Maeza Nr. 2 | September 2015
Magazine & Blog about Illustration and Art
“From topic to painting for Illustrationfriday� Creative playgrounds
Content
Our secound issue is looking on how I work on a picture for a topic from a weekly challange. I have found that I got the best results when I start off with a bunch of sketches. They do not have to be good or to fit perfectly, but they get me into the flow. When I am stuck with a topic, I do brainstorming and researching. If this still does not help, then I take it as it is and instead train a new drawing technique. There is always something you can train in.
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From topic to painting for Illustrationfriday
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Creative playgrounds
We hope you enjoy this issue. Yours Maeza
Editorial
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From topic to painting for
Illustrationfriday
Illustrationfriday is a webpage which announces a weekly challange for all artist and fans and is open for any art media. The topic is published of course every Friday and you can submitt your work during that week. Such webpage is a so called creative playground where you can get inspired and creative, simillar to „100 days drawing“, and other projects. For me, the weekly task is a great way to get into a routine, to train different styles and media, and to step out of my comfort zone of topics.
I documented my approach
The challenge: The topic
clothes and things, Tree. I
for the topic „OLD“ and will
was quite unspecific, as it is a
wanted my painting to inspire
show you how I got to the
description, so I decided to
you to think: wow, that is old,
resulting picture that you can
brainstorm around the topic. and wanted to think further
see on the front cover of this
What can be old? Grandma/
issue.
pa, newspaper, house, book,
You can also drawstorm, and sketch immediately. I use this technique often for topics I am more familiar with
Some details from the oak to get into the mood
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Blog
rather than painting a grandma who is obviously old. I also wanted to add a feeling to support the word from the first brainstorming.
What
feeling can I associate with old? Creepy, friendly, deserves
Colour and shadow studz
respect, is knowledgeable, boring, broken, dusty. I decided now for: Tree and friendly. Start sketching & researching I decided that an oak would be the best candidate and searched on internet different
A form studz helps meo understand the features
pictures of old oak trees to copy and sketch them. This was my first oak tree, so I made a small study: rough, detailed, silhouettes, shadows...
Sketches will help me as a cheet sheat for the painting
Blog
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At the end of the study, I made this prototzpe oak. I wanted to show the knobbed and knottz branches in detail., because they are tzpical for an old oak and that was the topic
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I then made a water colour picture of the tree only, so I was not too nervous about the actual picture and getting the technique right and finished the challenge with creating the picture that is now on our front cover. My oak tree is friendly and therefore a home to various creatures. I wanted the oak to give you a warm feeling and as if a goodnight story could start here.
Test water colour of the old oak
Blog
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Creative playgrounds This is an experimental approach to challange you to discover new twists and paths in your creativity. The point is to do something for you and expand your phantasy. There are different types of challanges: daily, weekly, monthly. You can create the piece just for you as a project or upload it to a community.
Daily
Weekly
Montly
You choose a topic every day and create a small painting. Normally you stay within your style of comfort and focus on constant output. They can be 100 days or 360 days long. I have seen these projects only as private projects so far, where you collect your pieces and publish them on your blog, or maybe at the end of the challange as a collection.
These type I have seen typically within a community, where you can also upload your work. They are mostly open to any style, media, and artist and you can just experiment around.
Withing this type I have seen just one so far: The palette project. Each month you create pieces within the same color scheme or using just one colour.
Ideas: What I had for lunch today A comic charater a day An animal a day
links http://illustrationfriday.com/ https://www.facebook.com/
I visit Illustrationfriday and the facebook group Build a Freelance Illustration Business, where the topic is announced weekly
link http://picolo-kun.deviantart.com/ journal/The-Palette-Project511143555
I haven’t started such a challenge, but I would like to do: a miniature painting a day.
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Column
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Published on ISSUU under Maeza