8 posts tagged “inspiration”
Keri Smith is an amazing illustrator w/tons of great ideas
Wish Jar Journal (her blog)
a work in progress.
1. Go for a walk. Draw or list things you find on the the sidewalk. 2. Write a letter to yourself in the future. 3. Buy something inexpensive as a symbol for your need to create, (new pen, a tea cup, journal). Use it everyday. 4. Draw your dinner. 5. Find a piece of poetry you respond to. Rewrite it and glue it into your journal. 6. Glue an envelope into your journal. For one week collect items you find on the street. 7. Expose yourself to a new artist, (go to a gallery, or in a book.) Write about what moves you about it. 8. Find a photo of a person you do not know. Write a brief bio about them. 9. Spend a day drawing only red things. 10. Draw your bike. 11. Make a list of everything you buy in the next week. 12. Make a map of everywhere you went in one day. 13. Draw a map of the creases on your hand, (knuckles, palm) 14. Trace your footsteps with chalk. 15. Record an overheard conversation. 16. Trace the path of the moon in relation to where you live. 17. Go to a paint store. Collect 'chips' of all your favorite colors. 18. Draw your favorite tree. 19. Take 15 minutes to eat an orange. 20. Write a haiku. 21. Hang upside down for five minutes. 22. Hang found objects from tree branches. 23. Make a puppet. 24. Create an outdoor room from things you find in nature. 25. Read a book in one day. 26. Illustrate your grocery list. 27. Read a story out loud to a friend. 28. Write a letter to someone you admire. 29. Study the face of someone you do not like. 30. Make a meal based on a color theme. (i.e. all white). 31. Creat a museum of very small things. 32. List the smells in your neighborhood. 33. List 100 uses for a tin can. 34. Fill an entire page in your jounral with small circles. Color them in. 35. Give away something you love. 36. Choose an object, draw the side you can't see. 37. List all of the places you've ever lived. 38. Describe your favourite room in detail. 39. Write about your relationship with your washing machine. 40. Draw all of the things in your purse/bag. 41. Make a mini book based on the theme, "my grocery list". 42. Create a character based on someone you know. Write a list of personality traits. 43. Recall your favorite childhood game. 44. Put postcards of art pieces/painting on the inside of your kitchen cupboard doors, so you can see them everyday (but not become deaf to them.) 45. Draw the same object every day for a week. 46. Write in your journal using a different medium (brush & ink, charcoal, old typewriter, crayons, fat markers. 47. Draw the individual items of your favorite outfit. 48. Make a useful item using only paper & tape. 49. Research a celebration or ritual from another culture. 50. Do a temporary art installation using a pad of post it notes & a pen. 51. Draw a map of your favorite sitting spots in your town/city. (photocopy it and give it to someone you like.) 52. Record all of the sounds you hear in the course of one hours. 53. Using a grid, collect various textures from magazine and play them off of each other. 54. Cut out all media for one day. Write about the effects. 55. Make pencil rubbings of six different surfaces. 56. Draw your garbage. 57. Do a morning collage. 58. List your ten most important things, (not including animals or people.) 59. List ten things you would like to do every day. 60. Glue a photo of yourself as a child into your journal. 61. Trasform some garbage. 62. Write an entry in your journal in really LARGE letters. 63. Collect some 'flat' things in nature (leaves, flowers). Glue or tape them into your journal. 64. Physically alter a page. (i.e. cut a hole, pour tea on it, burn it, fold it, etc.) 65. Find several color combinations you respond to in public. Document them using swatches, write where you found them. 66. Write a journal entry describing something "secret". Cut it up into several pieces and glue them back in scrambled. 67. Record descriptions or definitions of subjects or words you are interested in, found in encyclopedias or dictionaries. 68. Draw the outline of an object without looking at the page. (contour drawing). 69. What were you thinking just now? write it down. 70. Do nothing. 71. Write a list of ten things you could to do. Do the last thing on the list. 72. Create an image using dots. 73. Do 3 drawings at different speeds. 74. Put a small object in your left pocket (or in a bag), Put your left hand in the pocket. Draw it by feel. 75. Create a graph documenting or measuring something in your life. 76. Draw the sun. 77. Create instructions for a simple everyday task. 78. Make prints using food. (fruit and vegetables cut in half, fish, etc.) 79. Find a photo. Alter it by drawing over it. 80. Write a letter using an unconventional medium. 81. Draw one object for twenty minutes. 82. Combine two activities that have not been combined before. 83. Write about your day in an encyclopedic fashion. (i.e. organize by subject.) 84. Write a list of all the things you do to escape. 85. Cut a random shape out of several layers of a magazine. Make a collage out of the results. 86. Write an entry in code. 87. Make a painting using tools from the bathroom. 88. Work with a medium that is subtractive. 89. Write about or draw some of the doors in your life. 90. Make a postcard that has some kind of activity on it. 91. Divise a journal entry using "layers". 92. Divise an entry using "layers". 93. Write your own definition of one of the following concepts, sitting, waiting, sleeping (without using the actual word.) 94. List 10 of your habits. 95. Illustrate the concept of "simplicity".
These guys make gorgeous letterpress stationery & cards.... I ended up buying both of the blue & green prints. I don't even have any room for them, although I'm considering moving the Mark Ryden, Graffitti Bunny & Camilla Engman prints somewhere else since I'm not that happy with the arrangement of them.
Anyways, thanks to everyone that voted on the prints!
Here's some more beautiful notecards/prints/stationery, etc. from Elum
aren't these a cute idea - they're quarterly updates for baby
If you're into photgraphy at all, I think you'll like this site a lot.
It's called Photojojo and you can subscribe to the newsletter here
I could literally spend hours on this site.
It's full of how-to/tutorial/diy/tips with lots of fun projects...
some of the articles include (and these aren't even the best, just too tired to go through the entire site)
Make Your Own Photo Mosaics With LEGOs
Panographies: Panoramas on Steroids 
I know the contest is over but in an effort to spark my creativity and get my lazy butt motivated to get moving on the baby tshirts I thought I'd try to do something creative everyday - no matter how big or small......
Here's a few
also blatantly copied from whipup.net
*i'll remove it if author requests
Whether you keep a visual journal to sketch in, or jot down your thoughts, or glue in your magazine cuttings or draw up your craft designs, visual diarys are a wonderful way to keep track of your thought processes.
work out what the purpose of the journal is - to play, to help create, to collect memories, to be organised, to express yourself
begin when you feel the urge - get a book, make one out of recycled papers, buy a beautiful one from an art shop, or get a blank white spiral bound A4 book. Choose a sturdy book that will survive being carried around and has sturdy pages that won't tear or deteriorate quickly - choose a book that will last.
time to get over the first intimidating blank page - how do you start? write down how you feel at that very moment, write a list of what you want to achieve, your goals and hopes, write about your observations, write about your day, a conversation you had, something your heard or read and what you thought about it. try these exercises
how do i get started on the visual aspect - you think you can't draw, you think you are not an artist - well who cares, this journal is for you - for your personal growth. Start off drawing what you see, a tree, a leaf, your cup of tea - draw maps and plans, draw your ideal frock or just scribble and draw a page of circles. try some drawing excercises like blind contour drawing - not looking at your page and not taking the pen off the page, try drawing self portraits - give yourself time limit - do 1 minute sketches.
adding colour and interest to your journal - collect bits of things that interest you and stick them in your journal - press a flower, glue in some shiny chocolate wrappers, theatre tickets and newspaper and magazine cuttings. keep wonderful bits of paper and make a collage, use watercolours and crayons, experiment with colour. try some of keri's 100 things
find a time to write or draw in the journal everyday, make a habit of it, a quiet time.
tips for journalling:
amano books - as well as selling beautifully handmade journals also has a page on getting started with your journal
a helpful page on how she started and how you can too
read layers of meaning's archives
some inspirational sketchbooks
tania keeps cutting of things that inspire her
kim's journals are filled with wonderful sketches
beautiful pages from a travel journal
i love emma's mixed media journal pages
keri's journal pages are a wonderful inspiration
great sketch book pages here
and here
where to get a journal
http://www.lovelydesign.com/lovely_products_take.html
http://www.exlibrisanonymous.com
http://www.blissen.com/blis85.html
