Congrats to Robin Rosenthal and Juana Martinez-Neal! Plus SCBWI-NYC photos and some Mentee news

Just came back from the SCBWI Winter Conference in NYC. What a wonderful event! Thanks to the faculty and volunteers behind-the-scenes for all their hard work.

I was especially excited to see Robin Rosenthal (from the 2014 SCBWI-LA Mentee group) win the top prize in this year's SCBWI Winter Portfolio Showcase. CONGRATS, ROBIN!

From Robin:

"I am thrilled and honored to win this award. This is my ninth New York conference, and I am so thankful for the advice and feedback I've received along the way from my peers and from established illustrators, art directors, editors, and agents in the scbwi community. I've gotten some tough critiques at times, but it was often those critiques that propelled me furthest in my work."

Speaking of awards, CONGRATS to Juana Martinez-Neal (Mentee Class of 2011), who just won The Pura Belpré Award for Illustrators for LA PRINCESA AND THE PEA! Congrats to Juana and the other 2018 ALA Youth Media Award Winners.

Wonderful to see some of my Mentee friends in NYC. Like Jessica Lanan (Mentee Class of 2011) and Lisa Anchin (Mentee Class of 2012) at the Golden Kite Awards:

Jessica's first solo picture book, The Fisherman and the Whale, is coming out in spring 2019 from Simon & Schuster! See her blog post for more news.

And see this recent KidLitArtists post for an overview of our upcoming 2018 children's books! Meanwhile, a few more Mentee pics from the conference....

Here's Diandra Mae (Mentee Class of 2017) helping out at Registration:

Heidi Sheffield (Mentee Class of 2017) during the Portfolio Showcase and Illustrators' Social:

Great to catch up with Suzanne Kaufman (Mentee Class of 2014). Her upcoming book project, 100 BUGS! (written by Kate Narita, illustrated by Suzanne) comes out from Farrar, Straus and Giroux in June.

I had to miss the last day of the conference, but for a good reason. I had been invited to help celebrate Judy Blume's 80th birthday at Symphony Place that day! See this article (with photos) in Publishers Weekly last week.

Just before I went back to Toronto on the Monday, I ran into another Mentee, yay! You can find out more about Meridth McKean Gimbel (Mentee class of 2015) and her wonderful work at MeridthMcKeanGimbel.com:

If you missed the conference, you can browse other photos and some great takeaways at the SCBWI Conference Blog.

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Debbie Ridpath Ohi wrote and illustrated WHERE ARE MY BOOKS? and SAM & EVA (Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers).  Her illustrations also appear in books by Michael Ian Black, Judy Blume, Lauren McLaughlin and Rob Sanders. Her next book: I'M SAD, written by Michael Ian Black and illustrated by Debbie, comes out from Simon & Schuster in June 2017. She blogs about reading, writing and illustrating books for young people at Inkygirl.com. Twitter: @inkyelbows.

Portfolio: The Importance of the Series

A couple of weeks ago, SCBWI Insight included a bunch of portfolio tips from the KidLitArtists, and a number of them mentioned including sequences of related images in your portfolio. When developing a portfolio for the children’s book market, you want to demonstrate your ability to tell a story, and a series of images is a key way to do this. 

Pick a picture book, and then select 3 of the images from it – they will all look related. They will have a similar feel, palette, and usually show the same characters, just in different situations. Putting a similar set of images in your own portfolio shows art directors that you can maintain consistency with your characters and that you can develop a narrative. Those are both very important skills in picture book illustration. It can be good to have not just one, but several series of images in your portfolio. (When Juana Martinez-Neal won the portfolio showcase in SCBWI LA 2012, her portfolio was a set of 4 different series of images, with one stand-alone image at the end. You can see it here.)

What kind of illustrations you include in your series is up to you, but they should all vary from one another. You want each individual image to show the widest range of your abilities. If you have two in a series that are very similar to each other, it’s just redundant. I’ve done this myself. Here is an example of two images that go together which are essentially the same. Although the composition and color palette are different, the perspective and scale are the same, and the actions and emotions of the mice aren’t significantly different either. 

 Redundant images in a series © Jen Betton 2016

Here is a series of images I have in my portfolio that I think is successful: There is an environment shot, establishing where the characters are; a closeup, highlighting the relationship of the characters; and an action shot. Each one is different in composition, scale, pose, and perspective. 

Varied images in a series © Jen Betton 2016

In the end, it is all about telling a story, in the most interesting way you can. 

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Jen Betton writes and illustrates for children. 

You can find her work at www.jenbetton.com

@jenbetton on Twitter

www.facebook.com/jenbettonillustration on Facebook

She is currently illustrating TWILIGHT CHANT, by Holly Thompson, 

which will be published by Clarion in 2018. 

Interview with Caldecott Honor, Molly Idle - by Juana Martinez-Neal

Author Illustrator, Molly Idle.

Today, we have with us the most wonderful, Caldecott Honor winner, Molly Idle. Her latest book, CAMP REX (Viking Press) has just been released on April 22, and we could not wait to interview her to chat a bit about the new adventures of Cordelia, George, TRex and his friends. 

We met Cordelia and the gang at tea time on Molly's first book with Viking Press, TEA REX. This time, they are back and venturing into the outdoors on this second book, CAMP REX.

Now, let's get to the interview. Good morning, Miss Molly! Thanks for being here with us. 

"Camp Rex" by Molly Idle - Viking Press, 2014.

First, I have to ask- are you Cordelia? 

Ah yes, I am. Or, at least, she and I have a lot in common. Cordelia and I both get so focused on the tasks at hand, and on doing them well, wanting to do them perfectly really... That we often forget to live in the moment and enjoy ourselves and the company of those around us. Luckily, I have my boys here to remind me to loosen up, stay present, and embrace the wonderful mishmosh of everyday silliness that is my life.  They are my Rex and George.

True, we learn so much from our children. Would you tell us one thing you learned while working on "Camp Rex"? 

A note from my art director, about a possible inaccuracy in one of my sketches, led me to research poisonous plants. Did you know that poison ivy grows not only as a creeping ground cover, but can grow as bushes as well?! I get itchy just thinking about it... "Leaves of three- Let it be" folks!

"Camp Rex" by Molly Idle - Viking Press, 2014.

I'm curious... what books did you reference while working on Camp Rex?

Ah Google, how I love thee for instant reference material... Did you know that all the early 20th century Boy Scout and Girl Scout manuals are available as PDFs online? Neither did I before I started working on Camp Rex... But now I do. And now you do too! 

What advice can you share with illustrators who want to start writing?  

Read! You've got to read to understand how to write. My boys are 7 and 9, so for years now, I've been reading a lot of picture books. A LOT! And not just reading them once, but over and over. There was a period of about a year when my boys wanted to hear Jim Averbeck's book "In A Blue Room", 3 times every night! After the first 100 reads, I really got to know that book, why my boys loved it so, and why it worked, as a truly lovely book, on so many levels. 

And before we go... Camping trip essentials?

Marshmallows!!!

"Camp Rex" by Molly Idle - Viking Press, 2014.

Thanks so very much, Molly! And, congratulations on your Caldecott Honor. We look forward to seeing you receive your Caldecott Honor in June! 

You can find more about Molly on her website and Twitter.
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Juana Martinez Neal is a children's author illustrator and mami born in Lima, Peru and living in sunny Arizona. She's represented by Stefanie Von Borstel of Full Circle Literary.  Twitter | Blog