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The Blog of Lynn Adams

This is the blog of Lynn Adams - I'm an artist, an illustrator, a doodler and a scribbler and occasionally some of it will make sense.

Saturday 30 March 2013

WIN WIN WIN!!!

I love to give away my art work - with the current economic climate it's not possible for a lot of people to spend money on non-essentials like paintings but that seems so unfair so every few weeks I give away a little painting - it's open to anyone and everyone - there are no silly questions to answer - all you have to do is to do a simple 'like' 'share' and 'comment' in return i get a bit of publicity for my page and you could win a cute piece of original artwork. I've tied the painting in with the current festivities so it has a bunny and an egg - I think the poor bunny is a little confused!!
Now just go to my page, 'like' my page and comment on the rabbit picture on there - then on Bank Holiday Monday at 10pm I will use a randomiser to select a winner - if you don't have Facebook then don't despair just comment under this post and it will count just the same - or even do both and double your chances!!!

Friday 29 March 2013

Love and Other Chairs

Spent a few hours on a film set today - YSP Media's film Love and Other Chairs - Number 2 son (Karl) was Director of Photography so I get to go along and watch - I take along a sketch book and seem to get loads of work done - whether it's because I'm surrounded by so many creative people but I can concentrate better even though I'm being nosey and observing what is going on around me. YSP shoots are always fun and pretty relaxed which I think is what gets them the excellent results. So I thought I'd share with you one of the drawings I did - not sure what part of my brain it came from - it just started with an eye shape and grew - I had no idea what I was doing until fairly near the end - I love drawing in this way because there are no preconceptions of what it should be - it is whatever it becomes so is as much of surprise to me as it is to anyone else.

I did a couple of sketches for Amelia and the Mental Elf as well but you will have to wait to see them!!

Thursday 28 March 2013

Easter Bunnies

Today I painted a cute bunny picture to make us all feel more Spring-like despite the cold, ice and snow!! I have managed at last to get some of my work on Etsy - what a palaver!! - just hope it's worth it and someone is tempted to spend some money. With Easter now fast approaching it might be a good time to get yourselves to My Shop and grab a last minute alternative to Easter Eggs - These paintings are guaranteed not to make you fat and not to give you spots - what more could you ask for ;)

Wednesday 27 March 2013

Juggling Time

Working from home is never easy when you have a family - as the mother of 7 boys (only 5 left at home now though) I've spent the majority of my life learning to juggle. With the Easter holiday fast approaching and the prospect of a house full of kids for 2 very long weeks I know that I will be fighting for the peace to paint and draw. I could take a 2 week holiday and not touch a paintbrush for a fortnight but  I think that might just be a little counter productive, as I need to be creating something to be totally happy so I will aim to grab the peace where I can and work on things that are easy to stop and start. I will indulge my latest passion for cake baking (and cake eating) with the help of my littlest apprentice and we can decorate fairy cakes with sheep faces.

Next week my plans include making a start on getting my sheep book ready for submission to some publishers, working on Amelia and the Mental Elf and making a start on some dog portrait commissions. These plans could be totally different when the reality hits of having the bratlings around 24/7 but the intentions are good!!



Monday 25 March 2013

Plans

Over the last few weeks I've been hatching various hare-brained plans to try to avoid going back to teaching to earn a living. This is partly because of my hatred and fear of going back into the classroom - now don't get me wrong - I loved teaching the kids - it is one of the most satisfying jobs in the world but it's all the other crap you have to put up with - the backstabbing in the staff room - the horrendous amounts of bureaucracy and needless paperwork and to top it all, being blamed for all the ills of society. Plus I want to paint pictures for a living - is that so very wrong! - I'm not expecting to earn a fortune at it, just enough to keep me and the kids relatively well fed and happy.

Book illustration isn't going to make me any money anytime soon but it's number one on my list of what I want to do with my life so I'm happy to be patient with that (despite last week's major melt-down). I can make money from doing pet portraits - to me, that is my bread and butter work but it's not always reliable - I need to do at least 2 a week but with the state of the economy unfortunately means they don't come along that often - so now to the hare-brained schemes - I've worked out that if I do a wide variety of things then it will appeal to a wide range of customers so I'm now offering for sale Pet Caricatures (a cheaper alternative to the pet portrait) - Greetings Cards - made to order for whatever the occasion and lots of cute little paintings of whatever I fancy at the time - so I have set up my Etsy Shop in preparation and trying to build up the number of 'Likers' on Facebook

   I am desperately looking for future hare-brained schemes to make a bit of money to fund my illustration 'addiction' so please feel free to make suggestions (honest ones) either on here or my Facebook page.

Sunday 24 March 2013

Sheep Doodles







Some sketches I've done while pondering my sheep book - creating characters helps me to think and clears the mind of other clutter :)

Illustration Today

I spend many many many hours surfing the net looking at other illustrators work - I am often left feeling so depressed when I see illustrators like Gerald Kelley David Melling and most of all Jean-Baptiste Monge (my absolute hero) - their work is just so beautiful to look at and is what has inspired me to illustrate. Each one of these artists has talent and a skill to draw that is way above my own ability and probably always will be. But the value of looking at the work of artists that inspire you is that you will work harder to be as good as they are and even if it's an unreachable goal it's got to be worth trying. I feel bad for not adding other artists to the list now because I'm inspired by so many so i'll just add a few more

Chris Riddell
Korky Paul
Paul Kidby

Please have a look at their work and hopefully you will feel inspired too or at least they will make you smile :)

Amelia and the Mental Elf

Amelia and the Mental Elf is an illustrated novel written by Film Maker Si Wall - When he asked me to illustrate the book I don't think I've ever been so excited - I get to paint all the things I love painting most in the world and it's such a beautifully written book it makes my job so much easier - Although I'd love to show you some of the illustrations I'm not allowed just yet but I'll show you just one bit but you aren't to tell anybody what I've showed you - it can be our little secret ;)

Hopefully you are now itching to know what it's all about - well you will just have to wait and see - the book is with the editor and there are still illustrations that have yet to make it onto the paper but are whirling around my head - but I will say.....you won't be disappointed when the book hits the shelves!!

Red Nosed Animals

For those of you that don't know I raised a grand total of £575 for Comic Relief painting  Red Nosed Animals - a total of 78 paintings ordered in 2 weeks (still got the last few to finish but they are on the way folks) - I even ended up on the BBC news and on radio nottingham - I definitely have more of a face for radio than TV but it was a great experience and look forward to the next one in 2 years time!!


Bring Cute Things to Life

Oh whilst I remember I'm offering money off pet portrait commissions too - doing the pet portraits earns me money to allow me to indulge in my addiction - drawing cute things! - without the pet portraits then many cute things will never be created - can you live with that on your conscience! - plus you get a very nice painting - which I know you will love because if you don't then you don't even have to buy it :)


Facebook giveaway

This week's competition on my Facebook page Lynn Adams Illustration is to win one of my paintings - it's so simple to enter you just have to like and share the painting (and don't forget to like my page because this is the whole point of running a competition) I'm going draw out a random name tonight to receive the painting so hurry and enter before time runs out!

Not Just Sheep

I realised that anybody reading this may now think that my blog will be just sheep so I just want to reassure everyone that there will be a variety of other creature - both real and imaginary.


So now we have cows as well - notice how the variety is slowly building up but I realise there is still something missing - COLOUR! - a few may now be wondering if colour is an option in this strange woman's work - well here is a quick example to show that I can paint in full colour too :)

 I realise that with each post I add it throws up more and more questions about what I can and can't do - and to answer the next question i'll just say "yes I can do different shapes other than long short rectangles.....
I can do tall thin ones too!!

A pile of sheep

I decided to start this Blog with a pile of sheep - I love to draw sheep so sheep in this quantity should be 9 times as much fun.

I am planning a new children's book featuring sheep so they will pop up on quite a regular basis throughout this blog. I have a couple of reasons for starting a blog - Number 1 - apparently Art Directors from publishers love blogs and will ofter select illustrators based on their blog and as I'm desperate to scrape a living from drawing sheep and other stuff then thought I would try this out - Number 2 - hopefully other illustrators might read this and offer me tips on how to get published and these tips might also be useful for other illustrators so we end up with a mutual tip sharing experience and Number 3 (I know I said a couple but you will soon learn that I tend to ramble on a bit) - I like to ramble on a bit and hopefully occasionally it might be a bit amusing to whoever is reading it.