In the beginning, well maybe not the VERY beginning as I’ve been drawing and creating as long as I can remember, but this set most certainly started my CE(Common Era) and how I started approaching what comes after.
I’d been working in Afghanistan as a video editor for about a year. We’d come up against sections of downtime and my brain started wandering back to figuring out how to fill it.
It initially started by just doodling with the design tools available, but eventually evolved a bit more. The paycheck was more than pretty good and I found that I could get art supplies shipped over and as, at that point, I had my own room (and bathroom!) I decided to try start experimenting.
Dick Blick has these bottled watercolors I fell in love with. Dilute them or use them straight from the bottle, I typically dipped my brush in the bottle..lol…but I stocked up on paints, brushes, and markers.
I think that’s the most important part, the process, coming up with an idea and finding your way to an end result. It at least gives you a sketch, a place to come back to, but getting the idea down in some shape or form so it doesn’t get forgotten is important.
How many brilliant ideas or novels have popped to mind just as you fall asleep and you think you should write it down, but you’ll remember it when you wake up, but it gets lost forever?…lol…
I started looking for different mediums to work on beyond digital. I had some sketchbooks, but where I was, they ordered a lot of stuff and that stuff came in BIG boxes, good quality boxes. I left work one night and they were unpacking chairs, or something in these big boxes. All I saw was 4 large pristine surfaces to create on.
I asked them to wait and ran got a box cutter and over 24 cardboard canvases over 24x 36 inches…heh…
At that point in time i had room in my room to store stuff like that…oh man…
This first month was spent playing, experimenting, just trying to get one thing done a day, and for the most part it was a success.
The month was spent exploring bold graphic shapes, playing with depth and ways to create traditional splatters and drips, typography and layouts (because I’ve always had a fondness for magazine layouts…lol), and illustration and figure design.
It started me on a creative streak….
(tbc)