"What's worse than the total agony of being in love?" + Bird Illustrations 7-9 (of 14)
a little roundup of thoughts, work, AND in-depth looks (and a video) on my "Purposeful Practice Challenge - Round 1"
Hi! I’m Kayla Stark, an illustrator working primarily in the children’s publishing world. You’re reading “Odd Thoughts”, my blog/newsletter where I talk mostly about illustration, process, publishing, and anything else that’s tangentially related in my life. Join in! Everyone’s welcome!
Hi there fellow Substackians!
I watched “Love Actually” for the first time last Wednesday and I liked it. It’s news to me, but maybe I am a bit of a romantic after all. :) (Note: there are jokes about weight that feel really mean and out of place in 2023; I did not like that.)
When little Thomas Brodie-Sangster said “What's worse than the total agony of being in love?” I sat up a little straighter in my chair. This quote has rattled around in my head for days. Because, yes, love is total agony.
And I don’t just mean with another person, but with your craft, your art, your career. I found myself standing in the kitchen thinking about my art/illustration and wondering how something I love and have spent SO MUCH time and energy on can simultaneously bring me such joy and such pain—just like any relationship.
Who can relate? 🙋♀️
Maybe my art and I should work on our communication/expectations for one another. 😅
I should have seen it coming.
November put me a little out of balance. It was completely unpredictable and hit like a wall. BAM! Momentum gone. I need to understand why everything is happening and tend to overthink (a little) so I’ve spent the last week trying to understand what knocked me off kilter.
I’ll spare you the spiraling, and make a list of everything that I suspect led to it:
getting past one HUGE goal “querying lit agents” (and needing another thing for my hyperfocus to lock onto)
obsessively reading and finishing two books (in what will eventually be a 5 book series) back to back that end on a cliffhanger. (I want the next one now!) It was “Fourth Wing” and “Iron Flame” if you’re curious.😉
Thanksgiving holiday (my routines crumpled)
Money (a constant worry for a lot of us I’m sure)
Sneaky, sneaky burn out (I didn’t realize this was happening until my hyperfocus had nothing to laser onto. All of a sudden I saw how much I had been doing.)
Time change and less daylight
Once the momentum faltered, I was just there—taking stock of my day to day, the highs, the lows, and tbh feeling a bit lonely. But this is not a sad story. This is just a report. It will pass and I will be fine. I am not actually alone. 💛 There were nice times too! Our brains are just liars.
What else…?
I’ve still been trudging along on my picture book pitch while trying to remember my motto “fast, funny, fun”. The hardest part of the process is writing endings. (I’m on draft 3 or 4 with the ending.) I took a little time away to let feedback stew—staring out the window…living life and waiting for the solution…it’s hard, but is there really any other way? No matter how hard I try, forcing it never works. An idea did come and this week I’m back to sketching out the ending in the dummy!
Earlier this month I joined in the
events and organized an artist hangout/drawing night in Nashville. It was fun! There were approximately 15 people total. We chatted, drew, played a couple rounds of exquisite corpse, and laughed a lot. There’s tentative plans to team up with a couple other local artists and host monthly rotating drawing nights and critique nights!
So, I’ve been putting it off, but this is my first post with a paid section…I’m nervous about it…but I’m doing it anyway. I want to offer value, entertainment, a place for camaraderie, etc. I just can’t do it to the degree I want for free unfortunately. And if you just want to jump in once to see a specific post and jump back out, you won’t hurt my feelings! I completely get it!
Some things that will inform paid posts coming up! The rest in my Purposeful Practice series; drawings/lessons learned from the 100 day dragon drawing challenge I just started; the process of planning and preparing my picture book dummy for submission; drawing/painting videos
I will determine a structure and schedule to balance the free and paid posts, but in the meantime…
I’m back again with the birds from my purposeful practice challenge! In this round I’m talking about numbers 7-9 (of 14).
Here’s the first part if you missed it, and the BIG Purposeful Practice explanation! The first two roundups (birds 1-6) are up for everyone to see and read through! This is the first I’m sharing with paid subscribers only; your support means more than you know! After this one, there are two more rounds of birds to share from this challenge.
The quickest of summaries:
I wanted to get out of my head and draw in different ways.
I chose a random bird + a random drawing, then drew the bird in that style.
And I added an extra layer by setting a 40 min timer.
(timers help get me out of my overthinking loop)
First up are the notes that I made for myself in Notion after finishing each bird, THEN a video looking a little closer at each piece. Let’s get into it!
Bird 7: Red-billed Tropicbird
Thoughts: - Halfway! When I landed on this pin I cheered! 2-color, “simple”, exaggerated shapes and a focus on line. YES PLEASE! I’d love to work more like this for products and prints. I think it could work in a book too. Actually, I know it can. There are oodles of examples (past and present) to prove that. I did this digitally in procreate. I’m 100% certain that Bernice did her work by hand. I wonder if the production process gave it that flat quality or if she was a master at laying down paint. Note to self: Research her process. I had fun piecing together floating shapes to make an ocean-y composition. They eye and brain work together to make it make sense, even if it is just floating shapes. Further proof that our brains want to see patterns and make sense of everything. Elements to balance in this piece: shape (positive and negative); line and texture; color (usually 2-3 including black + the white of the paper
Bird 8: Whooping Crane
Thoughts: This was not very intuitive for me, layering color and texture variation does not come naturally—yet I am drawn to it. I’m sure there is a “style” we all love, but don’t love working in, or even can’t work in. My values are off, I need to consider the value balance of whole piece when layering. I went over time by 10 ish min—and didn’t care. I like the bird’s shape okay and I like the color lines. Would it take longer for me to work this way? Probably. Should I resist the temptation to put lines around edges? It’s always worth experimenting.
Bird 9: Green Kingfisher
Thoughts: Fun fun fun! Going quickly, the lines take on a living quality that I can’t totally predict. That gives a looseness I am seeking in my work. I tried sketching for this with a pencil before I officially started. I held the pencil loosely, back near the eraser to limit my control. I like those studies more—I don’t know why. Maybe it’s the softness of the graphite.
The ink definitely helps with my contrast and value issue. But I need to think about where the darkest parts are landing and balance it. Blobbing on watercolor was nice too, to give some focus and clarity among the jumbled, scribbled lines. I want to incorporate this “style” into my work. But, I’m a little afraid, I don’t want potential clients to think I can’t draw. Where’s the balance? Obviously Fischer and those similar earned/earn money and were applauded.
And here is a bonus video going a little deeper into the making and thoughts behind these three birds. Let me know if you have any questions!
In the last roundup I mentioned making worksheets to help plan a challenge of your own. I still think that’s a good idea and want to include them in either the next birdy roundup or the final. :) We can plan our next challenges together!
Thanks everyone! Talk soon!
I loved hearing your insights as the shapes and negative space on the first one. And the next two were so interesting too. Again, thank you!