M-M-M-M CUPCAKES
Scan of my Picture Book Dummy
All art and text © Diana Ting Delosh
Web/Portfolio - dianadelosh.com
Tah Dah - I'm so happy to say it's a DUMMY! I've been working on this dummy , betwixt and between jobs and life and there were many times that I thought it would never be a cohesive piece. This 32 page dummy is comprised of 2 finished colored spreads and the balance is loose sketches. I even created some yummy cupcake type for the title. Finally, here it is all put together and in time for my big portfolio review last weekend.
So how was M-M-M-M CUPCAKES PB Dummy Debut? I saw 3 reviewers; 2 editors from small to midsize publishing houses and 1 Art director from a large Big Name Publishing house.
The Big Name Publishing House Art Director liked how my dummy demonstrated that I had a real sense of how a picture book should flow. However her imprint was not interested in Concept Stories.
Editor # 1 was also not looking for picture book illustrators although CB liked my portfolio and told me I could send her ideas and sample art. Sigh.
However I really seemed to hit it off with editor #2. PG seemed to really like my portfolio and my dummies especially M-M-M-M CUPCAKES. She also really liked concept books as this mid-sized house tends to sell to libraries and schools, hence their lists are school curriculum driven. PG even quickly read through the brief text and gave me a few suggestions and permission to formally submit this proposal after I've made her suggested revisions as well as send other new proposals to her. YAY -very exciting! Keeping fingers crossed!
Note I did not mention the Publishing houses nor the reviewers by names. I have a superstition that if I talk too much about something prematurely I may jinx myself. More importantly though is that this is my experience and yours with the same company and reviewers would be your unique experience based on your work. This review has convinced me to try a new strategy of picking smaller or midsize publishing houses as they seemed to be more open to acquiring new projects/illustrators.
FYI: I only show my hard covered dummies in person at reviews, conferences etc. To submit this project as a Picture book proposal, I create a multipage PDF from the 16 spreads (15 internal spreads plus the cover) that I can easily pop in the mail or even just attach to an e-mail, with cover letters of course.
