April: KidLitArtPostcard: Kazu

Kazu, Fox girl character © Diana Ting Delosh

One of my  goals for 2022 is to post a #KitLitArtPostcard post every month on Twitter.  Here's my April digital postcard. That means designing 12 different digital postcards for 2022. Which will give me a range of designs to send out to Art Directors and editors when I do an e- mailing.

Rules for myself are: 

• Preferably fresh, recent illustration.

• Has to be an illustration I've never used for a KitLitArtPostcard.

• Post on the Day, the earlier the better.

The pros of creating digital postcards are many.  It's free and you can tailor your design to the recipient. No Printing costs. No stamps. No address labels. No waste. 

The cons: It's harder to get email addresses for art directors and  editors. Hence why #KidLitArtPostcard is such a genius idea for kidlit artists.

#KidLitArtPostcard created by Gina Perry, @ginamarieperry, last spring for illustrators to promote their art on Twitter since the pandemic made snail mailing postcards problematic. Illustrators create a digital postcard and post it on the 1st Thursday of the month on Twitter and now even on Instagram.

My Feb #KidLitArtPostcard Twitter post

Dragon Egg, Mandrake Root © Diana Ting Delosh

Web: dianadelosh.com

twitter: @dtdelosh

Instagram: @dtdelosh

Check out my shops:

Greeting Cards: greetingcarduniverse.com/dianascards

Gifts: zazzle.com/deloshdesigns*

Art Prints: wingedrabbit.imagekind.com

Good Fortune Fortune Cookie

 

Recently I got an amazingly auspicious fortune from a fortune cookie.  I should point out that these days an actual fortune in a fortune cookie seems to be rarity. Nowadays they're mainly pithy sayings or quotes like the early bird catches the worm or something about being diligent.  Which may be true but really, I don't need a cookie to tell me that. So this was an exciting moment.

"Look for the dream that keeps coming back. It is your destiny"

Yup this fortune is a keeper and I'm taping it to my desk. Mind you, I do take these things with a grain of salt, but it's still nice to see when you have a picture book dummy out on submission with your agent and a grant application out as well as numerous other things out that you won't get a response to for awhile if ever. Never mind the projects you're currently keeping busy with to keep your mind off of everything as well as the real need to have something new to: submit, share,  always keep moving forward. It's like the universe sending you a message that all your efforts may come to fruition one day. No harm in finding a positive sign among all the negative voices that makes you question your illustrator/author dreams.

Here's to all my creative friends ever working, illustrating, writing, submitting and promoting: Good Luck and may all your creative dreams come true.

You can find me at:

Website: dianadelosh.com

Twitter: @dtdelosh

Instagram: @dtdelosh

SCBWI Long Island March Newsletter Art

Winter Friends © Diana Ting Delosh
Colored Art and digital

Back at the end of 2018 I was honored to be invited to create cover art for the SCBWI Long Island newsletter, Kid LIt News . The only directive was to include a kite. As it was to be a winter/spring issue I decided on animal friends having some winter fun. It was bit tricky figuring out how to get the kite to work as logical part of the illustration but I think I came up with an interesting solution.

Winter/Spring 2019 Kid LIT News Cover

There is even a lovely interview by fellow illustrator, Stephen Ingram about my art process and more for an article in the Kid Lit News Winter/Spring 2019 issue, which I'm happy to announce went live, March 14, 2019.

If you don't live on Long Island, NY and want to find out more about the SCBWI click here: scbwi.org

Web: dianadelosh.com

Illustration blog: dtdelosh.blogspot.com

Product Blog: arthareswares.blogspot.com

twitter: @dtdelosh

Group Blog: drawntopicturebooks.blogspot.com

Check out my shops:

Greeting Cards: greetingcarduniverse.com/dianascards

Gifts: zazzle.com/deloshdesigns*

Art Prints: wingedrabbit.imagekind.com

Check out my ThumbNailer

Of Life and Dreams - MATS Boot Camp February

Of Life and Dreams © Diana Ting Delosh
Mixed media: Ink, Pencil, Digital
 Mock Journal or Book Cover

It's been awhile since I blogged, either I had nothing to blog about or something but no time to do it. At any rate, here I am. Not promising that I'll be blogging on any regular basis but hopefully more often then not. At the end of 2018 I signed up for a bunch of thing and one of them included Lilla Roger's MATS Boot Camp 2019. This is my second go round with Bootcamp. The first time was in 2014, during the months of Feb, March, May. June and July. If you're wondering, yes, you can read about my experiences in this blog's archive. I signed up this time because I felt like I wanted some assignments that would stretch me. A peek at other markets out there aside from children's book publishing. Similar to why I did it last time. Except this time around I'm at a different place with my art and I thought it might be a good time to revisit the course.

Lilla teaches by giving us a mini assignment before she gives us the brief for the main assignment. This way we get to explore a subject without being limited by the scope of the final product/project. This time around the mini was to do florals and use a specific media. My group was assigned lily of the valley and colored pencils. I hunted around my studio and found an unopened box of Derwent Inktense 12. These are colored pencils that are meant for you to wash over with water. Honestly wasn't sure about the pencils until I threw the water on it - Then I really liked working with them.

Here's one of my minis, Bunny Amongst the Lily of the Valley
© Diana Ting Delosh
Derwent Inktense Color Pencil Sketch 

February's Brief:  Journal Cover with some hand lettering as that's very trendy right now. I loved the idea of doing florals but had a hang up about type on a journal. I never buy journals with type as I always felt like they were telling me what to put in my journal. But I really wanted to do some Hand Lettering. Plus that was part of the brief. I decided to think of it more as a book cover to get over my mental block.

Of Life and Dreams © Diana Ting Delosh
Rough Pencil Sketch layout of journal / book cover. 

Here finally is my finished mock book, ahem, journal cover in the MATS BootCamp February Gallery amongst all the other lovely designs. Click on the thumbnails to see them bigger.

I had a lot of fun drawing florals for this assignment. There will be more florals in my future.

For more samples of my art check out my web portfolio at dianadelosh.com
Follow me on Twitter @dtdelosh

Greeting Cards: greetingcarduniverse.com/dianascards
Gifts: zazzle.com/deloshdesigns*