The School Magazine and you

We all want to reach young readers, don’t we? Well, did you know that THE SCHOOL MAGAZINE is always looking for new texts to engage and inspire young readers between the ages of 8 and 12?

THE SCHOOL MAGAZINE, Australia’s iconic literary magazine for children, has always accepted unsolicited manuscripts. Submissions are assessed purely on their merits, so emerging writers and established authors alike are welcome to send in their work.

So what types of texts does THE SCHOOL MAGAZINE want? The short answer is: whatever children love to read.

Writers:

Young readers love suspense, action, comedy, twists, science fiction, fantasy and credible characters. They love original and fresh texts that are written just for them.

• short stories—particularly for the younger readers—with a word length of 300-800 words

• plays—easy-to-stage with a maximum of 1500 words

• articles—dynamic, interesting and soundly researched. Again, keep these short.

• Familiarise yourself with the magazine. Visit their website to view lots of writing examples.

• Remember that young readers are part of a multicultural, diverse and inclusive society and the magazine aims to reflect this.

• Avoid being overly didactic and message-driven.

• Remember that The School Magazine is part of the Department of Education so carefully consider the portrayal of teachers, schools and controversial topics.

 Submitting is easy! Go to their contribute page to upload your text. Authors retain copyright of their material. A recent policy change has seen an increase to the payments writers receive which are now paid on publication. 

Illustrators:

THE SCHOOL MAGAZINE rarely opens their eligibility list. This usually happens mid-year but it pays to check their page for illustrators from time to time.

The magazine DOES accept one-panel cartoon submissions at any time.

They also accept short graphic texts such as re-tellings of traditional tales.

Each year, the magazine calls for comic serials - usually in June. Read the guidelines and perhaps start creating one now so that you’ll be ready to submit in 2022!

Photoshop Tips By Liz Anelli

My illustration work relies heavily on drawing and I have found over the years that I can lose line quality and vivacity if I try to recreate a drawing ‘in best’.

So nowadays I mostly now use the original drawings. But these usually need to be tinkered with.

Photoshop is like driving a car. There’s loads of stuff under the bonnet and I don’t even know what most of it called - but that doesn’t matter because all I want to do is go for a drive. There are also many different ways of driving – and possibly all of them are correct.

Here is one way of removing background from a drawing so that you can use it as the line layer for your artwork.

1. Scan in Greyscale.

2. I always duplicate that layer – so if I mess it up I still have the original.

3. Then from top menu bar select: Image > Adjustment > Levels

4. Use the eye droppers to decide on values for the whitest (the ‘white point’ = far right dropper) and the blackest (the ‘black point’ = left dropper) areas – so that you have plenty of contrast. It’s worth experimenting with this stage to get more or less graininess and texture.

5. Select the whole image and make it a channel.

6. Then Invert the image in this new channel (command + i).

7. Load the selection (the little circle at the bottom of the channel box).

8. Go to your Layers > open a NEW layer > Edit > Fill that layer in black… and Ta Dah … you have your drawing in black line all by itself, complete with all the lovely texture of your pencil drawing/print/collage.

9. It’s a good idea to rename that layer ‘Line’…

10. …and to add another layer underneath called ‘white’ that is filled with white. This makes it much easier to see what you’re doing as you work on the line layer.

11. Locking the line layer means you can colour just the line using the brush tool. The rest is really transparent … it only looks white here because of that White layer underneath.

12. I bring in scanned in collage/ paint or use the photoshop colours underneath the line layer.

13. You can have as many line layers as you like… bringing it separate bits of drawing.

14. Just remember to lock the layer if you want to colour ONLY the line

How To Draw Your Characters Head From Every Angle

Illustrator Tips from Nina Rycroft

Before and after 

I've been teaching character design and children's picture book illustration for a while now, and the thing that I see students struggle with the most is knowing how do you draw the same character from many different angles. 

Below I'll share some before and after character studies from some of my students. the before, I'll share some common issues that anyone new to character design experiences, I then walk you through some of the techniques that the students applied to their characters. And then I'll show you the after... the exciting results that these simple exercises produce.

Why do we need to be able to draw the head from every angle?

In a children’s picture book, the characters walk the reader through the story. As they move through the different scenes, you’ll need to be able to draw your character/s from every which way. The best way to understand what your character looks like from multiple angles is knowing what they look like from BOTH the front view and the side view.

Case study

Nichole Wade: took part in my 8-week Picture Book Illustration e-Course in 2017. Nichole then went on to showcase her illustration portfolio at the SCBWI winter conference in New York in 2019 and is currently working on her very first picture book for Little Pink Dogs Books.

Below is Nichole's front and back cover sketch for (the PBIC course manuscript), 'Florence Fox Goes to School' written by Ben Whittaker-Cook. Nichole in a natural, but illustrating the same character from every-which-way was new to her. She had no issues drawing Florence Fox from the front view.

But when it came to drawing Florence Fox from the side view, she really struggled. You can see the issues Nichole had around the jaw, chin and ears. Another common issue is not drawing the back of the skull big enough.

Nichole, who was determined to nail this by taking my Skillshare class 'How to Draw the Head from Every Angle' - a three-part series. Nichole downloaded the worksheet from How to Draw the Head from Every Angle: Part Three. 

Nichole drew the front-view of her Florence Fox's head in the centre and then drew the side-view of her Florence Fox head in the space far-left and far-right. She then filled the gaps, drawing her Florence Fox's head on the x-y and z-axis... and everything in between! 

Nichole used this worksheet as a guide while she worked through her storyboards for 'Florence Fox Goes To School'. Below, you can see by doing the process, Nichole was able to draw her Florence Fox character from every which way, bringing her Florence Fox character to life.

How do you draw your character's profile using the front view as a guide?

Below, I'll show you step-by-step how to draw the profile of a character using the front view sketch. Your character will obviously look very different from mine, so use these steps as a guide. 

Step One: Draw a circle with the diameter reaching from the top of the skull to the position of the mouth. Divide the circle into quarters. 
- Draw a soft-angled line from the frontal plane to the tip of the chin.
- Inside the main circle, draw a circle guide, half-the-size of the main circle.

Step Two: Draw guidelines marking...
- the top of the hair
- the eyebrows
- the top and bottom of the eyes
- the top and bottom of the ears
- the tip of the nose
- the mouth and
- the chin 

Step Three: Draw an oval to mark the position of the nose (on the outer-frontal plane). The ear needs to sit on or behind the centre line (never in front). Draw the jaw, from the tip of the chin to the base of the ear.

Step Four: Use the guidelines to find the points for the forehead, nose, mouth and chin. Draw the facial features along the frontal plane. Note that the bridge of the nose slides in to touch the frontal plane, then pushes out at the point of the eyebrow. 
- Draw an oval to define the chin area.  
- Draw the neck as a soft curved line from the base of the ear at the back of the skull.
- Use the guidelines to find the top and the bottom of the eye. The eye may even sit back enough to touch the inner circle. 
- Draw the arch of the eyebrow. 

Step Five: Draw the hair and other features.

Step Six: Once you have completed your working drawing, trace over the top in pencil. 

And voilà! You now have a reference for what your character's head looks like, not just from the front view, but also their profile.

Try drawing your character head on the x,y and z-axis

Once you have drawn the front view and the side views of your characters head. try drawing your characters head on the X, Y and Z-axis. 

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Nina Rycroft

Nina Rycroft has been illustrating picture books since her first picture book was awarded the CBCA (Children’s Book Council of Australia) Notable Book in 2000. Since then, she’s had more than a dozen picture books published worldwide, including award-winning picture book and stage production ‘Boom Bah!’ (Phil Cummings), ‘No More Kisses’ (Margaret Wild), ‘Good Dog Hank’ (Jackie French) and ‘Pooka’ (Carol Chattaway, YABBA Award Winner, 2013). Nina has taught more than 50,000 students worldwide in her character design series on Skillshare and her 8-week Picture Book Illustration e-Course. To stay connected, you can sign up for Nina’s news or follow her on Instagram