Daily Zoo
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I have just got a copy of Chirs Ayers' "Daily Zoo" and it such a fantastic book. It made me cry and it made me laugh and it is so full of humanity as well as great art: an awesome source of inspiration.
If you do not know it, absolutely check it out: http://www.chrisayers.bigcartel.com/
I was wondering if anybody here has ever attempted something like that - a themed drawing every day for a whole year - and how was the experience. I know Inktober is similar, or Jake's "100 somethings". How much discipline does it take and how could one make it work? -
Are you on Instagram? The 100 Day Project is happening right now (on day 8 today, but you can join anytime). This is my first time doing a project this long, but it's been very useful having lots of people across the world doing the same thing, it keeps you accountable when others are posting their daily projects.
It is hard to keep going on the days when my drawings have looked awful, but I've had to post anyway and move on to the next day, in order to keep up. On balance, I think it's quite healthy make yourself move on!
If you search #the100dayproject on instagram you'll see a ton of different projects. There's more info on this link too: https://thegreatdiscontent.com/100days
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@Nanette That's interesting! I did not know about that! Yes, I am on Instagram (simona.ceccarelli). I will check this one.
Thanks for sharing your experience! -
I've wanted to try a themed drawing challenge but haven't yet done one. I think they are great ways to get you to be creative and practice on things that you wouldn't normally work on.
I'll have to check out the 100 Day project and use it for my warm-ups.
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So, as a matter of experiment, I tried to emulate Chris Ayers for a week - one animal drawing every day. I invested between one and two hours time for each drawing and posted them on social media. It was pretty insightful, even in the space of a short week. This is my personal impressions on the mini-experience:
Pros:
-Engagement was pretty high, despite my limited social media fingerprint. As I was late with the post one day, one of my friends posted mid-morning asking where the daily drawing was! I can imagine this snowballing if kept up for a longer time;
-It is a strong motivation kick and exceedingly good practice, both to come up with a concept on the fly as well as drawing-wise (animals are not really my strong point);- A complete highlight that has made my day, week and year to come is Christophe Lautrette "liking" one of the drawings (the Thursday one). Chris Lautrette is an Art Director at Dreamworks.
Cons: - I have very limited time free from work and other engagements - even sparing 1-2 hours every day is a challenge at present.
- I am very concerned about posting sub-standard work or sketches, as I have the feeling that every elements of your public presence contributes to your artist reputation - maybe I am paranoid? Anyhow, this is a big driver in investing a reasonable amount of time even on this small drawings, but also an element of stress.
Overall, it is something I would really ponder doing...for a month or 100 days or a year. But not sure I can afford the time now...or maybe I am just overthinking it... Anyhow, here they are:
And a very short blog post on it:
Chris Ayers and the last week of April
- A complete highlight that has made my day, week and year to come is Christophe Lautrette "liking" one of the drawings (the Thursday one). Chris Lautrette is an Art Director at Dreamworks.
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These are all fantastic, and how great that you got an upvote from a Dreamworks art director too
My favourites are Thursday and Sunday, but they are all really nice. -
Love your pictures! I did the 100 day project last year and it was great! I created 100 fairies. It did feel like a marathon towards the end but I learned so much. I actually put my favourite fairy pictures in a book and self published.
It was a great way to build a bit of a following and I even got in the local paper! I managed to find the time as I could work on pictures on my iPad while putting by two year old to bed. I think that creative people get creative with how they do things.
Your work is already amazing! Goodness knows what will happen if you do 100! -
@smceccarelli these are all so fun and I like there is a bit of a different style/technique applied to each of them. Nice work!
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Not daily anymore, but I find using challenge prompts for creativity boost and regular practice very useful. This was done with on a Sketch_daily prompt (Centaur).
These are submitted via Twitter, so if you have a Twitter account you can rate it!
https://twitter.com/smceccarelli/status/728157749046038528
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Those Centaurs are beautiful. Wow great work.
