Warm Art Diary

If you've ever tried to sketch then I'm sure you've had to tackle the common problem of  having "shaky hands" which tend to ruin the ink work or sketch you are working on.  Here is a simple drawing exercise to help reduce this shakiness in one's lines and getting more confident with sketching: Draw these shapes 10 times, as straight as possible and without using a ruler: 3 lines- one about 2 inch long, second half the width of the page, and third the entire length of the page.  2 arcs- one about 2 inches long and the other half the width of the page.  A wave about 2 inches long Circles and ellipses of various sizes and orientations--basically fill the entire (8.5x11) page with shapes, lines and waves using felt-tip pens like microns/sketch-pens or just a pencil.  Then draw over them 8 times without making the line any thicker. Ideally it is done everyday before drawing as a warm up, keep doing this and your inking will get significantly better

        Can you imagine what it would be like if creativity worked like a tap? Just turn it on and art flows right out of your hands! Sadly that couldn't be farther away from the truth. For me, finding my inspiration is just as tough as actually creating something out of it. That's why, to avoid dry spells longer than time itself , I like to keep looking for inspiration all around me. Someday i'll look at a pretty flower and be inspired, on other days, although, I have to be considerably less subtle and more direct in my continuous search. Over the past few years I've found quite a lot of artists online that are so beautiful and so inspiring that i just can't help but talk about them every now and then.          My current favorite of these artists would be Santiago Guevara (you can find him on Instagram here  and check out his amazing website here  and  his Domestika course  ). I found Guevara and fell in love with the art instantly; it was as if every stroke was 

     They say watercolor is the most difficult media to work with, but isn't everything difficult before it becomes easy? You will find that most of these "they" are people who gave up on watercolor before they gave it an honest try! In my own experience with watercolor, the coolest thing is that they are mostly not too difficult to fix, that is, once you figure out what exactly is the problem with your artwork.       Here are some common problems I face in my works and my approach to solve them: The composition or the design isn't exactly right : My favorite way to fix this problem is to re-make the study of the composition and practice that on separate spare pages till I get it right and then try to re-work that improved version into my original work which is basically painting over the problematic areas with a slightly more opaque color. I could have sketched/painted it better:  This issue is fairly common with me and frustrating too. My best approach to it is to p