Portfolio Rebuild Part 2 - Girl meets Boy meets Fish

When I draw or paint, I try to invoke parts of my life to fuel the painting. It makes it less boring for me to paint ideas of people I know.

The inspiration for the kids in the painting are Penny and Mark (my sister, who is Chinese, and my brother-in-law who was born in the UK) I like the idea of East meets West, and the girl is like... Let me show you my world!!! There's lots of opposites going on too. Girl and Boy, Country person and city person, East and West, and uh... Fish and Frog? Hehe, that probably doesn't count.

And a closeup in case you are interested:

I Was So Angry With Myself ! ! !

because I settled. I was overwhelmed at thinking that I had to rebuild my portfolio from scratch so I only put half a heart into my first piece.

After I wrote the words, "I think this is the limit of my skill level at this point in time." in the last blog post, I soon got  angry with myself. How could I expect so little of myself, and how will I expect anyone to want to pay me to draw and paint if all I could give was something half-assed? (I mean, look at the wildflowers I painted last blog. Those are clearly half-assed!!!) I couldn't sleep afterwards. I need to shoot for something higher than my current comfort level. I am not good where I currently am. I need to strive. I hope this re-painted version shows that. I will try harder from now on; I owe my readers and future employers/clients the best I can deliver. I can sleep better if I know I did my best.

a zoomed in view...

It's now 3:00 in the morning and I still have to get my Illustration Friday piece for tomorrow! I will try to post something late tomorrow night. For now I shall crawl into bed and collapse.

Tiffanny

Portfolio Rebuild Part 1

 LATEST UPDATE-----
OK I think this is the last update unless someone has anything glaring to critique I added the dark rocks on the lower left to solidify the composition, but kept it far enough away so there's room for text. Thanks for the suggestion, Matthew! I think this is the limit of my skill level at this point in time.  Please stay tuned for part 2 of my portfolio rebuild!! (I'm hoping to get 10 pieces by december 31st, then I'll be ready to beg some publishers to work with me) :) Thanks all for the help! If you have ANYTHING more to say, please critique. I may not post it up here, but I will still consider any suggestions. If anything, it will give me things to look out for in the future.

*OLD POST--------------------
 UPDATE!! Adding more darks (darker rocks) really helps! It feels more finished. I added more horse rump form, added an eye sparkle, and added the saturation back in. Does this look ok? Thanks again from the bottom of my heart for the helpful suggestions.

*OLD POST BELOW-------
I'm rebuilding my children's book portfolio from the ground up this year. My portfolio last year lacked finesse and focus, and so, taking some constructive criticism from some people from the children's book illustration meetings, I've decided to completely redo my portfolio. Anyway, this is my first try since going to the meetings. Tell me, can you see this image in a children's book? What would you do to improve it?

and here's a bit of detail:

I'm really looking forward to hearing some constructive criticism.

With the few critiques I just got, thought I would try some quick changes to see how things read. Wow, flipping the image looks weird to me. Possibly because I'm so used to seeing it the way I had it originally. Does this look weird to you too? Also, I applied an auto-levels to the image. I worried before that the saturation makes it hard on the eyes, which is why i toned it down in photoshop. I have one of those stupid monitors that changes the value depending on the angle you're looking at it, So I'm never quite sure what you out there are seeing.

Thanks in advance,
Tiffanny