It’s not all black and white
Well, it is. At least for the moment.
I started the shop with a series about palm trees. I chose to draw in the style I knew best and that’s with black ink. First comes a sketch of the object, outlines and important other lines with a pencil. Then I draw over it with black ink. Once it’s all dry I erase the pencil. Only then come the details and shading.
That’s basically how I learned it for my job, drawing buildings. That’s what I loved doing and the reason for becoming a drawer all those years ago. So it felt only natural to go down that route and try to get into it again.
See, colour!
During one of the lockdowns, I bought a big selection of coloured pencils. Also watercolour. And markers. I wanted to try if I like it, but it didn’t work that great initially so I put it aside. Around that time I also started my Instagram account and shared some of my progress. One day, out of the blue, a friend from school asked if she could commission two drawings of birds, a bird from Africa and a hummingbird (in colour obviously, no one needs a black and white hummingbird), obviously I said yes and obviously I had no idea what I was doing.
So I bought a whole bunch of alcohol markers (obviously crazy expensive Copic, no one wants to be held back by bad markers) and started practising. At first, I was useless. But I was useless a while ago at playing the guitar and quickly made progress, therefore I knew, the way forward was to practice. So I practised every evening after work, between house chores and sporting and on most weekends. And it worked, I improved and was able to increase the difficulty level from drawing to drawing.
I chose quite a big format for the commissions (A2), so the actual drawings were bigger than the birds themselves, which is hard, especially for a beginner. I had to find a way between too much detail and not enough which was difficult, but I started liking the colours, it’s just much more impactful than black and white. The biggest challenge only came after I finished the birds, the background! I had no idea how to achieve a background that didn't completely ruin the picture I just spent days on. I also found out that the alcohol markers aren’t completely UV resistant and would bleach slowly over time. Didn’t expect that!
I decided to digitalise the drawings and add the background on the computer, which would create enough of a difference from the hand-drawn bird. That worked quite well, even though it took me ages to find the right tools on the computer.
No digital native
Another learning curve was getting to know all the tools and gadgets needed to digitalise my drawings. Most formats, at that time, were bigger than what a normal scanner could handle. I looked into scan services but didn't like the fact that I had to send the drawing away and wait for ages. And what if I wanted to add something or correct a mistake? I would have to send it again and pay again. So I started researching cameras. Now that's a rabbit hole!
With the camera I needed lights, I didn’t want to work with flash because of the reflection off the glass or frame, also, I figured I might want to use the lights for videos later on my journey. That stuff is expensive! I obviously first tried a cheap alternative and hoped it would somehow work but it was all too dark and gloomy. So I kept spending money, slowly acquiring the tools I needed. Another project was software. I needed some photo editing program but didn’t feel like subscribing to Photoshop. After some research, I came across an affordable alternative, Affinity. It's cheap, no subscription and is very similar to the big one. They also make a publisher and a design program. All in all brilliant! (This is no paid ad, I just love their products).
With that, I was finally equipped to finish the last steps of my projects, digitalise and print my drawings. Then I had to also get some money back into my account and boy, is it hard to calculate prices! Especially for a friend. But that's a topic for another day.
What’s next
At the moment I’m drawing in black and white, partly for future products for my online shop, partly for customers. Besides that, I started dabbling in coloured drawings again and I find it a nice change and helps me get over moments when I lack motivation. It gets me out of a rut and inspires me to think of different projects I’d like to tackle. Maybe the next big reveal will be bags with colourful animal drawings?