New to art journaling? Curious about this fun papercraft? Then join me for a series on Art Journaling Prompts, where I share a few of my art journaling ideas and tricks.
Art Journaling Prompt: Drawing from Photos
Lately I’ve been wanting to practice drawing more. The last time I put any real effort into it was several years ago at an informal drawing workshop. Lately I’ve been noticing more and more how enjoyable it is to pick up a pen and doodle while on the phone or in a conference call. It’s soothing, you know?
So yesterday I used it for a bit of badly-needed art journaling therapy. My daughter and husband and I were walking by the neighborhood liquor store when a man drove up onto the sidewalk to park in front of the shop. (Which they do here.) We were directly in front of him, my three-year-old with her new scooter. Because she is three and therefore short, and messing about with her scooter, both my husband and I held out “stop” hands at the driver as he came toward us. The driver kept moving forward too quickly for my comfort, Keith and I tried to pull Anna away from the car and the whole situation pretty much disintegrated from there: Anna struggling with her scooter, Keith trying to get her out of the way and me…well, me still waving about at this man.
The driver stopped his car a foot away from us, stormed out and started yelling at us in Polish. For blocking his way, presumably, although by that point two-way communication was not my highest priority.
So Anna is crying, I am losing it at the jerk driver (pointlessly, in English) and Keith is wrangling with a small person and a scooter. It’s not our best moment.
When we got home, I was still pretty shaken and the only thing going through my head was that I needed to focus my concentration on something other than crazy drivers, liquor stores, living in a place where I can’t communicate and a general sort of rushing adrenaline. I spotted my journal lying on the table, and it was like a physical relief.
Strange, isn’t it? The second I saw my journal, it was like: Okay, this will make things better.
And you know what? It did.
Since I’d planned to do some drawing, I had a photo printed out already, my pen set aside and only had to fetch something to color with. So while Keith and Anna went to get dinner, I propped up the photo and just drew. With the pen. Right on the paper. At that point I wasn’t worried about perfection as much as I wanted to just fall into that zone—you know that zone, right?—where the only thing to focus on is the way your hand moves on the paper.
Then I colored.
And I will suggest to you (and remind myself) that coloring has to be one of the most effective stress relievers around.
When I was done, I was still upset. But I wasn’t holding on to it the way I can sometimes (okay, often) do. It was as if some of the frustration and adrenaline and worry and sheer freak-out panic of a car headed toward your child somehow leaked out of me through the pen and the crayons and the process.
Art Journaling Prompt: Drawing from Photos
So all of this is a rather long-winded approach to this week’s art journaling prompt. (Thank you for hanging in here with me.) I wanted to practice drawing, using a photo as the basis. The point is not to create a perfect representation; rather, it was just to have something to model on. I printed my photo on my home printer. It’s about 6″ square.
Choosing a Photo for Art Journal Sketching
You’ll notice my photo is very simple, which is a deliberate choice. I wanted something with minimal details to fuss over, so I picked a scene with a lot of open space and straight lines. And I didn’t worry about getting it down perfectly—it was really just an exercise to get used to the pen in my hand and the process of training my eye to look at an image and then look at a blank page—and to make a bridge of sorts between the two.
It’s not perfect, it’s not detailed, but that’s sort of not the point.
Art Journaling Pens & Crayons
Initially I thought I’d draw first with a pencil, then re-trace with a pen, but in the end decided to be more spontaneous, so I drew right on the paper with my Staedtler 0.5 pigment liner.
My crayons were purchased at a post office in a small German town over the summer and I hadn’t had a chance to use them yet. This is a 10-color set of waxy crayons made by an office supply company called Q-Connect. I chose them because they’re simple to use, and because they were the first thing I spotted in my Coloring Supplies drawer.
I didn’t want to have to mix or prepare anything, use water or even have too many colors to choose from, so a basic selection of crayons was perfect. You could even use your kids’ crayons if you wanted to. The simpler the choice and preparation, the faster you can get to actually putting down color.
Art Journaling Writing
I love to write. I write every day and most of my art journaling pages are heavy on writing. But this one isn’t. Why not?
A couple of reasons. First, not all art journaling pages need to have a lot of writing, if any.
It really depends on the purpose of your page and frankly, whether you want to write on it. In this case, I wanted the page to be a drawing practice.
I also knew that if I started writing, all the frustrations of the day would spill out on the page…and this was not the page I wanted them to be on. (I saved that for me regular journal.)
Third, I really didn’t have much attachment to this image. It’s a nice pier and I enjoyed being there, but it’s not a place or a scene that really evokes a lot of emotion for me. I took the photo because I liked the emptiness of it, and the way the lines crossed vertically and horizontally. There’s simply not much more for me to say about it. I’m not sure if I took the photo with the idea of using it for sketching, but it might have been a subconscious thing. Who knows?
Instead, I just wrote the date, location and “at the end of the pier”. And that was enough.
This week, why not try drawing from a photo? Or if drawing isn’t your thing, you could print out a photo and simply draw or color over it.
And PS. Art really is therapy. Thank goodness.
Happy Monday!
Intrigued by art journaling? You might check out my Kick Start Art Journaling e-course. This is a 6-week online course with a lesson and art journaling prompt delivered right to your email in-box every Sunday. Just $15.00, it’s a super-affordable way to start art journaling, or to explore your practice more with additional journaling prompts. Hope to see you there!
