June 6th, 2013
Dream Boats is the beautiful new children’s book illustrated by Kirsti Anne Wakelin and written by Dan Bar-el. I’ve been following the progress of the development of this book for the last few years, and can hardly wait to get my hands on a copy. The illustrations are lush, finely detailed, and filled with imagery to stimulate the imagination.
Take a look for yourself, and I’m sure you’ll agree.
A description of Dream Boats from the Simply Read web site:
Where do children go when they close their eyes to sleep?
They step onto their dreamboats and sail toward adventure.
From Maiqui in the Andes floating through the constellations, to Aljuu paddling along the shores of Haida Gwaii with Eagle, Orca and Black Bear, to Ivan sailing into St. Petersburg, then sneaking between the bony legs of Baba Yaga, stories and memories lead them on.
Dream Boats takes readers into the dreams of children around the world, dreams that are filled with family and legends, culture and love.
There are so many lovely details to this book. From the end pages filled with instructions on how to fold your own paper boat, to the flying fish swooping off the credits page, and the beautifully designed barcode on the back of the book.
Dream Boats has its official launch next Thursday June 13th at Christianne’s Lyceum of Literature & Art in Vancouver. Dan and Kirsti will be in attendance, and copies of the books will be available for purchase.
All photos courtesy of Kirsti Wakelin
June 4th, 2013
One thing I’ve been wondering lately is whether or not an artist still needs to maintain a print version of their portfolio or does digital suffice. I have no idea what the right answer to this is, but I decided it couldn’t hurt to have something in print. Rather than doing this photographically and inserting the prints into a a traditional (but boring) black portfolio case with plastic sleeves, I decided to make a digitally printed photo book.
I chose Snapfish because it came recommended by my friend Valerie Arntzen. She uses the service to print books on an annual basis to keep a record of the work she’s created over the course of each year.
Snapfish has a good variety of formats and sizes for their photo books. I chose the 5″ x 7″ Everyday Book, which costs $12.99 per copy and comes with a paper cover in your choice of colour. The book layout is created by using a browser-based interface, which takes a bit of experimenting with to get a feel for, but is fairly easy to use.
A big reason I chose Snapfish over other photo book services is because they have a Canadian website and reasonable prices for shipping to Canada. I had my books within a week of ordering, and the shipping cost $10. I’ve used Blurb Books in the past and their shipping costs were higher and the order took longer to arrive.
The print quality is excellent, and the work looks good and reads well despite the small size of the pages. I’m very happy with these little books and will definitely use Snapfish again to make more printed collections of my work.
May 30th, 2013
A few photos from a lovely long weekend on Bowen a week and a half ago. It was a good time for bird watching, as you can see from some of the photos.
There were two Anna’s Hummingbirds constantly visiting the feeder. The view of them was excellent since it’s located just outside the window beside the kitchen table. They are amazing little birds.
The Canada Geese had taken over the Lagoon with their horde of goslings. There were at least thirty of them in one group, watched over by multiple parents. Gosling daycare I suppose.
Bowen Island a place where there are lovely things to see, rain or shine.
