Hello everybody!

[Pilonya]

Hello all,

I have recently joined the forum and posted a painting to the Music contest, so I thought I should also properly introduce myself. My name is Polona, I live in Switzerland, and I am a neuroscientist. Since I know I’ve been drawing or painting, and it’s probably after the birth of my son that I started gravitating towards children illustration with a wish to create my own book one day.

For the moment I don’t have any solid plan to change my science career for illustration (although would love to), but I’m determined to continue improving my skills, and try to squeeze out a bit of time every day to draw. I’ve read the @Sas post and I can really relate to it. In a way it is very comforting knowing there are quite some other scientist who are also (inspiring) illustrators. Hello to all of you here ! Also, the interview with @smceccarelli is just so damn inspiring and helpful!

I’m very happy I found SVS, it’s really amazing, the quality and amount of information you guys put in the courses. I got myself a month subscription to try it out and I binge watched your classes. So I did a bit of a break to give myself time to actually implement what I learned so far, but I am definitely getting the yearly subscription.
I totally agree with @Sas, the work that you post on this forum is truly mind blowing. Just reading the feedbacks on the posted art here has already challenged me to try to push my work further. I will try my best to be active here on the forum. I feel there’s so much to share and learn from you.

And for the end, I would like to share what I’m working on at the moment, a piece for the Fall contest. I’m really sorry to not include thumbnails and sketches, but my process was just all over the place. I would love to hear your comments on it.

Thank you!
Polona

[Chip Valecek]

@pilonya welcome to the forums! Your piece has a great concept behind it. I would suggest moving the tree in the middle and the hills in the middle out of the crease of the book. Then add some shadows to make it look like those are actual pages.

[demotlj]

Welcome to the forum. My undergraduate degree is in biology and my graduate degree is in theology so I’m all over the place. It’s fun to see people’s varying backgrounds. Love your piece. It’s a really clever concept.

[Sas]

Hi Pilonya and welcome to the forum! You and I are in the same boat. I hope we can keep on inspiring each other. I will definitely check out your journey. Love your fall piece! Did you do it digitally?

[Pilonya]

@chip-valecek Your suggestion totally makes sense, now it feels like the book sort of gets lost in the middle. I'll try to play with this. Thank you!

[Pilonya]

@demotlj Thank you! Sounds like a really interesting combination of backgrounds. Do you think it has any influences on your art?

[Pilonya]

@sas Thank you and hello sailor buddy! I'm also curious to see where your journey takes you and I'm looking forward to see your art here! Yes, I did that one digitally. I also like to work with watercolours and gouache, but with digital it's nice because I can really play around (although sometimes too many options are not working in my favour).

[demotlj]

@pilonya That's a good question. My biology background makes me enjoy drawing and painting animals, and my theological background has led me to create some children's books based on bible stories (self-published for my church families) but the only other way it may have affected me is that both disciplines require systematic thinking so I tend to be a very deductive learner and want to know all the whys and wherefores behind techniques. I love Jake Parker's lessons because he always has a structured outline to anything he teaches. Does neuroscience affect your art, or the way you approach it?

[Pilonya]

@demotlj That's also a good question I'd say that maybe some knowledge I have about visual perception does help me understand why we so much tend to draw what we know of the object instead of what we see. It is sort of a general principle of how the brain works. But well, one thing is theory, the other is practice. Other than that, I did a few simple illustrations that were focused on brain and mindfulness.