The finalists for the Lila Rogers Global Talent Search were announced yesterday. 50 were chosen from 1500+ submissions. (yowsers!) Unfortunately, I did not make the final cut. However, I was pleased that so many of my fellow MATS classmates did. (More than half I think!) Way to go you talented gals (& guy)!

I wanted to share my process and my entry in hopes to get some feedback. As you can see... where I started and where I ended are very different. This tends to happen and I feel now (as I have in the past) that something gets lost when I do my "finals."

I had a blast with my initial sketching for the assignment. (Which was a 5x7 journal, for Paperchase (a fun & fab UK paper goods company) with the theme: vintage playground.) Phase 1 shows my favorite developed sketches of the bunch.

Then I started tightening up once of the sketches & added color: (phase 2).

I loved the dynamic composition but wasnt sure about such a large character being front and center, and you couldnt see the playground images. I also know her hair & eyes needed work! So... I revisited some of my phase 1 ideas.

Somehow I got very into the vintage metal playground spring animals & in one of those happy and delirious post midnight art-making moments, I created the art in phase 3. (In hindsight, perhaps I should have taken a chance and explored my new loose "smooshy texture + line drawing" style further and sent my final in this method.) It was done with printmaking, collage & hand drawing.

However, instead I did a bunch of drawings inspired by this above piece, and ended up with my final design submission: phase 4, shown below. I really focused on color, composition and character development. I wanted to make sure it read well small and kept your eye interested.

I was initially confident in my submission however, soon after I began to have my doubts. I could have pushed the coloring further. I could have perhaps cleaned up the subtle details. (i.e. eggs in the design for the rooster saddle, clouds for the toucan, carrots for the rabbit etc.) After a disappointing morning yesterday, I reread the post regarding the chosen few. It seemed very logical that one of the main factors for the narrowing down to the 50 was "a strong, evolved style." I can freely admit that I am still trying to develop & find my own unique illustration style. While it is evolv-ING it is not yet evolv-ED, And, as I have been doing graphic design and art direction for 15+ years it is only recently that I am delving deep into the world of illustration, surface pattern design and art licensing.

And now with a good night sleep behind me - I find I am actually quite happy to be freed up to make some new art and take all the things I have learned in the past few months and put them into play. And so with this... I will more forward and draw some more. I will make more art. More prints. More projects. And joyfully still run my design business. And I will eagerly await October and Part B of MATS.

And on a final note... in a non related email that also got yesterday morning (from my local hair salon which I love btw...) this quote was randomly mentioned. It was very apropos for the day and I'm pretty sure I have never quoted a president before! :)

"I will prepare and some day my chance will come." – Abraham Lincoln

I welcome any feedback & comments whether here below, or via email.

Oh and thank you for reading my longest blog post ever. :)