How to Draw: NeuroArt Rose

1. Introduction: Hi, I'm Sam. I am both an artist and an art therapist. In this tutorial, we will learn how to use art as a mindful practice while creating this new railroads. You can use this class simply as an instruction on how to do neuro up and how to create this road. Or you can also use this as a tool for mindfulness. This is particularly good for those who struggled to meditate in the more traditional way. As an art therapists, there's always a therapeutic component to everything that I teach when it comes to art. But you can take that or leave it. It's up to you. I'm really excited to teach this kind of art because it requires absolutely no previous experience. Even if you haven't picked up or done any kind of art since you were in primary school. That's okay. This is really easy to do and I'm going to take you through it step-by-step. It's a passion of mine to help people understand that they can do art as long as they pick up some kind of mark making tool and put aside their inner critic and just make some marks on paper. Everyone can do. Everyone is creative, you can do it. So this class is for anyone who wants to explore their creative side. Whether you've done a lot of art in the past or you haven't for a very long time. It doesn't matter. And you can work with whatever you have available. So if you only have a ballpoint pens and paper, you can still do this process. If you just have some cheap crayons, you can still do this process. If you do want to follow along exactly as I'm doing, I'll be using an A5 piece of paper. And for anyone who doesn't know what an A5 piece of paper is, that's just a normal piece of printing paper folded in half. I will also be using a black Posca pen or sharpie to do the black lines. And then I'll be using my dough and intense watercolor pencils with my watercolor pen to do the coloring in and the finishing touches. I'm also using a white posca pen at the end just to do some little dots and highlights because that's what I like to do in my art. It's really up to you what materials you want to use. So feel free to experiment. I'd invite you to do this badly. Don't put any pressure on yourself to do something really beautiful, especially not if it's been a long time since you've done any kind of art. Just give yourself permission to do really badly because you don't have to show anyone if you don't want to. And then you can do it again and you can practice and you can practice. And you can keep doing it because it's fun to do. So. The invitation is to just not put any pressure on yourself and just have some fun being present with the art on the page. I'll start by showing you what the new graphic line is. And then I will teach you how to use the new graphic line to create the rows and how to round the corners. And then I will show you how I add the ink tents, watercolor pencils to the page and activate them with my watercolor pen. And then at the very end, I will have a little PDF of general prompts that you can use if you want to bring that more therapeutic flavor into your process. And it will just be a way for you to do some journaling about the whole process at the end, if you decide that you want to do that, the end project doesn't need to be for anyone but you. But at the same time you might get to the end and realize, hey, that's not so bad. And you could use it to give someone or create a card or just hang up somewhere in your own home. So come along for the journey and let's get creatively mindful together. See you there. 2. How to: Drawing the Neurographic Line: Today I'm going to show you how to create neuro OT in the form of a rose like these ones. This is called Neuro OT, and it should not be mistaken for neural graphic, which has a very specific process that must be followed and is a process developed and coined by prevailed *** graph in 2014. What we're doing today is taking some of the elements of Nero graphical and turning it into neuro art. While neuro art doesn't have the therapeutic depths of new graphical, it is still beneficial as a mindful practice and still contains some of my most favorite parts of New graphic in that it's still invite us to play on the page and let our mark making tool meander to the final destination, imitating life and how we set a goal, but rarely take a smooth indirect path to get there, such as, we wanna go from a to b and we think it's going to go like this. Whereas in reality, it goes more like this. This is the neuro graphic line where no one section is the same as another section along the path. And for me, this near a graphic line becomes reminiscent of the neural pathways in our brain. The idea here in neurons is to take the pressure off from having to be perfect or exact. The wobbly line that goes off course here is both encouraged and celebrated. Life is not perfect. And these lines do not need to be perfect either. When creating your graphic line, we want to get into a state of flow, state of surrender. Relax into it. Have some fun, and let your mark a play on the page. Now probably one of the most important parts of neuro art or new orographic or is the rounding of the sharp edges where they connect. This process calls for presence and mindfulness, allowing us to slip into a meditative, meditative state. As we find all the sharp edges and round them out. Remember to breathe. And to just focus on what you're doing. Every time a thought pops into your mind. Thank it. And let it go. Let it flow along the lines, and let it go. And of course, add lines as you feel too. And make them thicker. Keep them thin. Just round out all the edges that you come across. By doing this, it said, to help bring about a state of calmness and safety. In nature when we tend to find these sharp edges, they indicate danger because they could be the sharp teeth of an animal or jagged rocks that could hurt us. And by rounding out these corners, it helps us bring this sense of safety, a softness to the image into our lives. And it helps us create new pathways. Ease. Rather than having to stop suddenly and go in a different direction. It allows us to smoothly transition from one thought, one state into a new state and find a new thought for a new path. This feels symbolic to me. Us rewiring our neural pathways. Because sometimes you can get stuck on that one track, that one track of, Oh, I'm not good enough. Oh, I can't do this. It's so easy to keep going down that track. And by rounding out these corners, we can begin to create new thoughts and chase those thoughts down the line. And start building new neural pathways. Releasing the old thought patterns. We can go into this with the intention of creating more ease, better thoughts, different habits. We can help encourage our brains to make different choices. Instead of reaching for that chocolate. We might go for a walk. And all of a sudden is tangled mess. Starts to become smooth. Pattern. Where we can go in whatever direction we want to go. Make an add. New ways to go. Make an easily change direction. Anytime we want to. Creating a new picture for our life. If you start to get lost in doing this, then it's doing the job as you become present and mindful in the process. And that's pretty much all we really need to know. For your graphic on. The only other thing that I would probably add is that people, and I like to add circles throughout the image. I just use my little template here. But you could also just draw them in yourself freehand. Always remembering to round out any sharp edges that are created. 3. Grounding Meditation: It's time to make yourself as comfortable as possible, either sitting up or lying down. Make sure you're warm and all your basic needs are met to the best of your ability. Not hungry, not thirsty. Bladder is empty. Once you're comfortable. The invitation is to close your eyes and begin to focus on your breath. Just notice the natural rhythm as you breathe normally. Pay attention to if your chest and stomach and moving with each breath. Or perhaps you're breathing quite shallowly and only your chest is rising and falling. If you are breathing shallowly. I invite you now to make sure you are taking nice full breaths right down into the bottom of your lungs, allowing your stomach to rise and fall with each breath. Now, try to extend your in-breath just a little bit. And then extend your out-breath just a little bit more than that, making your out-breath longer than your in-breath. Now that you have focused on really filling your lungs with each in-breath and emptying your lungs with each out-breath. We're going to do some box breathing. This is a simple breathing technique that will help center us into our body. And we do this by breathing in for full. Pausing between the N and out-breath for fall. Breathing out for fall. Pausing between the outer and in-breath for four. Then cycling through this again. So let's begin breathing in 234. Hold 23, full, releasing. 23, full holding 234. Now let's do that a few more times. Breathing. 234, holding 234, releasing 234. Holding 234. Breathing in 234, holding 234, releasing 234. Hold 234, breathing in 234, hold 234. Releasing too. 1234. Holding 234. Now allow your breath to go back to its normal rhythm. As you begin to pay attention to your body. Notice any comfort or discomfort in your body. Notice any sensations or feelings that are happening in your body. You don't have to do anything about these things. Or we're doing right now, is being mindful in the present and connecting to our body. So as you notice in your body, we're going to imagine a fetus growing down and extending into the earth below us, like the roots of a tree. Going deeper and deeper through the layers of the earth, below the crust, past the vast crystal caves, deep into the hot magma until we reach the beating heart of our planet. As we tap into our planets hot, we allow that deep red love and warmth to flow back up into our bodies and begin to circulate up, up, up up into our feet, up our legs, up throughout torso and arms, up on next to the top of our heads. And then fall back down to our feet and cycle through our body in a circular motion up to I head back down to our feet. Now without body. If the delicious warmth from our mother earth, we focus on our head now and imagine it growing and expanding up, up, up. Through the Earth's atmosphere, continuing up and out into the solar system, going beyond and out past the edges of our Milky Way and out into the universe where we tap into the collective conscious, sometimes known as the Akashic Records. And as we connect with that super brain of all-knowing, we draw down the cool blue energy down, down, down into our body, letting it pour into my head. Going down our neck, down our arms and torso, into our legs, right down into our feet. Then cycling back up the body to the top of our head. And then back down again. And backup in a constant circle. As these two energies merge in the center of our being, we find ourselves connected to the planet and connected to spirit, centered firmly between the two as they flow through our body, cycling together, intertwining, and merging to create a beautiful rich royal purple color that fills our body with everything we need in this moment. As the two merge, it is time now to contain that beautiful energy in our bodies and withdrawer ourselves from first the collective consciousness in the vastness beyond our planet. Bring your tendrils back down, down, down into the Milky Way, down, down, down into our solar system. Keep bringing yourself back, back, back into Earth's atmosphere. And finally, bring all of yourself back into your own body, your own head. And seal off knowing you can tap into that goal knowing energy anytime you want to. Now begin to bring your tendrils back up, up, up, It's warm, cool. Back up through the maxima, back up, up, up through the vast crystal caves, right up through the Earth's crust and into your own body. Your own feet, sealing off. But knowing you can tap into the Earth's nurturing energy anytime you want. Notice that energy is from both still swirling around your body. Full of knowledge and connection. Warmth, love, divinity, centering you right here, right now in the present moment, in your body, with your limbs, your brain, your thoughts, your abilities, your room. When you feel ready, begin to move your body. Wiggle your toes and your fingers. Begin to roll your ankles and wrists. Stretch out and move your legs and arms. Feel your face than torso, and come back into the now, opening your eyes when you are ready. And moving on to the next lesson, knowing you are connected and centered and grounded. 4. How to: Drawing the Rose: So to start with, what we're going to do is put our marker somewhere in the middle of our paper. And we're going to slowly move out by in an ever-growing spiral outwards. And sometimes you're going to bring the line quite close. And then other times we're going to let it go out a little. And what you'll find is by doing this, it starts to look like the leaves of a rose. Petals are not leaves. And you just keep doing this until the rise is as big or small as you would like it to be. To fill most of the page. Now that's done. We're going to make some random lines coming out and try to dissect the petals where they come together. If you can. Really matter. If you do or not. Maybe bring it all the way to the edge of the page. As many or as few lines as you want. The more lines, the more rounding error you get to do. The rounding out, that becomes the Mindful Practice. You then just keep adding as many lines as you want to on the outside. Then of course, once you start rounding out, you may find you want to add even more and more lines, so just make it as busy or as calm as you want, as many lines, as few lines as you want. And the only other thing I'm going to do before I start rounding out is just add some circles here and there. Because that's what I like to have in my design. The beauty of this too is if you have a happy little accident like this one, you can just turn it into a novel. Just, I would suggest that any time you add an element like a circle into your design, you add it in a second or third place as well. So don't just make them one-off events. If you make a happy little accident somewhere, maybe you go and do it on purpose somewhere else in the design. And that just helps the design remain cohesive. Look like it's supposed to be there. And no one's ever going to know at the end when you finished that you didn't intend for it to be there. Now is when you start to take some time to round out all of those inches and add more as you want to want to or just keep it simple. It's completely up to you. For the rest of this video. I'm just going to fast forward a little bit of music. You can have it playing in the background if you like, while you are doing your rounding out of your wages. Or you can just now and go on to the next video. 5. How to: Colouring the Rose: So now that we've rounded out all of the corners, it's time to do some coloring in. I'm going to be using like dough and ink tents, pencils that just watercolors by the dominant brand. They're really highly pigmented so that quite bold with the colors. I'm going to do colors is a fissile roads. And then in the background I'm just going to do some blues, greens and a bit of yellow. I like to use my water pins. Things that just these pins that are filled with water. And I start by laying down good chunk color just on the inside edge of each petal. Then that way, as I activate the color and bring it outwards, it gets a little bit lighter. In the same way that I did this. Make sure that I have a spare piece of paper so that I can wipe off the excess from my pins. So I activate the pigment of the water. Then I spread it out to the edges. That gives sort of like an umbrella effect where it's darker on the inside, then lighter on the outside of the petal. Activate the pigment middle, and then just spread it out to the outside. If you get too much pigment on the brush, make sure you just won't get off. Always remember that if you make it a little mistake somewhere, just keep going because the end product, you probably won't see the mistake. And even if you do, other people won't know that it was a mistake. So don't ever let a mistake make you give up on what you're doing. Just see it through. Even if you never show any one, you still get to learn from that mistake. And if you make a mistake and you just keep going with it, then the rest of it, it's not going to matter. So all of a sudden you've got less pressure on yourself to make it perfect because you've already made a mistake, right? Don't ever throw out or stop. Always complete them all the way to the end. Because even if you have a mistake, it's still practice. The rest of it can still be practice. So the next time you can do it differently. But also you may get to the end even with that mistake and realize, hey, it's still turned out, okay. Now I'm gonna do all of the different circle. And this same kind of thing. I'm going to put the dark pigment on the inside of all different shapes and activate the pigment on the inside. Then lightly add more and more water so that it goes to the outside with a lighter edge. As you can see when I'm doing it, I'm keeping my tip, the very tip of the brush here, up against the edge to activate pigment. And then just kinda dragging it out to the edges. That warning it stops too much pigment from going to the edge. Brush quite flat on the paper. When I do it. Anytime it feels like I have just a little bit too much pigment on my brush. Wipe it off from as well. Watercolor tends to do whatever watercolor wants to do. So you can have all of this pigment in the middle. And it'll just slowly fade out to the edge. However it wants to. Just let it do what it wants to do. While it's still wet, you can kinda push it around a little bit anyway. Watercolors pretty forgiving them not to phase by making this an ombre effect. If it turns out that way, That's cool. But if it old ends up a solid coal, that's okay. Mostly I'm just putting the yellow in for some contrast just to help it pop, give a point of difference. Give a little bit of interest into the drawing. Instead of making it all one color. But I'm opposed to just one color. I love a good monotone. But essentially, if I could have people go away with anything from this, It's a freedom to just play and not care about the outcome. And not worry about it being perfect. I'd love for people to just just go and do art and enjoy it. And if it doesn't turn out the way you want it to, welcome to being an artist. I think there's very few people except for maybe the hyper realistic ones, the ones that do the hyper-realistic work. Whoever have this stuff turn out exactly the way they were envisioning. For me. Especially this kind of art. It's just about playing and relaxing into it and having some fun, having no pressure. Maybe using it as a YE to be mindful. The very nature of Nero art being unpredictable in where the lines go. And kind of breaking all the rules. Like it doesn't have to be perfect. And it's still going to look beautiful. And there's not any rhyme or reason to where I'm putting these colors. Just putting them wherever. So of course you could do this without a water pen tool. You just what your brush. Make sure you've got a nice clean well of water as well as the one that you want to rinse your brush out. And if you're going to use just a normal brush for this kind of work, make sure you've got two wells of water. One that is completely clean water that you dip into when you want to activate the pigment. And then the other one can be for when you want to clean off your brush. Now that all the color is being added. Just a few last things that I like to do to finish it all up. One of them is I tend to go over the black lines again just to help make them pop out a little more. And sometimes in the process I add more lines. This is just something that I do. Because sometimes the the watercolor goes over the black lines and dots from a little. Then the other thing that I like to do is to add these black dots. I don't know why. It's just a design choice. But I don't know. Just like it. And I also like adding like little black circles, little dots and also some white highlights on the edges of the petals. So I'm going to do that now. And phospholipid this, when it dumps, that will be it. Then the last thing that will be available will be the general questions that you can go through your experience of what this was like. To add that therapeutic elements to the whole process. 6. Thank you and Goodbye!: You made it. Congratulations. It's not an easy thing to finish a course, believe me, I know I've signed up for many of them are not actually gotten to the end of them. If you've made it this far, that's an amazing things. So give yourself a pat on the back. You now know what the new graphic line is and how to use it to create a rose. You have learned how to use watercolor pencils and watercolor pen. And even though I used the ink tents do and two pencils, you can use any kind of watercolor pencil and the watercolor pen in exactly the same way. And so now you have a piece of art that you did. If this was your first time. We'll have to start somewhere and what a great place to stop. Now you have the skills to take the euro graphic line and turn it into whatever your heart desires. All you need to do is give it a go. And remember, it doesn't have to be for anyone but, you know, pressure to be perfect. Because the only difference between an artist and someone who isn't an artist is that an artist keeps practicing over and over again. Please remember to share your project in the project gallery because I would love, love, love to see it. If you share it on social media, please feel free to tag me. All constructive feedback is welcome. So feel free to drop me an e-mail or message me if you feel I could do something better and how I'm always trying to get better at what I do. Any feedback or suggestions for courses that I can do in the future are also gratefully received. So let me know if there's something that you would like me to teach. Now going keep being creative. Is that near a graphic line and see what else you can come up with. Bye.