Bali Buddha Statue

Here's a sketch I did of a wooden Buddha statue while on a meditation retreat in Bali, Indonesia. 

Interview for Color Me A Kidlit Writer

Here's an interview I did awhile back for Kidlit author Dionna Mann as part of the buildup to the Virginia Festival of the Book.

http://www.dionnalmann.com/blog/kidlit-cville-blog-party-day-2

In addition to the interview, she was nice enough to feature a bunch of my sketchbook drawings in and around Charlottesville, like the ones below.

Story Starters With YA Author Lamar Giles

Last weekend, I attended a local SCBWI event (Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators) in Richmond, Va. Among the three excellent panelists was YA author, and 2015 Edgar Award Nominee, Lamar Giles.

Lamar did a super-fun Mad-Lib-style exercise with us called Story Starters, where he and the audience create a unique opening line by committee. Once the line’s created, the writers/illustrators in the audience have 15 minutes to write or sketch whatever that line inspires.

The sentence we came up with was "Alice never wants to hurt anyone again, but the robots won’t end the experiment."  Here's what I came up with in 15 minutes: 

I liked the sketch so much, that I went ahead and did a more finished version at home:

The cool part was that Lamar was pretty excited to share what everyone did on his blog, so I happily sent him both the sketch and the finished piece. Much to my surprise, not only did he post my images, but wrote up a pretty great review of my work as well. You check it out here: http://www.lrgiles.com/story-starters-scott-dubar-illustrator/ And for everyone interested YA fiction, definately check out Lamar's books Fake ID, and Endangered.

Urban Sketchers Gallery Show at the VCA

I got to participate in a local Urban Sketchers gallery showing at the Virginia Center for Architecture in Richmond, which marked my first galley showing in a pretty long time. The event was organized by Jessie Chapman, a Charlottesville-based architect and who is a long-time board member of UrbanSketchers.org, an international organization that promotes sketchbook drawing. 

The exhibit features our Charlottesville Urban Sketchers as a group, along with work from Andrew Moore, Don Gore, and Washington Post news illustrator Richard Johnson.

Above: Me standing next to my profound thoughts on the value of sketchbook drawing.
Oddly, none of the sketches pictured are mine. Below: A few of the panels that feature some of my work, along with Stephen Haske, Jessie Chapman, and others.

 The show will be up through July 5, so anyone in the RVA area can drop by. Check out www.architectureva.org for more details.

Hanging with the Urban Sketchers

 

Went to the downtown library today with some of the Charlottesville Urban Sketchers. Had a nice view of the street from a cozy window seat in the children's book section. #urbansketchers #sketchbook

Super Bowl Sunday sketching before the crowds came.

Met with the Charlottesville Urban Sketchers this Super Bowl Sunday at Buffalo Wild Wings. We got there well before the big crowds came, which was good since that gave us plenty of time to sketch, eat and talk without feeling pressured to give up our table. First image was colored digitally at home. 

Urban Sketchers Charlottesville

Joined the Charlottesville Urban Sketchers for the plein air event at the Miller School of Albermarle. It was a gorgeous day of sitting in the sun and the grass! Here's hoping we get a few more days like this one before winter sets in.

Urban Sketching in C-ville

Did some sketching from  the Water Street parking garage with the Charlottesville Urban Sketchers this weekend. I've been wanting to go there for awhile now and was so happy that it got picked. Parking garages are a great place to get good city views, provided the security people don't have a problem with it. The top image was done with a Pentel Pocket Brush, and then colored digitally at home. The bottom image was a quick 20-minute sketch with watercolor.

Carter's Mountain Orchard Peaches

Did a little sketching with the Chalrottesville Urban Sketchers this last weekend. We went to Carter's Mountain Orchard, sketching tourists and freshly picked peaches. It's been over a month since I joined up with them, and boy did I feel rusty! 

Kid Hercules 365 Challenge Update

Here's just a few samples of my ongoing 365 challenge for a character I'm developing called Kid Hercules. I actually completed the challenge back in April, but have a pretty big backlog of images to upload. This has been such a great project and something that has helped improve my work in ways I never expected!

You can follow my progress over at kidhercules365.blogspot.com and check out everything I've been able to post so far.

Smartphone Sketching

Now I can finally justify my smartphone. Did these using Samsung Memo. I have to say, my favorite thing about this is that I now have no excuse to not do some sketching whenever I'm out and about.

Urban Sketchers Week 5

This week we finally got some warm weather, so we went to the train station for some outdoor sketching.

Urban Sketchers Week 4

I'm really enjoying being a part of Urban Sketchers!

Urban Sketchers 3

Week three with Urban Sketchers. We had originally planned an outdoor event, but the wind was just too cold! Took refuge at Mudhouse on the Downtown Mall. Color was added digitally at home.

Urban Sketchers 2

This week Urban Sketchers teamed up with the Charlottesville Artists meetup group over at C'ville Coffee. I couldn't resist sketching their giant tortoise statue!