It's nice to peek into the minds of other people sometimes, that's why you and I read blogs, right? To me, a sketchbook is the same: a bundle of ideas and creativity that's all stemmed from the mind of one person. Other than that I'm just a nosy lil sh*t.
After explaining how busy March has been so far I thought it best to just show you what my hands and mind have been off making instead of just explaining! There's been a couple of projects on the go, so here are a few stray pages and details of the ones which turned out best.
Turadh Magazine Cover
I don't want to show the full thing on here just because the issue isn't out yet, but Turadh magazine is a wellbeing mag edited by April from The Fourth Month. Turadh means a 'break in the clouds' which is so lovely! The idea that reading the magazine might give you the feeling of having a break in your daily life is so simply put and sweet to me!
I can't wait to read it and am honoured to have been asked to illustrate something that fits my vibe so much! Here's a couple more close ups of the original painting.
This was done in watercolour, brush pens that I got for Christmas (you can read about what I got last Christmas here) and my trusty old fineliners. I'm loving playing with colour palettes at the mo, which it's been my goal to improve on for a couple of months. For someone who only used to work in black and white, this feels preeeeetty good!
To Kill a Mockingbird Cover
This was a watercolour job too, with fine liners but no swishy brush pens. The picture above is the whole cover, all hand painted at A3 size (which took FOREVEEEER) and the one below is the front cover of the book, finished. I hand painted the typography too! The full front/back/spine has been sent off to Penguin for the Student Design Award so I'm really excited to see if I get any response back. (I have to wait until April! Someone give me something to do until then haha)
It's been a dream of mine since I was a kid to illustrate book covers. There are a few 'books' dotted about my bedroom at home that a crafty seven year old me stapled together after hours of careful gel-pen and felt-tip art. Of course, these were mostly about fairies or my beloved stuffed bear, Pickles. I remember my teacher reading one out to the class in Year 3 and I was so embarrassed but lowkey proud, haha. If only lil baba me could see what I'm aiming for now!
The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole
I'd been so busy working on the To Kill a Mockingbird cover that this one didn't have as much time spent on it, so I didn't submit it. Buuuuut I have until May to do lots more work, so hopefully by then it's going to look great! This was watercolour, and my favourite pens too. Can you tell I'm obsessed by that media?
Here's a couple of pages from my upcoming project sketchbook!
I won't divulge too much about what this is going to be but you're probably able to guess. It's in the most early stages so who knows if the project is going to be anything like what hope! There's still time for it to take a different turn.
Sorry for the hideous watermark across all of these, a gal has to do what a gal's gotta do to not let people steal (even though most of this is unusable for other people)! This is a fraction of what I've been creating this month but definitely sums it all up.
I've also been asked "Where do you get your inspiration from?" by Hannah. It differs for each project! Lately I've become really passionate about finding ways to make important (yet often boring) topics interesting, and wanting to make people think about changing little habits in their everyday life, so doing lots of research and then creating artwork based on how I feel is how I've done most of my paintings lately. Also nature is one of my favourite sources of inspiration- so much colour, patterns that occur in places you never thought they would and tiny details that get missed unless you're looking for them! Naturally occurring beautiful colour palettes like crazy wild sunsets and flowers with a weird hue are my jaaaam.
I hope you liked this lil' peek behind the scenes in my sketchbook! Here's my previous sketchbook tour.
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