It should have something to do with children’s book illustrations, or illustrators or drawing or painting or simply communicating to younger readers with your art.

Aline H Rhonie learned mural painting from Diego Rivera. She painted the large aviation-themed fresco mural in Hangar F at Roosevelt Field.
By it, I do mean — your epiphany.
What epiphany, you ask.
The epiphany that you’re going to write and tell me about in your essay.
What essay? I can almost hear you.
Your essay for the contest to win illustrator Will Terry’s eight video course, Children’s Book Illustration.
Tell us that aha insight you had, or were keen enough to see when someone showed it to you or you saw, heard or read somewhere.
Keep it under 400 words and e-mail it to me at Mark@HowToBeAChildrensBook Illustrator.com
Or leave a comment here on the blog.
[contact-form] [contact-field label=”Name” type=”name” required=”true” /] [contact-field label=”Email” type=”email” required=”true” /] [contact-field label=”Website” type=”url” /] [contact-field label=”Comment” type=”textarea” required=”true” /] [/contact-form]
Or, if you prefer, use the form above. If you don’t want to enter the contest, use the form to express where you think children’s publishing is going, or what you’d like to see in the way of informal online training for visual artists. Your comments will get you a soapbox here.
But they won’t get you the prize. The prize will go to the writer of the best short essay about his or her aha moment or uniquely personal learning experience pertaining to drawing, painting, or children’s book illustration.
No, your epiphany does not have to be a result of my lessons. As much as I’d appreciate the references, your essay probably will be scored higher if it’s on your own inspiration or problem solution.
Many good essays already have been turned in since the launch of the contest a few weeks ago. You can enter more than one, by the way. But I want to make this an open competition. Open to everyone — not just those caring, responsible souls who always get their homework in early.
There’s a real deadline, though. It’s this Wednesday (April 6.) The winner will be announced here Friday (April 8.)
All submitted essays will be published at some point — along with attributions and links to sites and/or blogs, contributors willing.
Thank you to all of you who have taken pen in hand and submitted fun pieces. Good luck to everyone who’s been or will be daring enough to try.
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WordPress for Artists workshop
You’ve probably already heard from me, or others how awesome it was.
If you haven’t received an e-mail with the link to the recording yet, you can get that e-mail by signing up for the replay here. Web developer and animator Erik Kuntz of Square Bear Studio brilliantly walked us through how to install great looking and elegantly functioning picture thumbnail galleries on our WordPress blogs.
If you’ve ever wondered how to get your portfolio up and looking smart online, here’s a great way to do it with some free WordPress plug-ins.
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Houston SCBWI Conference set for this Saturday
Get your details and registration form here. Editors from Disney Hyperion and Scholastic and an art director from Simon and Schuster will present there, along with author-illustrator Ruth McNally Barshaw. Simon and Schuster art director Laurent Linn will do a 90-minute breakout session with illustrators and portfolio reviews.
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When was the last time you really doodled?
See the amazing Sunni Brown of the “Doodle Revolution” in the video made of a presentation she gave at Duarte Design. It’s up on my blog, Illustration Course and you really don’t want to miss her or her ideas.