Illustration Friday - topic: Rain

I had trouble sleeping last night and finally got up to work on an idea that was running through my head for the Illustration Friday topic: Rain. I did a sketch and wrote out a first draft of the text. Today I did this painting - it was for IF, but I had also wanted to create a sample for Babybug, one of my favourite children's magazines. I ended up revising the text and turning it into a poem. Even though it's so short it went through quite a few revisions. I read the manuscript requirements on the Babybug website and tweaked it to suit their specifications.

This illustration reminds me of my best tip for artists. I often work on illustrations and think they don't look great, and I'm tempted to give up and either start again or just get discouraged altogether. When I took a children's illustration course at OCAD I didn't always have a choice - the pictures were due whether or not I was happy with them. So I had to just keep going, try to refine and tweak the colours and work on the shading to improve the picture. And what I discovered is that almost all the time there would be a magic point where suddenly I would realize it was working. I would look at a picture that I didn't like and say, "actually it's not bad".

This painting was definitely one of those times. I kept working at it and it just seemed weak to me. I was pretty sure I would have to start again from scratch. But I kept going, and finally started to like it. I'm not saying it's perfect, but in the end I was quite pleased with the result. So that's my advice for anyone who feels their artwork isn't quite how they want it - just keep refining and you may be surprised.

As always you can click on the image to see it larger. Thanks for visiting!