Sketchbook Pages

I finished Dave Fox's "Globejotting" online travel writing class this month.  It was immensely helpful, showing me how to eliminate excess words, redundancies, and most cliches.  A few still slip through.  In my final submission, which had gone through six drafts and which I felt was tight writing, Dave managed to eliminate almost a hundred words.   Like a typical student, though, I'm avoiding going back and editing my earlier stories.  Hence, this sketchbook post.

Week 1 of Alisa Burke's Sketchbook Delight - Part 2 class was a refresher exercise using pens, pencils, and watercolor.  Homework: sketch our supplies.

Week 2 - Draw Everyday Objects

  Tax season paper purging.  Files are thinned out and the taxes are off to the accountant.

Yippee!  Back to the fun part of life.

more everyday objects with a dash of doodling

Week 3 - Draw from Nature

I couldn't resist adding some swirls and a lettering style learned in LetterLab, 

another online course.

Week 4 - Advanced Doodling

This week's assignment is Faces.  Stay tuned.

Create Daily

(Following Jane LaFazio's tip about learning to sketch outdoors.)

As I've mentioned to some of you, I signed up for two online creative

courses, both of which started this month.  The first one is

Create Daily by Alisa Burke

http://www.alisaburke.blogspot.com/

It's been a fun class and, so far, I've been able to keep up.  The premise

is that Alisa will give us a creative prompt each day and then we 

work on it as best we can and upload our results to a class 

Flickr group.  The prompts range from fairly easy things like 

look for inspiration in common places such as at the grocery store or

while taking a walk in the neighborhood to harder things, for me, 

like creating abstract art.  I'm finding that a loose style is harder

for me to accomplish than I thought.

Here are some of the results.

Day 1 - Organize your work space.

Been there.  Done that.  Always a

work in progress.

 Day 2 - Hunt and Gather

We were to find odd objects to create

 with.  I chose Post-It notes, a found 

washer, a highlighter pen, and

packing tape to hold it all down.

Day 3 - Use a Ball Point Pen

The prompt was to use a ball point pen for doodling.

The doodling was so much fun I did another one

this time with felt tips.

Day 4 - Play with Your Food

Day 5 - Go for a Walk

This day was so busy that the only walk 

I could manage was to the mailbox.   

I used the paving pattern for inspiration.

Day 6 - Explore Abstraction

My least favorite piece.

Day 7 - Play with Drips

Day 8 - Look Down

The caption says it all.

Day 9 - Time Management

This was a day off from having to create something 

so I just did something easy and playful.

Day 10 - Cook with Fresh Eyes

Day 11 - Doodles with Borders

My inspiration pieces: a Crate & Barrel

catalog, book cover, napkin, and the

inside of a Yogi Tea box.

My other class is Dave Fox's 

Globejotting: How to Write Extraordinary Travel Tales

http://www.globejotting.com/

It just started Tuesday and already I have writer's block!

The funny thing about taking Alisa's Sketchbook Delight

class and now this Create Daily class is that what used

to be hard for me, drawing and watercolor, is now not

only easy but also pleasurable.  That's because most of what 

I draw now is starting actually to look like what I was 

attempting to draw.

And what used to be easy for me, writing, is now harder.

I'm a bit intimidated by having a professional writer critique

my work.  But having learned from Alisa's classes I know

that the more I write the better and faster it will be. 

Loving the Internet and my home creative space.