Hi my loves and welcome to today's video.
A flip-through of all of last month's Inktober drawings.
I asked you guys if there was anything you wanted to know about this project, so I'll
be answering some of the most popular questions as we go.
So the theme that I went for this time around was Greenhouse Essentials for Potion-Makers
and Spell-Casters.
A few people were a bit confused, asking where I found the theme or the prompts list, and
so I thought I'd just clarify that that this was something that I came up with myself,
and so it was my own personal project without a list of prompts.
I actually came up with the idea the day before the month started, so didn't have a huge amount
of time for preparation.
In the lead-up to inktober, I actually already had an idea of what I'd be drawing, I thought
of doing something like haunted or cursed or evil plants, like a werewolf bramble or
a vampire ivy, making the plants look like they had this affliction or just a spooky
theme.
And as I was coming up with what I could draw for each day, one of the things I thought
of was ghost moss, which is something you'll see I actually drew later on in the tour.
And I imagined that as a light moss in a bottle or jar, which suddenly made me think of potions.
And so that's where my new idea for this years theme came from.
I started from scratch and tried to think of different things you might like or need
in a greenhouse and how I could spookify them.
So a lot of it was plants that I combined with spooky elements as I'd already been planning
on doing.
But I also thought about practical greenhouse things like grow-lights and water-butts and
misters and humidifiers and how those could look or function in more of a supernatural
sense.
It really pushed me to use my imagination and get creative with some problem solving,
and as I said before, the more I did, the easier it got and I started to create this
little world in my head and the people that would be using these things.
In terms of outside inspiration, I've been watching a lot of history videos on YouTube
recently, short documentaries about the Victorian era, and I really like the old journals and
guides they used to have- and the illustrations in them- so that's where that kind of vintage
look came from and the tone of the captions I used.
So that I hope should answer the questions I've had about the backstory, the ideas and
themes.
People also wanted to know to what extent I planned my drawings, if I knew what I was
going to do from the beginning or if I decided each day what I would draw.
I don't think I'd be able to manage coming up with an idea everyday.
The way I keep up momentum during challenge like this is taking away some of the decision
fatigue or decision paralysis from as early as possible.
So when I came up with this idea, I decided on every drawing I would do- as in what each
thing would be- and then I started putting them in order of which I wanted to do first
and which ones might look good next to each other.
I knew what sketchbook I'd be working in, so I made a rough sketch of the number of
spreads and started mapping out what might go where and how they vaguely might look.
Nothing detailed, but it gave me a guide and also helped me figure out how each thing could
be laid out on each page, to make the most of the number of pages I had.
I would definitely do things like this again because it really just saved me so much time
every day not having to think about which drawing I was going to do and how many pages
it should be on and where the text might be in relation to previous pages and how that
might look in the scheme of things.
Even though I was really flexible when it came to sticking to the plan or just going
with whatever felt right on the day, it was nice to have that foundation there to start
with and I was able to work on things as a whole from the beginning.
Okay, let's see if we can quick-fire some questions from Instagram.
Did I use references?
Some drawings were entirely form my imagination.
For some I looked at different elements in pictures.
But nothing is drawn directly from one image and I would say 60%, I didn't look at any
reference at all.
Was it stressful?
At times, especially towards the end, it just got a bit exasperating, a bit monotonous.
I missed using paint.
That said, I do find something a bit relaxing in the routine of a drawing challenge, knowing
more or less what you're going to draw every day and how.
Average amount of time spent on this per day?
I would say maybe 45 minutes per page.
As time went on, I spent a lot less time sketching and planning.
I think the first one took about 2 and a half hours altogether because I drew it on a separate
piece of paper and then tried to recreate it in the sketchbook, just so it could be
'perfect', so I would know exactly what I was doing.
After that, I got more and more open to making mistakes.
Was that enough time or did you feel overwhelmed by the pull of other projects?
I allowed myself to make this the priority, which was great at the time but not so great
now.
Now that it's over, I do feel a bit lost.
The inspiration I'd been building up last month has been fizzling out and I'm kind of
floundering around wondering what to do next and... trying to remind myself how to paint.
Process for idea generating fictitious plants?
As I said, it just came down to thinking of a plant, and combining it with something dark
or spooky, and then thinking about how that might work.
Sometimes I thought of the name of it first, or the function and then I thought about how
it might look.
Okay and finally, one of the most popular questions, will there be a printed copy of
this book for sale?
And yes, there will be.
It's actually available for pre-order now, so I'll have that linked below.
It will be available for the next 2 weeks from now, after which, I'll start sending
them all out, and I hope that means everyone that want one should get a chance to get one,
without me having to keep them in the shop year-round.
And I think that's about where we'll leave it!
As we look through the book as a whole.
Really hope you enjoyed this project as much as I did, it's one of my favourite art things
I've ever done and I'm looking forward to doing more like it!
Thanks so much for joining me and I'll see you soon for the next video.
Bye!