One of my favorite archetypes is the Wizard. Wizards have many aspects—they can be Alchemists, Magicians, Scientists, Counselors—but I keep my own personal Alchemist Wizard as an inner ally. The Alchemist turns raw metals into gold—so first, the obvious—as an artist, as I take raw materials and turn them into art. But I like to think of any creative transformation as an act of alchemy! The act of seeing something in the world, or having an idea and putting it down on paper, can feel like alchemy. Sometimes I engage my Wizard to help me maneuver an upsetting situation. Finding the silver (or gold!) lining can really help transform the experience.

On a side note, I’d like to add that it’s important, (or at least interesting!), to know the difference between an archetype and a stereotype. Both are characters drawn from a set of character attributes, which you can think of as a template—but the difference is in the use of the template. The archetypal character is built onto the template—individuality is added; whereas a stereotypical character stops at the template—it is simple and often clichéd. For example, both Harry Potter and Frodo Baggins are “The Unwilling Hero” archetype, but they can’t be switched into each other’s stories. If they could, they’d be stereotypes.*

Think about archetypes that play a role in your life. Which ones are your favorites? Which ones do you draw? Which ones do you dress up as, for Halloween? I find that identifying the archetypes I personally relate to not only is fun, but can help me get inside characters I am trying to understand, or create.

Here are some brief descriptions of a few familiar archetypes:

     

The Angel: The Angel embodies a loving and nurturing quality. Angels may also play the role of a Fairy Godmother or Godfather by helping someone in need, either anonymously or with no expectation of any return.**

      

The Damsel (Princess): The Damsel in Distress may be the oldest female archetype in all of popular literature and the movies. She is always beautiful, vulnerable, and in need of rescue, specifically by a Knight and, once rescued, she is taken care of in lavish style.** 

          

The Goddess (Heroine): The oldest religious tradition on earth may well be Goddess worship, which some archaeologists trace back further than 30,000 years. The Goddess embodies wisdom, guidance, physical grace, athletic prowess, and sensuality.**
 
       

The Knight (Warrior, Rescuer): The Knight is primarily associated with chivalry, courtly romance, protection of the Princess, and going to battle only for honorable causes. Loyalty and self-sacrifice are the Knight’s great virtues.**

        

The Rebel (Nonconformist, Anarchist, Pirate): The Rebel follows his or her own beliefs. They do not obey rules nor do they accept normal standards of behavior—resisting authority, control, social pressure and tradition. They are a key component of growth and development.** 

    
Monsters (the Vampire, the Werewolf, the Zombie, the Destroyer, etc.): Monster archetypes represent the part of our being that is least familiar to our conscious mind. They become hostile when they are ignored or misunderstood—expressing themselves through behavior that sabotages our wishes or self image. Some basic attributes: The Vampire: Feeds off the life force of another; The Werewolf: Has something festering inside that is struggling to get out; The Zombie: Has been hurt in life and has "died inside";*** The Destroyer: The Destroyer generates death, madness, and abuse. It can also refer to releasing that which is destroying. The power of positive destruction is enormously healing and liberating.**

There are many, many archetypes, and always something to learn from them. I highly recommend exploring them!

*http://enchantedinkpot.livejournal.com/91935.html
**http://www.myss.com/free-resources/sacred-contracts-and-your-archetypes/appendix-a-gallery-of-archtypes/

***http://malayna-dawn.typepad.com/my_weblog/2010/10/examining-our-shadows-the-symbolism-of-monster-archetypes.html

Molly Ruttan

www.mollyruttan.com

twitter: mollyillo

FB: Molly Ruttan/Molly Ruttan Illustration

Introducing #digital art #Photoshop tips #Tutorials

Hello

This is my second post and I was thinking about what would be a good post to write and share for visitors of this blog who I assume are illustrators, writers, or people who are interested in making children's book.

I've attended SCBWI several times, went to Critique meet ups and attended picture book class last year. I've noticed that there are a few people who were interested in digital painting and wanted to use Photoshop as digital tool for their art.

So, I thought it will be nice to share what I use to create illustrations on Photoshop.

These tool I am explaining below are what I'm using at work and I have learned from working in animation studios. It is very helpful and you will save lots of time if you know the right tools to use! :)

In this post, I break down into Brush / Layer / Adjustment.

Here are some tips I'd like to share here and I hope everyone finds this information helpful! :)

Firstly, I want to talk about Brush and some brush setting you can play around with.

If you want to give some texture to your work, what you can do is, you can grab texture online and copy and paste on the layer. Here, you might change the normal layer to overlay and bring the opacity down to make it look more natural.

However, it's really up to you as an artist to decide!

Does this happen to you, that you are making over 100 layers and having a hard time finding the layer you want?

Here is a little tip for that one.

Short key for this tool is "V"

Let's say you are on the other layer and want to find the layer you want quickly. While pressing the Control key, click the image on the layer you are working on and it will automatically find your layer. See how comfortable that is! (It was really a struggle for me before I knew about this tool..:/)

Snapping layer tool

How to use it?: Press the ALT key on the layer below you want to snap on.

What it does? : It will only allow you to paint that layer that is snapped on.

Masking tool

How to use it?:Click this box shape thing

What it does? : You can use it to erase only the layer which you have selected.

These tools give you control over the layers you are working on.

Lastly, I want to talk about quick adjustment tools that will help you find value and color, either saturation or desaturated color. Curve, color balance and level adjustment layers are found in small icons on the bottom of layers. Curve is quick way to make adjustment in value and color brightness.

Color balance is a very good tool to make the color harmonized into warm or cool tone. It's great for getting overall mood out from illustration. Level adjustment is similar to Curve but I prefer to use Curve. It's personal choice so you can choose whichever works for you.

I hope this was helpful for some of you who are interested in learning about Photoshop tools.

Here is also my Photoshop Brush tool preset I am using for illustrating my work, please check it out if anyone interested in it!


Thanks and Happy illustrating! :)


Nicholas
Designer | Illustrator
www.nicholas-hong.com

Illustration Intensives: Intensely Beneficial

Lauren Rille 

Hi there creative friends! I was at an Illustration Intensive this last weekend, hosted by the SCBWI-San Diego Region, featuring the the insightful, and totally entertaining, Associate Art Director,  Lauren Rille, from Simon and Schuster.

(You can follow her on twitter, and if you would like a sneak peak at her design savvy, check out her blog.)

I love going to conferences, but I especially love going to illustration intensives. The purpose of an intensive is to bring you back to art school (only the knowledgeable professor is replaced with an insightful art director). The assignment is suppose to replicate what working with an art director is like.

Months before the intensive, Lauren sent us the text to a picture book. She asked us to create a thumbnail dummy  (or teeny tiny drawings that map out the pacing of the book). From those thumbnails she asked that we send her 2 roughs (or more finished drawings) of the spreads that we wanted to illustrate. Once we turned those in, she would email us a critique. We were to bring the revised thumbnails and 2 final spreads to the intensive, to be critiqued as a group.

The text we got was a sweet and very young picture book called Baby Love by Angela DiTerlizzi and illustrated by fellow Mentee Brooke Boynton Hughes. I'll be honest, I pulled a few hairs out trying to think how I could illustrate the text differently, especially since Brooke did such a gobsmacklingly wonderful job.


After drawing what seemed like a million and two families with babies, I finally decided to put this family in space... going on a spacewalk, with them bringing their baby home to sleep at their colony on Mars. (Everything is better in space, right?! ;)

Here's what I sent in:

Stick figures in.... SPAAAAACE!!!

This is one of the roughs I sent in. (I do my roughs... extra rough.)

Doesn't this sweet face make you weep?!

Lauren responded with a very helpful critique. She mentioned one reason she had prompted our group with this particular text was because babies are so hard to illustrate; people often get the proportions wrong. So I decided to do some more "research" on babies and ended up waxing nostalgic, thinking of my kid's infancy. Something that I noticed is the lack of neck and the adorable potbelly. Lauren also said babies barely have any eyebrows or eyelashes.

So armed with a refreshed knowledge that babies are not  just miniature adults, I went back to the drawing board and sketched another million babies. 

I redid my thumbnails and revised my roughs.

My sketches are starting to get tighter here. 

Next, I scanned my drawings in, printed them out on Arches 140lb, and painted with watercolor. 

Then I scanned the watercolor in and painted in some digital layers.

Finally, after all our blood, sweat, and tears, we went to the intensive, and had our illustrations critiqued. This is what I submitted:

(You can click on them, to see closer,  if you have ancient eyes like me.) 

If you are not already a believer, I strongly urge you to start doing illustration intensives. (You can check out if there are any intensives in your neck of the woods here.) I've been to many of them in different regions, and I've always learned something about myself as an artist, or about how art directors interact with illustrators, or even whether or not my style is right for that particular art director or publishing house. You have nothing to loose and everything to gain.

Alrighty friends, thanks for dropping by and happy illustrating!

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Interview by Meridth McKean Gimbel, a kidlit writer, artist, & champion taco cruncher who is currently building a time machine. They are also represented by Linda Pratt at Wernick & Pratt. You can follow their work at:

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Three Social Media Tips For Children's Book Writers and Illustrators - by Debbie Ridpath Ohi

In the past few months, I've given my Social Media Master Class to writers and illustrators at SCBWI events in New York, Miami and Los Angeles. I still feel odd when people refer to me as a social media expert, mainly because I believe:

1. There is no ONE right way to use social media. What works for me may not work for you. 

Also, it drives me a wee bit crazy when some come up to me and say stuff like, "You're so lucky to be so good at this! It comes so naturally to you."

I feel like yelling at them, "It wasn't luck! I started from scratch, made MANY MISTAKES, learned how to use social media gradually through observation and practice." But of course I don't yell because I've made the same sort of assumptions about others who work very hard to learn something over a long period of time; we only tend to see the end results. I try not to make this mistaken assumption anymore, to give people more credit.

When it comes to promotion, part of my "strategy" in social media comes from my introvert tendencies as well as my aversion to asking people for money. It's one of the reasons I very rarely help promote crowd-funding campaigns and will likely never use Kickstarter or similar venues to fund a project.

2. Respect your followers' time.

It's worth taking the time to craft a post that shows that you respect your followers' time. I assume that many others are like me, often feeling overwhelmed with the barrage of information and tweets and "click THIS link" and "look at THIS" posts on social media.

I never post on Twitter with a bare link, or a "Check this out! xxxlinkxxxx" because I rarely click through that kind of post. When I use auto-share tools, I try to customize the descriptive text whenever I can.

I try to make my posts as entertaining or informative or as visually enticing as possible. I try to include an image whenever I can; I have found that my posts with images almost always get more attention that those without.

3. As fun or useful as social media can be, your work needs to come first.

I strongly recommend figuring out what you want to get out of social media; I wish I had done this from the beginning. It will help keep you focused and time-efficient, plus save you frustration. Be realistic. "I'm going to find an editor who will publish my book" is not realistic. "I want to get to know what editor xxx is like" or "I want to find out if agent xxx is someone I'd like to work with" is more realistic.

These are just a few general tips, but they are three of the most important. I could write a book about social media advice (general and specific) for writers and illustrators, but why bother? Social media platforms change all the time; so much has already changed in Twitter since I wrote my Twitter Guide For Authors and Illustrators.

And a last tip: Try to have fun!

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Debbie Ridpath Ohi wrote and illustrated WHERE ARE MY BOOKS? (Simon & Schuster Children's). Coming out in 2016: RUBY ROSE, BIG BRAVOS (author: Rob Sanders, HarperCollins) and MITZI TULANE, PRESCHOOL DETECTIVE: WHAT'S THAT SMELL? (author: Lauren McLaughlin, Random House). Twitter: @inkyelbows.