Everyday Pages: Build A Relaxing Sketchbook Habit

1. Introduction: Hello and welcome to my class, Everyday Pages. Build a relaxing sketchbook habit once bread at a time. My name is Imran. I'm a graphic designer and illustrator. And if you watched any of my previous sketchbook classes, whether it be the creative sketchbook or sketchbook journaling, then you'll know I'm a huge advocate of building good well being in our life by creating a daily habit that will really give us a way to escape away from the hustle and bustle of our daily life and enjoy a little bit of time, a little bit of peace and quiet, creating beautiful sketches and writing our thoughts in our sketchbooks. This class is a continuation of my previous classes. But this time, what we're going to do is we're going to focus on a specific subject or a topic that you absolutely love. And that's what the entire class is all about. I'm going to break down the process that I've personally been doing for the last couple of years, creating lovely spreads. This class will be divided into six parts. And the first part, we're going to be discussing what everyday pages are all about, the thinking behind it, and the process that I want you to try following so you can create the beautiful sketches in illustrations and writings to put into your sketchbook. And then we're going to move on to the class supplies. I'll go through some of the recommended supplies that I've used, and then Part three, we're going to be concentrating on the subject and selection. That's where the fun starts, and we're going to explore all those lovely topics that you like. I'll have a nice step by step process for you to follow and narrow down those subjects and topics that you may love to talk about or read up on or just have that lovely enjoyment time where you're watching a video about that certain subject. It may be vintage cars. It may be beautiful old school camera. Coffee and cakes, one of my particular favorites. As you well and truly know, if you've watched any of my classes before. The fourth stage is all about planning your spread in advance in a nice kind of rough style so that you have some direction and a bit of an idea of options that you may want to explore. And then the fifth stage is all about the layout and composition. Yes, I will be providing you with a nice resource sheet that shows you different layouts and possibilities across different shapes and sizes of sketchbooks so that you can print these out and use them as a reference for inspiration when you can't figure out where I'm supposed to place an illustration or a little bit of writing. Finally the final stage, where I'm going to go ahead and do a complete demonstration of all the stages that we did before where I'm going to do a bit of research, select the subject, use digital method, and even go outside and gather some information on the subject that I've chosen, and then amalgamate it all into a nice little rough sketch, and then I'm going to transfer it onto my sketchbook using the mediums that I absolutely love to use. So I know that you can't wait to watch me do this so grab yourself a nice drink, get yourself a nice treat, sit back, relax, get your sketchbook ready. And let's get started with the class. 2. Class Project: Okay, welcome back. Let's quickly go through what your class project is going to be all about before we start the lessons. So this class is divided into two main parts. The first part of the class has all the lessons that will go through what everyday pages is all about, the class supplies that you need, and the step by step process of how I create my spreads in my everyday pages process. Then once we've done P one, then P two will start where I will implement all of this process that I've gone through from part one and go through a real demonstration step by step using my favorite materials and supplies and selecting my inspired topics and subjects that I love. Two part process and then your class project is all about going through P one and P two of the class and being inspired and creating your very own first everyday pages spread of your favorite subject, and that's it. And once you've completed watching Part one and Part two of the class, and you've completed your beautiful spread of your chosen selected subject, using your favorite materials and supplies, all you need to do is take lovely pictures of the stages and your final spread and upload it to the project gallery so that we can all see your beautiful enjoyment in this journey of everyday pages, once you've completed that, all you need to do is leave a nice review on the class so other students can find this class and be inspired by your work so we can all learn from each other and enjoy this everyday process and bring it into our daily routine to improve our well being. That's it now. You know what your class project is. Now you're in focus and you're ready to start watching the lessons. Let's jump straight into them next. 3. Everyday Pages: Okay, welcome back. Let's now quickly go through what everyday pages are all about, the thinking behind everyday pages so that we can set the scene for the next part of the class. What are everyday pages? Everyday pages is a relaxing sketchbook habit that lets you enjoy your favorite subject and topics. Through daily creativity, simple research and using traditional materials. So let's now move on to answering the question of why everyday pages. So, number one, everyday pages is a creative dive into your favorite subjects, whether it be coffee, to nature, to vintage cameras, choose a topic that you love and explore it through drawing, sketching, illustration. And writings and even some of your daily journal thoughts. Why not? It's all about that creative journey through the subjects that you love. Number two, it's a tactile, joyful way to create any medium that you enjoy using or that's super satisfying for you to use, use that medium to bring your sketchbook spreads to life one layer at a time. Number three, it forms a mindful routine into improving your well being. Focus your mind, unplug from the distractions, and enjoy the calming rhythm of working with physical mediums, with your hands, with your mind in focus and with your heart and with a big smile. Finally, number four, it will provide a gentle habit that builds over time with no pressure at all. We're not looking at perfection or creating perfect illustrations. It's all about creating and building this habit over time that you can really explore and add into your daily routine and reflect once you've created, revisit those lovely pages, and remember it all with a smile because it's all about your favorite subject. That's it. That's the reasons for everyday pages and for you to jump into this class and get ready to go. It's all about building that daily sketchbook habit where you actually go ahead and draw something, write about something that you love, and really build this into your daily routine. So it provides you with a lovely escape for you to relax and improve your well being. Let's now move on to the class supplies that you're going to need in order to start designing and drawing up these beautiful spreads in your sketchbook. 4. Class Supplies: Doke, welcome back. Let's now talk about the class supplies that you're going to need for this class in order to do the lessons and do your class project. Number one, yes, you're going to need a sketchbook because the class is all about drawing and creating this sketchbook habit. So yes, the most important thing is a sketchbook. Now, I would advise that you get yourself a watercolor sketchbook, preferably one that is 100% cotton at 300 GSM paper weight. However, if you don't have 100% cotton available wherever you are in the world, then any good quality sketchbook will do, but try getting a sketchbook that has some decent paper inside it because you're going to be using this on a daily basis, and you want it to be able to withstand your mediums that you use, and on a particular day, you might want to swap around your mediums. So it's really important that the sketchbook can handle mediums that you go ahead and use on a daily basis. And again, that's one of the main reasons that I recommend using a watercolor sketchbook. Now, these can come in various shapes and sizes and formats. Whichever size you're comfortable with, it makes no difference. But I do recommend that you don't go too small with this class because we are really creating a lot of details within the spreads themselves. There's going to be so many different elements, and you don't want to squash them all together in a small space. Having a decent sized spread will really make the job a lot easier, and it'll make it a lot fun. So I generally recommend that you don't go smaller than an A five size sketchbook. I personally like to use A four and B five sizes. My personal favorite is B five, and that's the one that I've been using for the last couple of years. I've particularly been fond of using the Echa series. I've used a lot of their books in different formats in small formats, square formats, A five, and especially my favorite one, the B five. I've tried out their ranges. They can be rather expensive. But I feel that having a decent quality sketchbook will really reap the benefits of this entire process. Grab yourself a good sketchbook and again, have a look at my recommended class supply list in the resource pack, where I give you reviews of which ones I've used and alternative to the ones that I used that are fairly decent. Two, you're going to need some mediums to use to start filling in those beautiful pages in your sketchbooks. Now, this is entirely up to you what mediums you want to use. Generally, I tend to go with some pencils and then some inking tools, and then some format of color, which most of the times is watercolor. So whatever you like to use from a traditional perspective, make sure that you've got your lovely mediums and tools ready. If you're using colored pencils, they're nice and sharp and ready at hand. It's always a good idea to have all your tools ready. In your pencil case or in your container so that you don't have to go running after your mediums if you can't find them all of a sudden when you're doing your beautiful drawings and illustrations. And again, I've got a general recommended supply list in that same resource pack, so do give that a look and see which ones I use. But again, I'm going to generally stick to pencil ink and then watercolor and then maybe some marker work here and there. But I have to remind you that using markers can be a little bit tricky, especially if you're using alcohol markers, which I'm actually saying do not use them for this actual class because I don't intend to use them. But if it's something that you really want to use, then maybe check out my class on alcohol markers and the types of sketchbooks that you can use with those markers. But to be totally honest with you, I'm going to say don't use alcohol markers at all. Instead, use water based brush markers. That's a medium that I use, and they won't have any problem with bleed through that will ruin your artwork. I would say avoid alcohol markers unless you're absolutely adamant that you must use them. In which case, you need to have a alcohol bleed proof sketchbook, which can be quite difficult to find at some point. Again, I'm going to recommend just stick to water based markers. Some other useful items that can help you along the way. I tend to use a lot of these, so I'm just going to quickly list these out now. Sheets of plain printer paper. These are really handy to have, especially when we do the planning stage of our spreads. We don't want to use expensive paper for this. It's just to create rough sketches and layouts so that we have a direction and a focus. So a nice bunch of plain paper or even lined paper, it makes no difference. Have them to the side. It's a great idea. Number two, watercolor brushes, again, watercolor brushes, you're going to need if you're using watercolor paint. So it's always a good idea to have a range of watercolor brushes, maybe some fine detail brushes, some medium round brushes. I tend to use one or two brushes throughout my watercolor adventures, so I'll be using them. And again, it'll all be listed in the resource sheet, the particular ones that I use. And alongside your watercolors you're going to need. A jar of water, a couple of jars of clean water. A mixing palette is always a good idea. Have some tissue to hand, some paper towels to clean up those messes, or just to dampen your brush and get rid of all that excess water. So these are usually the typical supplies that you'd need if you're going to go down the watercolor route. Having a sharpener and an eraser is always a good idea if you're going to be using a lot of colored pencils. And even when you're doing some light work with graphite pencil, if that's the route that you choose, having a decent eraser and a decent sharpener will be super handy. And having some clips are always useful when you're using a sketchbook so you can hold the pages together so they don't flop all over the place, especially when you're applying watercolor or wet mediums. A bull clips or any kind of clipboard style clips would work fine. And finally, some scissors. It's always a good idea to have some scissors at hand just in case you want to do some cutouts and place them on your spread to see how they so that's it for the other item recommended list. And overall, we don't really need that many things. It's just a sketchbook, a decent quality sketchbook. Get your mediums ready, have a few extra items that are going to help you along the way, and you're ready to start. So let's now move on to the exciting stuff and focus on your lovely subject selection. 5. Subject Selection: Hidoki welcome back. I know you're excited for this part because we're going to look at subject selection. Now this is divided into three parts. Part number one, write a list of five to seven subjects or things that you love, like, and enjoy. Now, I've only said five to seven things because sometimes if you have a list of too many things, then it's difficult to focus on one. So write as many as you want, have it on a piece of paper, and keep it to the subjects that you really enjoy rather than additional subject, which you can add at a later stage. Number two, select anyone from that list that particularly excites you at that moment in time and highlight it with a highlighter or just circle around it, so it's in focus on the actual list itself. And finally, number three, place that sheet where you've got the list of your favorite subject and the one that's highlighted, place it in the back part of your sketchbook. Generally, a lot of sketchbooks have this lovely kind of pocket at the back. We can throw in a couple of sheets of paper, small little kind of cuttings ideal for this at but if you haven't got this, then that's absolutely fine. Just get that piece of paper that you have and stick it at the back, maybe the back hardcover part of your sketchbook, so it's inside. Stick it with some sellar tape or a bit of glue or even a bit of blue tech, whatever you have at hand. This will remain as our reference list for when we continue doing our lovely subject in our sketchbooks. That's it. Now we have initiated our subject selection. We can move on to the next one, and that's all about planning our spread. 6. Planning The Spread: Okay, welcome back. I know you're super excited like me because we're about to start planning our spread. So I'm just going to quickly give you a summary of the options and methods that you can use to start planning at this stage of this wonderful journey. So, number one, research your subject. Now you can research your subject in two main methods. You can do the easy method, which is the most quick method, and that is online, go online in the world of digital and have a look on Google, pinterests, go onto websites, articles, YouTube, or you can even use a little bit of AIchat GPT, if that's what you want to do. But again, if you don't like using AI, then just go ahead and do the research from proper articles that you can find online on your selected subject. The second option is to go offline and go all analog instead of digital, where you can go to libraries, visit the libraries and find books on those subjects that you love, go to museums, go to shops, even go to art galleries, where you can have a look at your subjects that have been painted by the masters and get inspired by their color palettes, and their beautiful compositions. And you can also have a look at maybe some books or newspaper articles or even some exhibitions that might be going on or event displays in your area for that particular subject or topic. Then number two, you're going to be summarizing and sketching all of the information that you've gathered, whether it be online information or offline information, or maybe a mixture of both. That's usually the route that I take. I like to do a bit of online and a bit of offline and bring it all together and start scribbling away and writing a summary of my main topic on plain paper, sketching rough outlines of the key elements that I want to include. And then once you've done this, it doesn't have to just be on one sheet of paper. It can be on two or three or as many as you'd like. This is just the initial ideation stage where you're getting everything down on paper, really nice and rough, maybe summarizing some of the areas that you find in maybe a book or a magazine or on an article, just highlight and pick out those areas that you find interesting or that are relevant to you and have a look at the kind of photographs and images of those subjects. And also look at the real life versions of those things, too. So, for example, if your subject that you've chosen is fruit, then maybe just go to a fruit store, buy a couple of fruit, take some pictures of some fruit, and do some studies on fruits. I love doing lovely watercolor illustrations with some poetry, all about the wonderful world of fruits. So that's another way on the offline method. So try it out online, offline, get your information together, scribble it all down on a few sheets of plain paper, and that's that stage complete. And now we've got all our information together and we've roughly outlined it and planned it across our paper, our plain piece of paper. We are now ready to do the layout and composition. So let's now move on to that. 7. Layout & Composition: O kidokF this next stage, the layout and composition, what I want you to do is download the PDF that I've got in the resource area, and this has all the different variations and layouts and compositions for portrait size sketchbooks, for landscape size sketchbooks, and also for square size sketchbooks for you to get inspired from. If you can't come up with a quick layout on composition and you can't think of anything, this is just there to give you some focus and direction and some inspiration for you to use. So print whichever one is relevant to you. So if you're using a portrait sketchbook, then print that sheet. Using a landscape or a square, then print that relevant sheet out and fold it up and keep it at the back pocket of your sketchbook just like you did with your subject list. And that's it now. You've selected your subject. You've researched it, you've planned it on a page, on a couple of sheets of paper, and now you've refined the layout and composition by looking at the template that you've just printed out. So now you're going to be ready to start designing your spreads. So let's move on to that one next. 8. Create The Pages: Dk, welcome back. It's now time to create the pages. So this is the final step before we go ahead and start designing in our sketchbooks. So, number one, select the summary pages that you want to include in your first spread that you want to design. So those sheets of paper that you put all the information on that you picked out from your research, select the areas that you want to use for your spread. And then number two, select the layout composition that you want to go with and create a new plan on a plain sheet of paper using your selected summary page. So now you've got a new plan that you've used and picked out the research and the little bits and bobs and the drawings and the illustrations and the writings that you want to go ahead with in your sketchbook and you've decided that you want to go with a certain layout and composition all you're going to do now is you're going to just amalgamate all of that, put it together in a nice sheet of paper that reflects the orientation of your spread. Then finally, number three, use your new plan and recreate it in your sketchbook, start off with a pencil to do the outlining, following along the patterns and the composition layout that you've done in your plan, and then go in with some ink and then maybe go in with a little bit of cross hatching, if you want. And then finally, when it's all dry, give it a splash of watercolor and add in those beautiful writings or even some journal notes of your thoughts of what you feel like, whatever you like. That will give you a beautiful, complete spread that you've just done, following this method, and we're all going to be in happy days. So I can't wait to actually go ahead and start this now. So we've gone through all of the process and the procedure that we need to do to get to this stage. What I'm going to do now is I'm going to grab myself an ice drink. Get myself a nice little treat. I might actually just go to the coffee shop. I think I will. Yes, I think I'll do that. I think I'll go to the coffee shop, have a nice little treat, a bit of relaxation. Everything's ready. My plan is ready. It's on my table, and I'm going to start doing the sketching of my spread, so I'll see you when I'm ready to do that. 9. Inspired!: Kidoki welcome back. So I've just come back from the coffee shop. I had a gorgeous, gorgeous coffee and some lovely biscuits with a bit of jammy jam in them. And that got me thinking while I was eating meat biscuits with a jam that, oh, I actually fancy doing a little bit of research on jam, and it was raspberry jam, I think it was. But I was in the kind of mode of jam and fruit. So on the way back from the coffee shop, I went past the grocery store, and I just got inspired 'cause I saw some gorgeous, lovely plums. And, yes, that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to go ah I do my lovely little spread all about plums. I'm inspired and motivated to do it now. So I'm going to start doing some research into plums. I even got myself a couple of different varieties that could get me hands on. And yes, I know what you're thinking. I already had a plan before to do those these teapot sketches that I did, but I'm going to park that because I've just been completely bamboozled when I saw these plums in the shops. So what I'm going to do now is jump straight into that research method where I'm going to go online. I've already been inspired by the offline visuals of these plums and thinking about it on my walk on the way back home from the coffee shop. So let's get the paper out. Let's get the iPad out, and let's go and do a bit of research on Mr. Google or on Pinterest and see what we can come up with. 10. Research: Okay, okay, welcome back. Let's now do our research. We have selected our subject, as you already know lovely plums. That inspired me. Let's now get the iPad out and let's have a nice little writing and research from what we can find online. So let's quickly go ahead and do that. Now, so I'm just going to generally have a look at what I can find on Google. I've got nice plums over here, different types of plums. These are the ones that I actually picked up the yellow ones, the black ones, and these nice Victoria plums that we have in the UK, which are an absolute classic. So maybe just have a look at some writings that we can find some things on. So let's just click away from that and yes, I think this is looking really good. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to go ahead and jot down some of the main kind of facts and things that really stick out to me that I like to read up on and then maybe do some sketches of the images that I can find online and especially the sketches of those real plums that I have to come up with some information pages. So let's move on to that one now. Okay, okie, welcome back. You can see now I've done my rough little research using the iPad and having a look at Pinterest and finding some more details on Google. And I also looked at those lovely pums that I bought earlier on. I did a nice cross section of them, cut them up, and after I cut them up and left them and took some nice little videos and pictures. You know what I? I eat them, I eat them all, and they were delicious. So that's a great way to do your subject spread and eat your subject at the same time as long as it's edible. Don't be eating things that are not edibles, but if having fruit, generally, that should be edible. So enjoy and draw and research at the same time. So you can see here, I've just done a nice bit of rough writing of a few details, a bit of history of plums, different types of plums, especially in the UK, Victoria plums there. Then we have these blue tip plum trees, then we have local plums from our kind of local garden then the ones that I found in the supermarket, the grocery store, I found nice yellow plums, black plums. And the Victoria plums, they're fantastic, beautiful shapes and lovely flavor. We've actually got our own plum tree at one of my relatives houses, so I might just go there and have a look and see if they've got any nice ripe plums on the tree. Absolutely fantastic stuff. And again, just on the last page over here, just a few details of the benefits of plums and what you can do with plums, some drawings of the plums that I found. So just like this, I've just done this. It only took me about five or 10 minutes to do. I did it quickly on the screen for you to see. So once you've got all your lovely details here on your pieces of paper, the next stage we need to do is have a look at our layout and composition like we did before. So let's grab hold of our layout and composition sheet. This one over here is for the portrait spread. So I'm thinking with all this lovely lovely information and a lot of drawings and sketchings that I can potentially do, I'm thinking maybe I might do a combination of these spreads, so I might have a main spread on the left hand side of my book that has mainly drawing on it and a bit of scattered writing, so maybe something like this on the left hand side. The right hand side, I might have something that has more information with accompanying picture on the right. So just like this, like a crisscross design in a grid, but I'll do it as I go along and see whatever works best. The next stage now is to use all our information now and fit it in into a nice layout on a fresh piece of paper. Let's move on to that one next. 11. New Plan: Oki doke, welcome back. Now, what we're going to do is we're going to start creating our new plan that has our layout and composition that we want to go ahead with. So on the screen over here, you can see, I've got a nice clean sheet of paper. This is just normal printer paper, nothing fancy. And I've got my Bwpoint pen, and I've got a ruler. What I'm going to do is, I'm just going to go ahead and measure out the kind of mid section of this piece of paper, so it's roughly about here, and I'm just going to draw myself a line in the middle. Now, the sketchbook that I like to use, as you already know, is a B five size sketchbook. So this kind of replicates the area of a B five spread. So that's the left side of the page, and this is the right hand side of the page. And that's the reason that I'm doing this so that I can easily imitate this when it comes to the final stage of putting the lovely work onto the actual sketchbook itself. So what I'm going to do is on this left hand side, I've actually decided that I'm going to keep this free flowing. I'm not going to stick too much to the layout and templates that I've got. Again, these are just guides for you to give you a bit of an idea to kind of, like, spark up that inspiration for where you want to place things. It's always good to have one of these printed out and maybe just put on the side of your table so you can keep looking at it. I've just got it on the top there, and then that can give me some sort of guidance or direction when I'm a little bit confused of where to place things. So what I want to start off with is I want to have the title over here, so I'm just going to add in plums on the top left hand side. I'm not going in neat. This is not about being neat and perfect. This is about going in with the layout and composition and just adding in the words that we want to use and just doing light rough sketches. So I'm going to put down plums over here because that's what it's all about. And then I'm thinking maybe have some detail over here. I might start off with a little bit of detail from this first sheet that I have. I've got this history of plums when plums first started being cultivated. I think I'm going to do that. Let's quickly go ahead and write this down in this space over here. Oki Doke, so I've got my little bit of blurb about the history over there. And then what I'm thinking is I might just do a nice little drawing of a plum over here on the right hand side. So actually, on this sheet, I've actually got the Victorian plum, so I might go ahead and do that. So maybe just drop in this kind of image, and it doesn't have to be exactly the same from the reference source that you use. You can go ahead and manipulate the image and make it fit the design of your spread. That's absolutely fine. I don't want you to be worrying about designing things perfectly. Just get a rough indication where you want your drawings to go. Then when you come to do them in your sketchbook, when you come to inking them, then you can spend as much time on them as you want. We're not here creating perfect art, like I always say in all my classes. It's never about realism, photorealism or any type of realism. It's just about relaxing your mind and just following this process and just having something to do while you relax. That's what art is all about. It's an escape, a relaxation. So just draw it as it flows, and you can see I'm going over the spread now, so I'm going over the midpoint. So I want it to kind of flow across the spread. Generally, I like the way that looks. It tends to look quite nice and gives it a unique flow. So I think that's about it for this one. And then I think I might just put a little bit of a note over here on Okay, so that's my first page done. I've nicely labeled it and put it across the spread so I can move that one out of the way. The next spread that I've got or the next few spreads is basically these here that we did of the cross section, and then I've got a little bit of details on different types of kind of benefits of those plums in gardens. So I think I might keep that for this right hand side. And I think let's keep that for the right hand side and maybe do the cross sections here. Yes, I think we can do the cross sections over here. And we'll see how it goes. So I think let's do the cross sections in this section over here of my spread. But before I do that, what I really want to do is I really want to have a nice drawing kind of covering this area. So for this area, maybe I do this one, might do this kind of this blue tit plum tree. Funny name that isn't it, but let's just call it the blue plum tree. So let's maybe add that over here. So we've got blue. And then all I'm going to do is I'm just going to maybe start with a bit of writing over here, put this writing across here, and then I'm going to expand this drawing. I'm going to go get that reference image that I have, expand the drawing when I come to do it in the sketchbook, but just have kind of a nice shape coming in this way. So let's do that now. Okay? Now, what I'm going to do is I'm going to start doing that design of this branch over here, so I'm just going to drop this branch. And with this one, we have a lot of the kind of plums coming out from the branches in this kind of scene that I've got down here, and then again, maybe drop one in over here. And then just drop in these plus gorgeous looking plums, these beautiful color there. Again, with the spread that I want, I want to vary the color, so I'll have some bluish purple shade here for the plums and have some red, orange, yellowish shade. It'll just make it look so much more vibrant. I think that'll just give it a really, really nice look. Again, we're just doing this to enjoy the process. It's all about enjoying the process. Make it up as you go along, if that's what you want to do. You don't have to draw anything specific or correct. Just enjoy that process, enjoy these subjects that you like to talk about or admire or just enjoy. That's what it's all about. Draw, enjoy, relax, do a bit of writing, and you're good to go. Just like that, I'm going to maybe drop in a couple of leaves from here and I think maybe a bit more fruit hangings down here, and I think that looks quite nice, maybe just adding another one down there and then to leave it at that. So I think that part is done, and then I've just got this one over here a little bit blurb about local plums, but I might leave that towards the end if I have space. Again, you don't have to fit everything in from your research. Just pick out the bits that you like. It's always a good idea to have more pages of research so that you can pick and choose. But when you start drawing it out, you've got options rather than you're stuck with just one or two drawings and one or two bits of information, always give yourself flexibility so that you don't get frustrated. No, we don't want to get frustrated. We just want to relax and just go with the flow and enjoy this fantastic process. So, let's now do that cross section thing that we're talking about. From these. I think, yes, I'm going to go straight into the cross section. I really like the way the cross section looks. I bring it up on the screen, as well. So this is what I did from my images that I took off my plums that I was eating. So this was a cross section. Let's quickly put these in now. And there you go. So what I've done is I've kind of, like, alternated between the cross section and the full size and then gone the other way just to make it more interesting. I just did that as I went along. I didn't plan to do that. I plan to just have it straight as I did with my research. So just like that, be flexible, change it around, make it fit the orientation, and just add in a couple of interesting bits and bobs throughout your spread. So now I've got my last bit of information over here. I just move this one to the side down here and see what we can pull out of here. So this was mainly the health benefits. So let's just maybe add in health benefits here. And there we go, so I've just added in the health benefits over here, and I've done a little drawing of jam jar with some kind of plum jam in there and a bit of a chutney there. And then I've got some gaps over here, but I'm going to leave them as it is. This has given me a nice little kind of overview of what I want my spread to look like, and that's it. So really nice and simple few bits, just make them as you go along and then just add in whichever elements you like. And then when it comes to the actual sketching of it in your sketchbook, you can add in wherever you have space, do a couple of splashes, just do a couple of patterns if you like, just to fill in those areas if you need to. So that's my plan on a page, done that new plan. We are now ready to go ahead, open our lovely sketchbook, get our lovely supplies out, and start sketching this spread. So let's move on to that one next. 12. Sketchbook Time!: Ooky, welcome back. Let's now continue. We've got our lovely plan over here. So what we can do is do the exciting stuff and get it in our sketchbook. So on the screen over here, you've got the plan that we did. So that was my kind of rough layout of the plan. Again, sometimes when you're doing a plan, you might change your mind, you might want to move something around. That's absolutely fine. This is just a guideline to give you that direction so that you don't get too confused or you don't have that blank sketchbook page syndrome going on where you can't figure out where to place things. So just use your plan as a guide, and as you go along in your sketchbook when you're transferring this over, you may want to change it around. I might do that. Let's see how it goes. So the sketchbook that I'm going to be using is my favorite sketchbook. By etcha This is just the standard sketchbook in hot pressed paper, this particular one. I've used both the cold press and the hot pressed in this particular version, and currently my Cal press one is all finished, and I started this hot press one, so I'm going to continue in this. I don't like to leave the sketchbooks blank. I'd like to just continue until they get finished until I move on to the next one. This is the echa one, so let's just have a quick look at this. So see on the screen. You should be able to see that, and there we go. We've got our lovely etch sketchbook. And in this sketchbook, I actually just did different things and some drawings here and there, and a little bit of research type topics like this. And this was actually part of my pencil work that I did, enjoying a bit of InktensPencil, if you've not seen that class. And then here this is where I've got a nice spread that I did a while back all about matcher. The world of match not that I really drink match, but I just found it really interesting. My daughter was drinking a matcha oat milk glotte type thing, and I just found the colors really interesting. So I thought, I'll do a deep dive, and that's what it's all about doing a deep dive into things that interest you and doing your research and then coming up with some nice drawings from the research that so that's the last thing that I did in this book, so let's go on to the next page. Nicely marked up over here, move that out of the way. And I think what I'm going to do is I might just go ahead and go straight in with pen. I tend to not recommend going straight in with pen just in case you want to change things around. So ideally, for this stage, I would say just grab yourself a pencil and start doing the sketch. But like I said, I'm going to go ahead and use my pen straight because I have a rough idea and I know what I'm going to do with this. Let's get my pen out, and the pen that I'm using for the inking is my lovely fountain pen. This is just my standard ami all star fountain pen. That will work really nice. We don't want the lines to be too thick at this stage. So let's have a look. So I think I'm going to prop this up right in front of me so I know what I'm looking at. And then that way, I'll be able to work really well. So again, got my spread over here really nice, nice and easy. What I'm going to do is instead of doing the writing first, I'm going to go ahead and do the drawings. So I'm going to do the drawings first and get them laid out. That's the step that I always like to do when I'm working in my sketchbook. And then that gives me enough room to figure out where to put the writing and maybe make a few changes if I need to. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to start drawing this in now with my pen, and then I'll see you once that's done. Ok ok, I've now done the lovely drawings from my plan. Now you can see that I've changed my drawing slightly. So with my plan, I had the plums on this side, and I had the Victoria plum here as well. But I've decided that I want to change the layout a little bit so that it looks a bit more balanced. I didn't really like having the Victoria plum on the bottom here because it was kind of a different shape, and it kind of didn't look right to me when I was thinking about it. But that's what it's all about having this plan, having those rough little drawings that we did before. So the research drawings, having all these laid out in front of you close by, we'll give you some more ideas and spark a little bit more interest in your layout and composition. So just like that, I went ahead straight with pen and just drew in some of the areas that I liked from my plan and then changed it around a little bit. And what that has done now is that has given me a nice template to go ahead and start drawing in the lines for where I want my writings to go. Now best way to do the writing is, I would say, first of all, let's put a pen away. Let's put the pen away. So the best way to do the writings is draw some writing lines. Now, get your pencil out. That's what I'm going to do. I'm going to get my pencil out, use my standard pencil here. And what I'm going to do is I'm just going to get my ruler, so get a ruler, and then I'm just going to draw in my kind of title lines where I want the titles to go. So the main titles going to go over here. So I'm just going to go ahead and just draw a line down here. Just nice and lightly, we don't want these lines to be too hard. So that was where the main title of the page was. And then I had a little bit going on over here, so maybe have another title here for the Victoria plums, a bit of detail on the Victoria plums that I had written down on my plan. For the blue plums over here, we had another title over here, so just like that, on the titles, I'm just doing that so that we have a bit of guidance and then maybe there was the health benefits that I put down here, so maybe a title going down here. I think that's it for the main wants and maybe on this area, I've come up with this idea as I've gone along, but I can just do the writings that go underneath, which is absolutely fine. And for the actual lines for the content to go in, I've actually got myself a nice little template, and I know what you're thinking. Where did you get this template from? This looks really good. This is like a line stencil, and it's a little secret that I shouldn't really tell you, but I think I'll tell you anyway, but I actually make these. So this is one of my side projects that I do. I love to design things and make things as well, or to do with art, of course. So this is a product that I create. I make it. So if you're interested, then let me know, and I'll let you know where you can get this from. But yeah, so this is one of my templates, my stencil linemer. And all I'm going to do is with this now, I'm going to draw in the lines underneath the title areas and potentially where else, I think I might add some more writing. So let's quickly go ahead and do that now. Okay, okay, now you can see, I've added in my lines, and now this gives me a nice, lovely, lovely kind of template to just start dropping in my writing. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to get my fountain pen because I think I'm just going to do my writing with my fountain pen first and then we'll move on to the coloring aspect of things. But before we do that, I think it's time to grab myself a nice drink and have a break and just relax for a bit. So we'll move on to that stage next. 13. Writing: Oh, that's a nice bit of that licorice licorice TA hooked onto this stuff. Has a bit of a plum taste. Maybe that's because all I keep thinking about is plums. Okay. I'll have to park that on the side, put it on the side. And now let's get back to the class and do some writings. Okay, ok. Welcome back. Let's now continue on our page over here. We can start doing the writings now. I've got all my writings on me plan. So all I'm going to do is I'm going to use my same fountain pen or actually, I might change I might change it to my thicker fountain pen that I've got here. One of my favorite ones is my Ecoline. Is this the Ecoline? No, it's the ECO It's the ECO T fountain pen. I've got that plum tea. It's not even plum tea. It's licorice teas just made me go all funny, so let's just carry on. So I've got my black ink in this, just gonna open this on the side to make sure it doesn't leak. Let's just get that on the side over there. Fantastic stuff. So what we're gonna do is what I'm going to go ahead and do is just add in my title and start filling in those details that I had before. And then once we're done on that, we can let it dry and then have a look and see what it looks like. So I'll see you once that's done. Okay. Okay, now we're done, so I had a lot of fun doing that. It's such a relaxing exercise just doing some lovely writings with a nice fountain pen. And you can see, I've just filled in the areas that I put in with the pencil lines, and I think it's looking really good, especially with the nice deep black of the fountain pen, and then the light thin lines of the artwork. I think it just gives it a really nice balance, and it just makes it look interesting, doesn't it? So absolutely do this in your class project when you go and find your subject that you want to draw and write about. Try this out. Remember, you don't need to be very specific in things, keep things nice and loose. You don't need a lot of detail at all. Keep it very subtle in detail, subtle in writing, the writings that you do. They don't have to be specific facts or anything like that. You could even do some journals over here of what you feel for example, what I like what type of plums I like to eat and which kind of really give me a lot of enjoyment by just looking at the colors, it's just about enjoying the subject that you're writing about. Again, the advantage of doing fruit is you can go ahead and eat the fruit once you've drawn it and written about it. So absolutely great. What I'm going to do is I'm going to let this dry now and then the final stage is just to give it a splash of color. If you don't want to add color to it, that's absolutely fine. If you just want to go in with cross hatching or just maybe just light kind of tone work on it, absolutely fine. If you just want to leave it as it is, again, absolutely fine. So I'm going to let this completely dry out because I don't want any smudgy smudgies. And while this dries, I think I might go and grab a cheeky little snack. So I'll see you once that's done. 14. Watercolour: Okay, welcome back. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to go ahead and splash a bit of watercolor onto my illustrations. I'm going to keep it really nice and light. I'm not going to go in too much detail and start building lots of layers. That's not what I want to demonstrate. I just wanted to demonstrate just completing a nice simple page so that you have an idea how to follow this, and then you can go ahead and do as much detail as you like. And again, one thing to note is that you don't need to do an entire process and this entire spread all in one go, break it down, maybe spend a little bit of time on doing some research. On day one, and maybe the next day, spend a bit of time just amalgamating your information. And maybe the following day, Day three, just go ahead and start doing some sketching work. And then on day four, maybe you're ready to start doing the layout work in your sketchbook. And then on the next couple of days, just spread it out. Don't put too much pressure on yourself. It's all about building this routine so that you're constantly doing some type of artwork in your sketchbooks. And again, lot of the times this will just be a daily process. And that's what it's all about building that daily habit of having something to do in your sketchbook and remaining focused and having a direction. So, what I'm going to do now is I'm going to go ahead and quickly fill in just maybe one or two layers of watercolor on this, and then at the end, we'll see what it looks like and see if we need to do any additional work on it, maybe add a bit of colored pencils or a little bit of marker work, but we'll see how it goes. So let's move on to that one now. Okay, okay. We've now finished the kind of first and half second layer of the watercolor, and I'm just going to leave it like that. I don't want to spend too much time going in on it. I probably spent about 30 minutes just doing that. So let's let that dry now, and then once it's completely dry, I might add in a couple of hatching lines to just bring out a little bit of texture. And then what I might do is do a bit of a splashy splash of some watercolor droplets on it just to finish the page off, and then we're done. So I'll see you once that dry. 15. Finishing Touches: Okay, okay, welcome back. Everything is nice and dry to the touch now. So all I'm going to do is going to put my watercolor palettes away and my watercolors away so that they don't smudge everywhere. So just get that on the side over there now so we have our watercolors away. And then what I'm going to really do now is I'm just going to go ahead and maybe just add in some more detail with my fine liner or my fountain pen. Actually, I think I'm going to go in with my fountain pen. I just want a nice couple of thick lines going across some of the detailed area over here. And what I'm going to do is basically just use my fine liner to just really bring out some of the texture just on the sides here, like so so that it doesn't look too flat. But again, it makes no difference how much detail you have on yours. You can spend a couple of days doing detail work on it, work on it like a piecemeal type of thing, so that you maintain your lovely sketchbook habit. And again, that's what I'm really emphasizing here. It's not about the final result. It's about that habit, creating this habit that will last and you will continue the momentum of and that's what really it's all about. So just like this, just a couple of details there on the edges, and I'm just going to finish that off and just add in a bit more cross hatching. And then once that's done, maybe a few splashes of watercolor, and we are done. So let's quickly do that now. Okay, okay, welcome back. So now I've just added in a few stipples and a couple of cross hatching lines, a few hatching lines with my fountain pen just to really bring it out a little bit. I'm going to leave it at that. Otherwise, I'm going to sit here and I'm going to do lots and lots of details, and I'm going to be here forever all the way till my next class. So let's leave it at that. What I will do, though, is let's maybe do some splashes of a little bit of paint on here. So I've got me palette that I mixed with my other colors, maybe this nice kind of reddish color over here just to give it a bit of a pop. I like to do this in my watercolor sketchbooks. So it just gives it a nice funky look, not too much. Don't want to overdo it. But just like this, maybe just a couple of splashes here and there, just to fill in those kind of gap areas just like that. I've got a bit of red. It doesn't matter if it goes over the illustration or the writing. It just gives it that nice kind of organic effect, just like that with the red color. I think that's going to bring it out really nice. And then I've got my blue color as well. So maybe a couple of splashes with my bluish grayish tone that I use for the plums, just like this, on the corners there. That's looking really nice. Beautiful stuff. So I think that is done. What I might do is I might add in some kind of drop shadow typelines with a marker and thinking about it. I don't know whether I should do it or not. But sometimes what that does is it just adds a nice bit of pop. I think I'll do that. Let's see. I've got my brush marker here. Let's see what color that is. Always test it out before you use it. I think that's a bit too dark, that one, maybe a lighter tone would work. So maybe this one over here, that's much better. So yeah, I think I'm going to do that. I think I'm just going to add in maybe a couple of these kind of drop shadow areas here just to make the illustration pop a little bit. So just like that. Nothing too much. I'm not really that bothered whether it mixes in with those speckles. Should I really done this before I did those speckles. And then I've actually left this bit out. So this would be nice just to color these in in this gray tone over here, and again, just maybe a little bit under the leaves and under a couple of plums. It just adds to the illustration and just makes it look a bit more nicer. And again, if you have one of these brush pens, then maybe give this a go yourself. So let's just see over here where we've got this plate with a kind of fruit salad of plums. I do fancy a few plums right now. Actually, I'm a little bit hungry, so I might see which ones I've got left. I kept them in the fridge, the ones that I opened up, and I might have a few more of them. They do taste very nice, especially if they're nice and ripe. Don't want unripe ones because then they just taste all horrible. They taste like potatoes, just raw potatoes. But now, let's have some nice ripy ripe plums. So again, maybe just a couple of lines there, a couple of dots here and there, add that final kind of touch to the overall illustration. And I think that should be enough for now. Yes, I think I'm going to leave that. Otherwise, like I said, I'm going to be here forever, and you're probably just going to end up falling asleep. So let's now have a look at this. I've actually left that little plumby plum there. How dare you leave that little plum alone? I've got to color that in, so let me just get me maker out again, that brush pen gonna color it in with the brush pen. Always end up leaving something out, don't we? So just like that and maybe drop in a couple of lines like this, a couple of dots, make it look nice, then maybe do the same for these over here. Maybe nice little kind of effect. And I've left those pencil lines that I did with my template in there. Sometimes I rub them out, I raise them out before I put the paint on. This time, I thought, you know what? Let's leave them in. Let's make it look nice and raw, just like plums, but not eat them raw. Let's eat them nice and ripe. So there we go. I think that looks pretty cool. Looks really nice. So I think that's it. Now, we've done all of the steps for our lovely everyday pages. We selected our subject, we did the research. We then planned our spread using the template, maybe picked a few other template layouts out, and then we just went to and did it ourselves, didn't we? We just let it kind of organically grow on the page, and it was so much fun. It did take me quite a long time to do this. So as I mentioned before, take your time with each step, maybe do one step every single day, or kind of spread it over your day depending on how much time you have, and then just complete a page. It's so satisfying, having a nice complete page like this, and then once it's all dry, you can have a look at the one that you did before and then keep moving on and then you'll have your sketchbook filled over the next couple of months with some beautiful work, and I want to see all of it. So there it is. The class is now done and you're ready to do your class project, and I can't wait to see what you do. So let's just wrap up the class with some final thoughts. 16. Final Thoughts: Oh Oki doke, just a few final thoughts now. I hope you really enjoyed the class. You know, I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the entire process. You know, I enjoy anything to do with art, especially traditional art. So hopefully, you would have gone through the process and watched me do a complete spread and really got inspired by what I do and that this easy step by step method that really gives some motivation to you to really grab hold of that sketchbook, get that medium out and just start this journey of everyday pages. Remember to follow me on Skillshare, on social media and stay in touch. Post your lovely work on the project gallery, regardless of whether it's finished, it can be just on pager or just some pencil sketching that you do in your sketchbook. Keep posting it in the lovely project gallery so that we can all see what your progress is like. And once you've completed your spread, it will give so much satisfaction to you. It'll give me so much satisfaction to see you complete a lovely spread in this everyday pages sketchbook and have it. So thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for your lovely motivation and the work and the comments that you leave me. So hopefully this will really get you warmed up in your daily routine of sketchbook, journaling, everyday pages, and having this momentum going forward. So do remember once you've completed the class, and once you've uploaded your beautiful work to the project gallery, do ensure that you leave a nice review on the class. Otherwise, other students are not going to be able to find the class, and learn from your experience. That's a huge, important point to make. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for your help. And hopefully, I'll see you on the next one. Don't stress, relax, and keep sketching.