Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Big Kids Creating Kids Books at Camp Creative


 Multi-award winning illustrator and cartoonist and our old mate Jules Faber is running a children's writing and illustrating course in Bellingen, NSW, Australia in January 2015.

What do you need to know about the course?

Well, in working as a cartoonist and illustrator for over 20 years, Jules has figured out the right way to approach a children’s book from an illustrator / author’s perspective. Many people believe it is easy to write a children’s book but the complexity of children's publishing is deceptive. Some authors claim it’s actually more difficult than creating adult fiction

Jules will give you lots of tips and examine:
  • What the different aspects of writing and creating a story are about
  • How to make the story age-appropriate, and 
  • How to lay it out into illustrated form. 

Utilising his personally formulated nine rules and guidelines, he will demonstrate how you can apply these to creating the right artwork to accompany your story from rough ideas through to finished art.

Participants will complete enjoyable small projects, and work towards creating an illustrated children’s story by the end of the week, thereby gaining an insight into the world of children’s writing and illustrating.

What do you need to know about Jules?

Jules has been working in book illustration for over 20 years, having completed work on many grown-up books and 10 children’s books for well-known authors like comedian Anh Do and cricketer David Warner. Jules is a multi-award-winning children’s book illustrator and cartoonist. He won the 2014 Book of the Year for Older Children at the Australian Book Industry Awards with Weirdo alongside author Anh Do, as well as the 2014 Best Designed Fiction Book for Children and the Best Cover at the Australian Book Design Awards with designer Nic Stofberg. His versatility as an artist means he has worked in a variety of different fields including live caricature, editorial cartooning, editing an award-winning comic book series and animating on a Disney program. From 2002-2004 he taught Comic Book Illustration and Scriptwriting and Storyboarding for TAFE Qld, and in 2005 he began a full-colour series of comics entitled Golgotha, which he re-imagined in 2014 in classic black and white. He has served three terms as the President of The Australian Cartoonists Association, the world’s oldest cartoonists organisation, and has won three Rotary Cartoon Awards, Australia’s biggest International cartooning competition.

HURRY! Bookings close on 20 November 2014!

When: January 2015 (dates and times TBA)
Course Length: One week
Where: Bellingen HIgh School
Level: Everyone
Age: 16+
Cost: Adults $370; Under 18 $210





Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Presenting Comics Masterclass at the Australian Cartoonists' Association Stanley Awards and Conference


Black Mermaid Productions’ (BMP) partner and comic book writer Julie Ditrich will be presenting an information session on the new Comics Masterclass arm of BMP at the upcoming Australian Cartoonists’ Association (ACA) Stanley Awards and Conference in mid November. Julie will talk about this new professional development service that provides comics script and sequential art assessments, short courses and training for the next generation of Australian comics creators. Comics Masterclass team members Julie Regan will discuss the benefits of Creativity Coaching, and Lyndall Briggs will addresses creatives who are struggling with inner life issues such as anxiety and depression that may be hampering their success.
The event features an extraordinary line up of cartooning and comics talent including Nicola Scott, Pat Grant, Madeleine Rosca, Bernard Caleo, Steve Panozzo, Peter Lewis, Mark Knight, Nigel Buchanan, Jon Sommariva, David Rower, Sarah Catherine First, Warren Brown, Mike Bowers, David Pope and many others.
The Conference will be followed by the Stanley Awards on the Saturday night.
Here are the details:
Dates: Friday 14 and Saturday 15 November 2014
Venue: Menzies Hotel, 14 Carrington St, Sydney NSW 2000 Australia
Cost: $75 per day (members); $90 per day (non-members)
For more information and registration: https://cartoonists.org.au/stanleys-registration/
PS Julie is super excited and honoured to have had her first ever caricature, which was created by the amazing Christopher Downes. See if you can spot it in the poster at the top.