Life drawing. Ink.

I’ve been experimenting with an ink pen during my life drawing project. It makes me think of the calligraphy master who meditates for an hour before making a brush stroke. Obviously, I’m not claiming to be anywhere close to a calligraphy master, but I do find myself working at a different rhythm, pausing, and then putting down my brush stroke. Ink is so definite.

I made a series of life drawings defining shapes as either white or black. Finding a quality of mystery emerge in the drawings when resisting the temptation to add outlines or boundaries. Which leads me to a quote about art and mystery:

The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.
Francis Bacon

Life drawing: watercolour and ink

Life drawings in watercolour, pen and ink.

charcoal on paper. life drawing #1

From my sketchbook: charcoal on paper. Soft and brittle. Smudges. A series of 2-5-10 minute poses. The sound of charcoal as it snaps. Different mediums see different things. Or I see differently using different tools… With charcoal I feel like I’m sculpting, adding, subtracting. The ink brush wants to find lines, shadows and light. This time I go back to charcoal. Here are a few of my sketches.

charcoal on paper. life drawing #2

charcoal on paper. life drawing #3

charcoal on paper. life drawing #4

charcoal on paper. life drawing #5

Dry pastel crayons

When your art is your work or when you’re blogging about what you create, the spontaneity is easily lost. You want your clients and buyers to be happy and you want to give your blog visitors a valuable experience. Your art becomes an achievement.

Part of you goes about your day thinking “this would make a good blog post” or “now I know how to solve that detail in the commission I’m working on“. Sometimes you feel you’re producing art and regardless of what mood you’re in, the job is due tomorrow. Even though you love your job, it’s partly become an obligation.

When you put your creative life on display or make a living as an artist, it’s easy to loose sight of creating without intention, just for the sheer joy of it.

A blog or an online portfolio can be a creative outlet in itself and a great way to stay motivated and hold yourself accountable for your creative projects. A way to document your creative journey and to connect with others.

On the other hand, blogging takes a lot of time and puts you on a schedule. You can begin blogging for the comments on your blog, and maybe you start looking for validation from your readers, rather than from within yourself. In a time when we seem more busy documenting our lives than living our lives, it takes deliberation to find a peaceful space that hasn’t got anything to do with other people or how they perceive us. To create a space that has nothing to do even with our own expectations.

A creativity lab. So can you plan to be spontaneous? Write your own permission slip? Can you make room for experiments, happy accidents and non-judgemental creativity? Find time and space to change your mindset?

This autumn I’ve reserved Friday afternoons for spontaneous explorations and I promised myself that I wouldn’t display any of the art from these sessions here on my blog. It’s been a process that’s about loosening up, improvising, letting go of expectations, being associative, having fun and allowing art to unfold intuitively. I’ve been working quickly with natural media. Each Friday a new theme and different mediums. The emphasis is on getting into flow rather than stepping back and judging.

I’ve spent time getting messy with acrylics, oils, dry pastels, clay, oil pastels, watercolours, textiles, charcoal and gouache. Working on different types of canvases such as cardboard, different kinds of paper, wood panel and canvas. I’ll admit that after the first two sessions I felt disappointed with the “result”, even though the whole point was to let go of expectations, but after that it’s been much easier to let go, have fun and step into the freedom of playful creating.

Paintbrushes

Palette with acrylics: earth tones

Icon sketches: inspiration, mockups, drafts, ideas, palettes, mood boards

I’m having so much fun designing this icon for drafts and sketches! Perhaps because I love this part of the process myself. Gathering inspiration, finding reference, doing research, catching ideas that spark in mind maps and mood boards.

The texture I used for the Moleskine (image below) is the same as the one I originally designed for the leather wallet, briefcase, satchel, old book and folder icons in the Organizer Collection. I felt that it worked well for the Moleskine and that it helped make the icons fit smoothly together, connecting the Moleskine with other icons.

While I was working on the icon for “Sketches, Drafts”, I came up with several variations. First I felt I had to pick one, but then I realised that a lot of people probably have different kinds of inspirational material that they collect. There could be drafts of text or images or a combination. There could be textures and palettes. Or combinations. So, why not include all three!? I’m calling them Sketches/Drafts, Ideas and Inspiration but naturally you can modify their names so that they work for you. How could you make use for these icons?

Sketches, drafts, inspiration, ideas

[To be continued... ]

Did you miss the other parts of this series?

• Part One: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Sketches
• Part Two: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: A Vintage Touch
• Part Three: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Indicating Time
• Part Four: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Look and Feel
• Part Five: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: The Dreaded Report

Icon sketches for "dreaded report"

I’m really struggling with this icon for “Dreaded Report”. Maybe some of the boring, corporate cubicle office culture that I’m trying to infuse this icon with, is rubbing off on me?

So I made some variations, one with a ballpoint pen, one with a graph and one with a skull. And then I can’t make up my mind… Should I put them all in the collection, or leave some out? What do you think? [To be continued... ]

Did you miss the other parts of this series?

• Part One: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Sketches
• Part Two: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: A Vintage Touch
• Part Three: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Indicating Time
• Part Four: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Look and Feel

Icon design process. From sketch to basic shapes

When I’m happy with the sketches for the icons, I launch Adobe Illustrator and start blocking out the icons, drawing simple, clean vector shapes using my pen tablet. I’m designing the Collection of Process Icons in the same style that was established for the first three collections of desktop icons. In this unique design project, everything from the icon concept to the simple and elegant style is based on feedback from you. The look and feel for Process Icons uses the same set of perspectives with simple, uncluttered shapes that are easy to distinguish and find on your desktop. The style is based around a rich colour palette and elegant, natural textures.

Icon design process. Adding details, colour, shading and light

Once I’ve blocked in the basic shapes, I start adding details and colours, next shading and last highlights. In this example with the alarm clock you’ll notice the same palette of reds as in the icon with the Cookery Book, the same greys as in the Gear icon and the same soft cream as in the Shoebox icon. Using the same style consistently, ensures that all the icons fit together and that you can mix and match the different collections to suit your needs.

And in case you were wondering about the dotted lines across these images, yes they are the watermarks I designed for these icon previews to at least make it more difficult for people who want to steal images. [To be continued... ]

Did you miss the other parts of this series?

• Part One: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Sketches
• Part Two: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: A Vintage Touch
• Part Three: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Indicating Time

Today and tomorrow. Icon sketches

These are my sketches for icons that represent things that need to be taken care of “Today” and “Tomorrow”, or “Later”. Many of you have asked for “Today” and “Tomorrow” icons, some of you cooperate on projects where time needs to be specified, others need to schedule work to be published or for deadlines.

While I was working on these icons, I thought “what about adding the dates of a month, wouldn’t that be handy if you really need to indicate time with icons?”

So I made a few sketches to see what it would look like, and I’m thinking of adding a full month of days to the set. What do you think? [To be continued... ]

Calendar with dates. icon sketch

Did you miss the other parts of this series?

• Part One: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: Sketches
• Part Two: Designing the Collection of Process Icons: A Vintage Touch

Project. icon sketch with blueprint and hard hat

Here’s the second part of the story about a new design project I’m working on. It’s about the creative process of a new collection of icons called “Process”.

I started this design project by asking you what kind of icons would be exceptionally useful for you. Which are your recurring projects and important files and folders that you need to find at a glance? Which of your projects do you love the most?

I also started the process of my previous collections of desktop icons by asking you what kind of icons you need, what would help you get organized and find focus in your digital environment?

Each time I’ve asked you what kind of icons you’d find useful, one of the strong trends has been icons that depict tangible, vintage or retro objects to symbolize your most important or loved projects. For example, there were tons of requests for a feather quill pen for “Writing” or “Documents” and an old-fashioned vinyl LP for “Music” (both part of the Collection of Creative Desktop Icons). The vintage office equipment in the Collection of Workflow Icons is another example and so is the old book for “Resources” and leather briefcase for “Work” (both part of the Collection of Organizer Icons)

Perhaps these types of solid, vintage objects bring a tangible feeling of functionality and beauty to our rather abstract, digital environment? Holding a charm and grace that captures our emotions in a way that digital, intangible audio, text and film files don’t?

Safe. icon sketch

Here’s my sketch of an icon that represents “Safe”. A small, old-fashioned office safe.

This is where you would store documents that are really important to your self, your family or your business. I’ll be using the Safe to store my original logo files, a backup of my blog, and some other important business documents. The “Safe” icon would also make a great icon for a backup disc. What would you put in the Safe?

Urgent/Overdue/Late. icon sketch of an old-fashioned alarm clock

This is my sketch for an icon that symbolizes Urgent/Overdue/Late. A retro wind-up alarm clock with bells.

Here’s an icon with a unique silhouette that makes it stand out on the desktop so you can find it at an instant. And that’s just what you need when you’re looking for overdue or urgent projects.

One of the challenges when creating this sketch of an alarm clock, was making sure it would look good at small sizes too. I actually spent several days making new sketches of the design and testing that it would look great all the way down to the tiny size you see when you display your icons in list view. I’ll still be reworking the smaller versions, but I want the largest version to resemble the smallest version, as much as is possible without losing any of its functionality and beauty. That’s one of the most important parts of the sketching phase for a new icon project.

Another key part of the sketching phase is to create distinctive silhouettes that make it easy to locate the icon you’re looking for (I wrote about that in the first part of this series).

And last but not least, creating a family of icons where everyone is unique and has their own personality and yet you can tell that they’re family. They fit together as well as with the icons that belong with your operating system, either Windows or Mac. The icons bring a personal, designer feeling to your desktop, and without drawing too much attention to themselves, the icons help you get unstuck and organized so you can work with flow and ease through your day.

Not sure how to customize your icons? Here’s a tutorial for using icons on a Mac and here’s a tutorial for how to change the icons in Windows.

[To be continued... ]

Did you miss Part One of this series?