Alright you lot, we made it to day four of inktober!
Today’s lovely old house is haunted by a group of unruly vandals who’ve trashed it
inside and out.
I enjoyed this one, though it didn't come without any issues, you’ll see at one point
I attempt to use gold ink and fail miserably, but I’m happy with how it looks without.
This was also one of THREE, yes three, inktober videos that I filmed today.
I thought it time to get ahead of myself a little bit, prepare myself for the weekend
where I might not be able to draw- or more of an issue, film- around other commitments.
Anyway, I’m letting you know that the next two videos are pre-recorded, just to kind
of break the illusion that everyone out there taking part this month is managing to do it
day in, day out without compromise.
Like we talked about in yesterdays video, it’s okay to bend the rules to a point where
you still feel you’re achieving your greater goal.
My goal is to be consistent and driven enough to fill this sketchbook and put out a video
every day.
That in itself will be an achievement for me.
And figuring out how to work that kind of goal around my real life is so far becoming
a really useful experience.
Anyway, I’ll still be editing each video the day I put it out so if you still have
a question, feel free to leave it below and I might answer it in tomorrow’s video.
Today’s question was a popular one in the comment section of the first video.
It’s from Elena and she wants some advice for dealing with having ideas but not the
motivation to follow them through.
Or having ideas but not the skill to put them down onto paper.
There was a similar question from Ronnie who deals with the familiar feeling of being unsatisfied
with a piece of work, which leads to a complete lack of motivation to create again.
I think it all ties in together really.
I had this feeling today when I was about to start drawing.
I’ve known since last night, and had a vivid image in my head of what I wanted to draw.
But I spent half my morning procrastinating, it even got to a point where I was aimlessly
wandering around the house, looking out the window to see if the postman was coming.
At one point I was lying in bed staring at the ceiling with my inktober sketchbook in
my hand.
A lot of the time, what stops us from taking that step from idea to execution is a kind
of fear.
Fear of getting it wrong, and fittingly, fear of not having the skills to do it properly.
For me, a great way to get past that is to do a fake ‘test run’ of the drawing in
mind.
Fake because I’ll call it a test run in my head, but put as much effort in as I would
for the real thing.
Even though the ultimate goal is for that drawing to be THE drawing, when you approach
it as a kind of practice or first round, it takes the pressure off it having to come out
just right, because you’re just using this as a way to figure out what you’re doing,
get to know your tools, get to know what areas you might need to improve on.
And that’s essentially how you get better at art anyway.
Every piece you create has it’s own little lesson to learn and take into the next.
So for you Ronnie, rather than be discouraged by what you see as shortcomings in your work,
try to take more of an objective look at it.
Pin-point the parts that you don’t like and almost get excited to learn more about
that thing, so you’ll be able to use it in all your artwork into the future.
You’re mistakes are just potential to grow and learn and take your work to the next level.
Sometimes I genuinely do get excited when I realise I need to spend more time on a certain
aspect of my art, I can kind of imagine how much better it’ll be when I just master
that one thing.
I’m waffling a bit today, but the point I’m trying to make is, if you’ve got the
ideas but not the motivation, try to get that idea down on paper even if it’s not the
finished piece.
Get it down in some form and work from there.
And if it doesn’t turn out how you want it to, instead of shrinking away, telling
yourself I told you so and convincing yourself not to try again, be objective, be methodical,
zone in on the mistakes and look ahead to learning more and creating art closer to what
you had in mind.
Thanks for watching guys, I’ll see you tomorrow for the next one.
Bye.