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9 ways to encourage young artists

When I meet parents at events they often say,

‘my child loves to draw/write/create. How can I encourage their interest?’

Best-selling Australian author Matthew Reilly says, ‘never underestimate the power of your encouragement.’ He writes it in the thank you section at the back of every one of his books; he knows that it got him to where he is today. Encouragement is an incredibly powerful thing; young artists grow when they know that people believe in them and support their interest. (The same goes for adult artists, too!).

My advice comes from my work as an artist (who was once a young artist), my studies in primary teaching and psych (though I’m not a child psychology expert by any means), and my experience of working with kids in workshops. Here’s 9 things you can do to encourage the young writer and/or illustrator in your life … or even your own inner artist.

Continue reading “9 ways to encourage young artists”

Upcoming events, January-March 2017

I’ve got bunch of workshops over the next three months, most of them free! But firstly, a public service announcement:

Please check my upcoming events page for updates to these and other events – sometimes new events are added at the last minute, or details can change.

To get email notifications of future events, you can either:
– subscribe to this blog via the little box on the right; you’ll get each post emailed to you.
OR
– sign up for my free newsletter, The James Foley-o, and get all my news and events in a single quarterly email.

Jan 21 – Books From Your Backyard – FREE EVENT

I’m doing a free mini-workshop this school holidays!

Come to ‘Books From Your Backyard’ at the State Library of WA. I’ll be there along with 9 other local authors and illustrators – Frané Lessac, Gabriel Evans, Kelly Canby, Teena Raffa-Mulligan, Bec J. Smith, Cris Burne, Aska, Elaine Forrestal, Dianne Wolfer and Norman Jorgensen. We’re each hosting a little session, giving readings, and running fun activities for kids. And it’s all FREEEEEEE. My session is from 3-3:25pm, after which I’ll be signing copies of my latest book Brobot.

Continue reading “Upcoming events, January-March 2017”

Brobot: from roughs to final artwork

Hello! I’ve pulled together some gifs to show you how I made some of the illustrations in Brobot. You can see how I got from the first rough drawing to the final artwork for each illustration. Check them out below.

(NB: if you’re receiving this post by email and the gifs don’t appear, just click on the post title above to view the original post on my website).

brobot-final-pg-38-39-timelapse

brobot-final-pg-44-45-timelapse

brobot-final-pg-52-53-timelapse

brobot-final-pg-56-57-timelapse

 

brobot-final-pg-84-85-v2-timelapse

Brobot-3d-final-400pxBuy ‘Brobot’ now

When does a week have 56 days?

When it’s Children’s Book Week.

My author/illustrator friends and I call it Children’s Book season as the celebrations and events cannot be contained in a single week, and usually spread out across term 3 and term 4. My 2016 Children’s Book ‘Week’ went from August 4th to September 26th, a solid 8 weeks of talks and workshops across WA. It’s my busiest time of year but also my favourite, as I get to travel and meet lots of hilarious kids.

Here’s some photos showing my highlights of those 8 weeks.

Hand-painted Last Viking mural, Dardanup PS
‘In The Lion’ ideas by St Mary’s Bunbury
In The Lions at St Damien’s in Dawesville
Storytime, BHP Billiton Family Day
Front page, Today section
Cumulative stories at Goollelal PS
Robot designs, Goollelal PS students
Dead Bunnies, Souther River College students
Zombie animals, Trinity College students
Trinity College went all out
Picture Book in a Day, Marmion PS
Picture Book in a Day, Marmion PS
CBCA WA Book Week dinner
A wall of Dead Bunnies!
Viking room decorations
Viking room decorations
Dead Bunnies, Tuart Forest PS
Thanks Willetton Library!
Displays at South Lake PS
My Dead Bunny shortlist award
Brobot in bookstores
Viking food ‘gift’ from Palmyra PS
Palmyra PS
Palmyra PS
Palmyra PS
Robots, Palmyra PS
Derby
Cartooning class, Looma Community
Looma Community
Looma kids
‘In The Lion’ by Looma kids
Bayulu school near Fitzroy Crossing
My Kimberley Uber
Kulkarriya PS
Kulkarriya PS
Kulkarriya PS
With Brenton McKenna at Magabala Books
Brobot v13.0, Beaufort St Bookshop
A zombie frog, Kapinara PS
Robot designs, Kapinara PS
Kapinara PS
Gifts from Kapinara kids
Red Dog, Dampier
Kuala Lumpur
COMEL Lit Festival, KL

Thanks to the following schools, libraries, bookshops and festivals for inviting me to visit:

Dardanup PS; St Mary’s, Bunbury; BHP Billiton Family Day; St Damien’s Catholic PS, Dawesville; Marmion PS; Goollelal PS; Southern River College; Beaufort Street Books; Trinity College; South Perth & Manning Libraries; CBCA WA; Tuart Forest PS, Dalyellup; Warnbro and Mary Davies Libraries; Willetton Library; Cambridge Library; Kalamunda PS; South Lake PS; City of Perth Library; Palmyra PS; City of South Perth; Derby Library; Derby District; Holy Rosary School; Looma School; Bayulu School; Kulkarriya School; Kimberley School of the Air; Magabala Books; Aubin Grove PS; Kapinara PS; Rockingham Writers’ Centre; Dampier PS; Children of Malaysia Engage in Literature (COMEL) Festival, Kuala Lumpur; Murray Library, Pinjarra; Fellowship of Australian Writers WA & Fremantle Library.

My new book ‘Brobot’ is out now

img_8485It’s finally here! My new book Brobot is now available in bookshops.

Brobot is about a young inventor called Sally Tinker. She gets sick of her baby brother Joe, so she builds a new one, called Brobot.

Here’s some more info on the characters …

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And here, for your viewing pleasure, is the Brobot book trailer! I had heaps of fun playing with a program called Adobe Character Animator to bring Sally to life.

Brobot-3d-final-400pxBuy ‘Brobot’ now

 

 

 

Events for September, October & November

It’s my busy time of the year. Between August and October I’m visiting lots of schools and libraries for private events, but I’m also running some public talks and workshops – including a public launch for my new book Brobot on October 7th as part of the Awesome Festival.

See below for all the details.

Sept 3 – children’s book illustration workshop (for adults)

'The Last Viking' (2011), A New Believer?

A 3 hour workshop for the City of South Perth’s 2016 Evolve development program.

WHEN: Saturday September 3, 10am-1pm.
WHERE: Halo Espresso, 82 Angelo St, South Perth.
COST: $30 + booking fee.
BOOKINGS: essential. Click here for bookings.

 

Continue reading “Events for September, October & November”

Win a copy of my new book, Brobot

It’s almost here!

My new book is called Brobot. It’s a graphic novel for younger readers and it’s coming out with Fremantle Press on September 1st.

Sally Tinker makes machines … and Joe Tinker breaks them. As the world’s foremost inventor under the age of twelve, Sally knows she can build a better brother than Joe. But is her invention – Brobot – really all that a brother should be?

Brobot-3d-final-400px

Want a cheeky sneak-peek? Click here to read the first 16 pages for free.

Want to use the book in the classroom? Teacher notes are available now.

Want to order a copy? Ask at your local bookshop. If you don’t have one near you, Booktopia is taking pre-orders.

Win a copy of Brobot for you and your school

Fremantle Press is offering five lucky schools the chance to win two special Brobot gift packs: one for the classroom and one for the person who designs the best robot. Each gift pack features a poster and bookmark plus a signed copy of Brobot the book!

Want to enter? Visit the Fremantle Press website for entry information.

Entries close October 15th, 2016. Good luck!

Teacher resources for My Dead Bunny

Children’s Book Week is coming up fast: this year it’s August 22nd – 26th.

My latest book My Dead Bunny is shortlisted in the 2016 Children’s Book Council of Australia Awards, in the Picture Book of the Year category.

A lot of older students will balk at the mention of picture books because those are just for babies.

But this book is different.

While it is technically a picture book, it’s definitely not a bedtime story for little ones – it’s for older readers, 8-ish and up (teenagers and adults especially seem to love this one.)

Older kids take one look at this book and know it’s not for babies, so they don’t feel like they’re being talked down to. It’s a great book for looking at rhyming texts, visual narrative/visual literacy and generic conventions. Plus it has zombies in it. Kids love zombies.

In preparation for Children’s Book Week, Walker Books and I have put together some free teacher notes for My Dead Bunny.The notes include heaps of discussion points and activity ideas, with links to relevant behind-the-scenes posts from my blog. It should all make studying the book in class super easy.

Download ‘My Dead Bunny’ Teacher Notes (pdf)

Behind-the-Scenes blog posts

My blog has heaps of posts about the making of the book; each post is tagged with ‘My Dead Bunny’.

View Behind-the-Scenes blog posts

Craft Activity – make your own zombie rabbit softie

Shannon at OhCreativeDay.com has put together this brilliant tutorial on how to create your own zombie rabbit softie.

Blackline Masters

Here’s some fun activities for early finishers – two word searches and two colouring-in sheets. Feel free to download these for use in your classroom.

– My Dead Bunny word search –
Download word search (pdf)
Download solution (pdf)

My-Dead-Bunny-word-search-600px– Zombie vocab word search –
Download word search (pdf)
Download solution (pdf)

My-Dead-Bunny-zombie-vocab-word-search-600px– Mindlessness colouring sheet #1 –
Download now (pdf)

MDB-mindlessness-colouring-1-600px– Mindlessness colouring sheet #2 –
Download now (pdf)

MDB-mindlessness-colouring-2-600px

If you choose to use the book in class, I’d love to hear about how you use it! Please leave a comment below, or send me photos of displays/student work via james(AT)jamesfoley.com.au   [replace the (AT) with an @].

MDB_cover-400pxBuy ‘My Dead Bunny’ now

Booktopia (Australia)
Readings (Australia)
Angus & Robertson (Australia)
Book Depository (UK)

How I use texture in illustrations (plus 4 free texture sites)

Today I’m going to show you how I used photographic textures in the illustrations of My Dead Bunny.

Photographic textures are great for whenever you need a realistic-looking texture, or when it’s going to be too hard ot time-consuming to draw a texture by hand.

I’ve used photographic textures in all my books so far, but only sparingly.  The creepy, cinematic style of Dead Bunny called for the use of lots and lots of textures, and it was heaps of fun to let loose.

Example 1: title page

Here’s a little excerpt from the title page illustration. It uses the three three texture samples you see below it.

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Continue reading “How I use texture in illustrations (plus 4 free texture sites)”