Querying Agents/ Portfolio Critique

lenwen

@Katie-Kordesh I love your works!the characters are so lovely, and the color palette is fantastic.
When I sent my portfolio to my agent, I was first being rejected. Then it took me more than one year to add and tweak my portfolio again. I think what I did is:

Sequential arts, I added some sequential arts to show that I can handle consistency.
Environments, I created indoor, outdoor, fantastical scenes.
Lighting schemes, I added dusk, evening, fire scenes.
More than one spread dummy of a picture book, I made sure that there are spaces for texts and no vital character in the border or more straightforward to say, scenes with texts.
Lots of kids! I know some artists only draw animals, but to increase the chances, I added a bunch of kids with various ethnicities, gender, ages, shapes, and personalities.

And the most important is, I've had to feel comfortable with the technic and style I used. I understand that after someone signed with an agent, they still able to change the technic and style depending on the projects, but I didn't want to start with something I didn't feel comfortable or confident in the first place.

I hope it helps and good luck!

Lee White

@Katie-Kordesh Very nice stuff Katie! : )

Katie Kordesh

@lenwen Aw thank you so much for feedback! I am big fan of your work.

Yeah I can see I have a lot of things to work on. Moving forward I'm gonna work on building out some more complex scenes so I can get more lighting/ scenery and character involved. Also noticing a lack of interesting compositions on my end. I think a nighttime campsite scene with snacks would be so much fun! : )

Katie Kordesh

@Lee-White Wow thanks so much Lee!! this just made my day

Shawn

Hi Katie. Wanted you to know your portfolio link in the post goes to a 'We couldn't find the page you were looking for.'. Your link goes to /childrensbooksl rather than /picturebooks.

Katie Kordesh

@Shawn omg! thanks for letting me know!! I just changed my url slug yesterday I think I have updated all my links now

Katie Kordesh

Painted!

APHOTICMOTH

@Katie-Kordesh When I blur my eyes, the shoes disappear on the older girl painting , they are pretty close to her skin color. Fun piece though.

Katie Kordesh

@CLCanadyArts ok thank you for note!! I’ll make them a different color

APHOTICMOTH

@Katie-Kordesh You're welcome. I really love it. The other kids are so carefree, while the older girl beems confidence, almost smugness.

NatLundeen

Hi Katie! I love your work! I got a portfolio review from an agency last year and one of the biggest things was needing to show several sequential pieces with the same characters to show that you can hold the character and take them through a story. You have that with your bat character which is awesome, but probably need a bunch more variety of different characters. Also showing kids of all ages—actually from babies up to grandparent ages so they can see how you handle them. Another thing is showing a variety of viewpoints—like birds eye view, wide environment scenes, close ups, etc, not just a straight on view like they are characters on a stage. I’ve been working on my portfolio for months and still haven’t checked all the boxes—it’s a lot of work! But I’m sure you can get creative with nailing a bunch of things in one illo!

Katie Kordesh

@NatLundeen Aw Hi! Yeah I think I am really starting with the bare bones of a portfolio. So much stuff I need to work on and add! I freaking love your donut shop/hardware piece and campfire scene. Definitely need to be more intentional about what views Im showing and adding more characters. I think I haven't been using my brain that much and picking easy design solutions like the straight on view. Thanks so much for the feedback : ) I really appreciate it

NatLundeen

@Katie-Kordesh oh thank you so much!! If I could I would do every single piece just straight on, it’s fun to work without having to work your brains!