Join us for one or both of our virtual workshops, geared especially toward illustrators! In the first session, Mirka Hokkanen will help you take your character designs from bland and stiff to charming and energetic, using the personality of your character to guide its design and give it energy and using shapes to explore character design--plus five tips on how to draw characters consistently. In the second session, borrowing techniques from cinema, Stan Yan will show you how a graphic novelist approaches sequential storytelling, from writing, to storyboarding, to process for comic strips, picture books, graphic novels and more. Choose one session or register for both! These sessions will be recorded and available to registered attendees for 30 days.
Sessions
Drab to Delightful: Craft Engaging Characters for Picture Books (12:00-1:00 PM MDT)
Are you feeling stuck with designing characters for picture books? Have you gotten feedback that your characters are stiff or not drawn consistently? Mirka Hokkanen will help you take your character designs from bland and stiff to charming and energetic. You’ll learn how to use the personality of your character to guide its design and give it energy, how to use shapes to explore character design and five tips on how to draw characters consistently. ❖ Mirka Hokkanen is is an award winning neurodivergent Finnish-American author-illustrator who likes quirky animal characters and humorous stories. She began her career as a fine art printmaker before transitioning to book illustration. Mirka is the illustrator for several books, and the author-illustrator for the graphic novel series Mossy and Tweed (Holiday House), the picture book series Kitty and Cat (Candlewick), and the non-fiction picture book series Little Seasons (OddDot). Mirka currently lives by Washington DC in Maryland, but has lived all around the world as a military spouse. She loves to knit, sew and explore the outdoors with her three kids.
Panel to Panel (1:15-2:15 PM MDT)
How much or how little do you need to draw on each panel? What do you draw next? How much text? Borrowing techniques from cinema, Stan Yan will show you how a graphic novelist approaches sequential storytelling, from writing, to storyboarding, to process for comic strips, picture books, graphic novels and more. ❖ Stan is an award-winning, first generation American-born-Chinese, Denver-based writer, illustrator, caricature artist and instructor. He is currently the co-Regional Advisor for the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (RMC-SCBWI), a professor at the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design, and co-founder of the Cuddlefish Academy kidlit art school. His late middle-grade graphic novel, THE MANY MISFORTUNES OF EUGENIA WANG is being published by Atheneum (S&S), scheduled for Fall '25. His work was the grand prize recipient of the 2022 SCBWI-FL Conference Portfolio Excellence Award.