Below is the complete gallery from drawing sketches for an entire year (using the sketch a day app).

Its hard to believe that I have been doing this for a whole year ! I am not sure how my artistic skills have improved, but the challenge was trying to find something creative for each prompt. Looking back, I did some really poor, inane sketches. I also felt the last 2 weeks, the final stretch, was the hardest part. But I’ve also done some sketches that I’ve really loved, particularly those done in Charcoal – which has been been my favourite medium. I’ve learned that the mediums I enjoyed most, in order, where: charcoal, pen, digital, pencil, and coloured pencil. Perhaps the next step for me is painting, but I still think I have a long way to go for getting more realistic drawings.

The most wonderful part was creative process; some things that helped me with the creative process:

• use juxtaposition: the act or an instance of placing two or more things side by side often to compare or contrast or to create an interesting effect.
• If you doing this for a popularity contest, it will stifle you. I see this a sometimes in younger folks who really want likes on Sketch a day app. If you are in for approval, you probably aren’t expressing your true creativity.
• Its ok to have a some terrible attempts. I’ve had plenty. Just move on, no big deal.
• Downplay your ego. My very worst attempts were usually centred around myself, rather than the art itself. Perhaps I was trying to do something really clever to impress somebody, or prove a point. The results were often contrived.
• If you find exactly what you want to draw on your first google image search, its probably not creative enough!
• Crude mock ups help: I would images and put them together in Photoshop (In my case PhotoShop 5.5 running on Linux Mint with Wine!) .
• know your prompt – what are all the alternative meanings of the word? Are the homonyms? Is there similarly spelled or sounding word in another language? Dictionaries, thesaurus, and translations can all open up new world of possibilities.
• Don’t be afraid to express your humour.
• Don’t be afraid to express your sadness.
• Don’t be afraid to be fucking weird. It’s really o.k. It’s 2019, not 1919.

Learn from everyone. Its not just the amazing artists. There are gems in the rough on sketch a day, so what if they are not Picassos or Rembrandts. These artists make have incredible creativity. If you see something you like, a kind word goes a long way.

So here is the gallery for you to check out:

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