Prompts to Paint - Turning Words into Art

1. Prompt to Paint Introduction: Hi there. I'm Terri Renyon, isual artist and creative encourager. And today, I'm going to share with you how I come up with ideas for my art and illustration. I do have a group on Facebook called the Daily Creating Group, which I post prompts every week for every day of the week. So that's a really great resource for having just a spot to start. For today, that prompt is playing the sand. So we're going to use this prompt as a way to generate ideas about what we might want to do. And one of the things I do for that is I start to think about how many different ways do we know that sand happens? We know what happens on the beach. We know there's kiddy sandboxes. There's some sand and gardening and landscaping. So here's a few things that I might pursue, but I know what I like, and I like cats. So we know the cats have sandboxes. So that is what I'm going to be working towards on this. And I usually start my idea generation by just thinking about what you can do with sand. I know that people when they play in the sand like to make sand castles. So I have that in mind for how I might approach this illustration. So the next step I take is to take a look through Pintrist and maybe I look up playing in the sand illustration or I might look sand castles or that kind of thing. So you may want to try doing that. Just see what catches your eye on Pinterest, or maybe you like to look at Google Images. You can look at other Illustrator's art or you can look at photographs or anything having to do with sand or playing in the sand. So this is how I generate ideas. I like to follow a prompt, but I don't always follow a prompt. When I don't have a prompt, I usually just ideate by looking at a ton of stuff. Like, I just wait for that inspiration to come when something I think, Ah, that looks like fun or a portion of something looks like fun, yeah, it's like a quickening feeling. I get like, Oh, I could do that. And then I make sure that I don't copy what inspired me. I try to look at a lot of variation around the theme. I might take the color palette that inspired me or I might take a subject matter that inspired me. But I make sure I vary greatly from the original work. And I do that by mixing up all the elements so that nothing is exactly the same. And I also look at a lot of different artwork to help with that inspiration. So I'm going to go ahead and get started. I'm going to leave you to do your research and think about what you want to do with playing in the sand and then come back here and let's jump in. 2. The Project - Part 1: So I've decided since I am a cat fanatic that I am going to paint a kitty cat playing in the sand, and this is going to be sand that we all know and love, and that is the kitty litter box, which has sand in it or some sort of sand derivative. So I am going to look through a little bit of Pintris. I got sandbox Illustration up here as my search. And I can go here and see all the kids sandboxes, or I could say sand illustration. And that might give me a wide range of different ways that people have played with sand. And here we have some sand castles, which is awesome. So I think that's the direction I'm going to go with my artwork. But these are just some ways to search on Pintris. Now, as I said, if I've got really nothing in mind, no prompts or anything like that, I might just start going through here and notice, there's an old one of mine. So yeah, usually a lot of my own illustrations will come up here, another one that's mine over here. Yeah, there's just a massive amount of things in here that are having to do with cats. So maybe I'll need to search. Here's a dog one. I love this artist, Marie Rose Boyle Boy o. And she does all kinds of dogs and cats and animals. Really good for different types of ideas. Here's a photograph. So yeah, these are just different ways that you can generate ideas for your illustration when you don't have a particular place to start. So I might say, yesterday, I did a lion drawing, so I looked up ion Illustration. And that just gave me a lot of ideas about how I might want to proceed. But I know I want to go with a sand castle in a cat box. So I don't need to do any of this research right now because I've already generated the idea in my head. Now I'm going to go and research some sandcastle illustration, so I have an idea of how that castle might look in a cat box. So I'm looking up sandcastle Illustration, and there's plenty on here to give you an idea of shapes of sand castles. And also helps to generate what else might be with a sand castle. You could also look just at sand castles, and then you'll get some photos, too, mixed in. Oh, yeah, here's a photo, another photo. But all these are really awesome ways to generate ideas for your sandbox. I'm not going to research cats, and if you know me, you know why. I think I know what a cat looks like at this point. I did get a new palette I'm kind of proud of. I got a smaller palette, so I don't have to lug around that huge thing. And also, this way I can mix colors in front of you, which you might find helpful. I do have a list of all the colors I use in the about section. So now that you know this lineup, I'm going to do my best to mix some paints up here so you can see it somewhat. I'm using two different brushes. This is the round mimic Kolinski and a size 12, and this is the size ten mimic creative mark. So these two brushes are synthetic hairs. So I also always work off to the side to test my colors, use black to test my posca and mola tow pens, which are acrylic markers, and I have a couple of water jugs and some paper to blot my paint off. So back to this cat box castle, I'm not doing a drawing, right? I'm just going to start in. And you can do a drawing. I just prefer to see what happens, basically. I think I'm going to start with what color do I want to have this box? 'Cause I'm going to start with the box. I'm not gonna make it yellow because the sand is kind of yellowy. I think I will make it. Let's just go ahead with the turquois since we love it, so and so what I do is I come over here and I grab a piece of paper to test my color to see if it's the right color for me to use. And I think I'm going to saturate it pretty well by adding more of the color. It's a good idea when you start with a palette I squeezed all these colors out for myself, and they dried, and then I spray them with water to kind of reconstitute them so they're easier to use. So I think this colors going to work. Removing cat hair, and cat boxes in general are shaped a little bit like a pie. They have a lip. At least the cat boxes that I've come in contact with. And then the bottom of the box is a little tapered most often. I'm sure there's exceptions to this rule, but this is just what I'm gonna do 'cause it's what's coming to me now. Keep going back to my palette and grabbing this color. I forgot to start with the bigger brush. If you start with the bigger brush, you can hold more watercolor in your brush. So that's good for now. I'll come back in with a little bit of shading later, maybe. Now I'm noodling. Noodling is allowed. Just know when you work back into watercolor, it kind of shows with some colors, particularly, it shows. And now I'm starting to think about this castle and how that's going to work in there. To do the castle, I'm going to use basically yellow ochre, a very light yellow ochre. Let me try that color out here. Probably in order to get the castle so that I can add some layers to it, I'm going to start with a relatively light color of the yellow ochre. This is still a little wet, but I'm not that concerned about it. I kind of like it when things run into each other. And I'm just going to do a basic shape. So this has got a straight side. Maybe there's a few of these. And then it comes back up, filling my brush. My intention here is to fill these in somewhat. I actually probably fill it in completely because and to mix this up, I'm going to make a third one of these. But this is a general castle shape. I'm going to go ahead and fill this in completely. Moving rather fast, we don't end up with a big old edge where our water colors have dried. Good idea to mix up enough paint to begin with, so you're not having to remix it as you go. Which I did not do. I need to mix up a little paint as I go. Not worrying about any of the windows or the door or anything like that, those are going to be darker than this initial color. My perfectionism conditioning likes to pop in and start giving me feedback as I work. And I've gotten to the point where I just I hear it, I see it, I notice it, and I ignore it. I don't try to fight with it or get rid of it because that's just giving it energy. I just keep working. Here I get my basic sand castle shape. I can start mixing up a little paint to start doing some details on that. This feels pretty dry down here with my cat box, so I'm going to go ahead and use the same turquoise with a little bit of pains gray in it so that I can get some shadows on this cat box. Mix this up on the side. I might be a little dark. We'll see water it down a little bit and just start defining this cat box a little. Doesn't have to be complicated. It's simple. They got that done. And now I got cat he in my paint. I always recommend that you leave your hair in the paint till the paint dries because then it's easier to just sweep it off after the paint dries. And I have tried everything to get that hair out of there before the paint dries, and it's always better to wait till it dries. I also know I need to do characters in here because that's just the way I am. And we know a cat would be in a cat box scene. So I'm thinking about I got more room on this side the cat can be. I also want to make sure people know that this is a cat box. There's always some sort of scoop, right? And that really kind of can make this more a cat box that a cat would use for his business. I'm just going to do a classic one of these because that's the kind we use at this house. So I'm going to have to make it a little darker than what I've got going on here. And I think again, I'm going to go for a little bit of black mixed in with my paints gray. Check my color. Nice and dark. I'm just going to put this little kitty shovel to the side here. It's coming right over everything. It's a big old shovel. Who knows what they look like? I'm looking at them here in Pintrist that really just helps me know to kind of get in the ballpark. It doesn't have to be exact. They got a lot of little holes. One of the ways you may want to do this, and I'll just do it right here is to do this type of thing. We know that they're closed at the bottom. I'm gonna make this like a double type. Lots of little tiny places to catch the kitty goodies. I'm not loving my little shovel here, but it is what it is, and I'm just gonna leave it. So there's the shovel. This is dry enough now for me to come back in with some details on the sand castle. So I'm gonna use the same yellow ochre. I know I'm gonna want it darker, and maybe I'll add a little this grayish mixture to it, but I also want to make sure it's warm, so I'm adding a little red oxide. That seems like a good place to start. So here would be the door on my castle. Constantly turning my paper when I work. Always good to not run your finger through your wet paint, which I just did a little bit. Defining things a bit with these little side towers. Who knows what these things look like? I have built a sandcastle in my life at the beach, but it was eons ago. So, you know, I'm not fresh with my sandcastle building experience. This cat here is still in here. Got it out, and then there's a lot of little windows and sandcastles. I'm not intending to add cats to these windows because this doesn't seem like the thing to do, but you could always do that. I want to work around the shovel on this one. It's still a little wet, so I got to be careful when I paint around it. I don't want to go right into it because then we could end up with a lot of black is dark color in our window color. I sort of want to make them mostly the same the same height. I know there's a lot of little spots and things in sand 'cause it's sand. So I'm just doing a few little dots with this color. I think I'm actually going to come back in with color pencil and do most of this. You don't have to overdo it. Like, just a suggestion is enough. I think I'll stop there for now and figure out who is going to be here building on this castle? Let's see. What color kitty do we want to do? I don't want it to be like this color because it will blend in. Black is always good. That'll be a really nice contrast. I'm keeping the blue out of it, for the most part. I'm just going to do solid black for this kitty. Or it may end up being, I'm going to do a tuxedo. That's the plan that I just figured out. So this kitty is in the back and it's looking over what it's done. Expert digging techniques. Here we go. We've got the makings of a tuxedo cat. And since we're working on a white background, I'm going to go ahead and paint this body in And for the sake of simplicity, I'm not gonna have him actually working on the sandcastle with its hands, which some people call paws. I'm just gonna have him behind here looking around the edge. And, of course, you will be able to see a tail coming out this side. Very quiet when I concentrate on painting. I didn't load up my brush quite enough, so I have to keep going back and refilling it. If I had a bigger brush, that wouldn't be as big a concern. 3. The Project - Part 2: Alright. Here we go. Got the cap. You know, I'm gonna bring this down a little bit, just 'cause it's not delineating this very well. Well, that is better. Okay, we got the kitty element. We've got the castle element. We've got the whatever this thing element. I think I'm going to add a little bit of detail to this. Usually these things have a lip to hold the little sand bits and such. And they oftentimes have a little thing to hold. Let's do a few other details just for fun. I always love to bring somebody else into the picture because this kitty does not want to be working alone on its sand castle. For a little contrast, I think I'm gonna do a little red bird with this kitty. And this red bird will be here. Here, here, here. Here. Sometimes they get completely out of control with my sizes on the critters that I make red bird, so that's a nice addition of a color. And I think I am going to create a mouse character down here around this area. It's going to also have to be pretty dark so that it will show up. I'm thinking this through. Do I want it? Do I want it? Do I want it? I think right here is good. Went dark so we can cover that blue. The blue will still show up. But with the darker color, it helps to blend it. You know, I can still see that blue change there. But I don't care, okay? I just don't care. The tail Do we have enough characters to make this kitty feel like it is not alone in its work? I'm going to go ahead and use that color I just made with a little yellow ochre added in for a little more highlights on keeping my hand out of the paint for a little bit more detail on the sand castle. So, yes, little edges on windows and such, just to help it give it some dimension. I kind of like adding a little dimension to my work. Everybody's got their own idea about what they like. So we're getting there. I might want to fix a little of this. I think there's a little bit of a shadow going on underneath the top parts of this castle. And then we'll come in with more details as we go along here. Everybody's drying, but in order to speed that process, I'm going to go ahead and break out the hair dryer. A few more sand bits. We're going to need to be in here, because when kitties play in their sandbox, there's usually some residue. So I'm just going to put a few things here just to show this kitty is not any neater than anybody else's kitty. While I've got some paint on my brush, I'm gonna put in just a few details which you probably would not have because this cat may not have quite that much experience with making sand castles, but we'll pretend like it does. I actually want to make these little sand bits a little bit lighter, so I'm just going to come in here with a piece of tissue. And pull up a little of the color. Okay, maybe while things are drying, again, I could come in. Well, that's dry. I think I'll use a very dark color for my mouse, miss legs. And while I've got this, I'm going to give it the insides of its ears. The bird needs a wing, so I'm going to mix in a little of the rose color with my red, maybe a little lack to get a darker color so that I can add that to the bird friend. Details make a big difference. Well, why these are drying, I'm going to come in with some colored pencil and just add more sand. Here's a few that might work. You know, with these littler marks, it can be easier just to use a color pencil than a paintbrush. I'm not a purist when it comes to watercolor. I like to use whatever it takes. Maybe a little darker bit to mix it up a bit more, and I can add a few of these down here. I'm also going to use this colored pencil to sort of delineate some of these parts. And I'm not loving this so far, although the granular texture of the colored pencil works really well for this type of thing. So I think I'm going to stick with it. And I'm thinking right now I'm just making a mess. All is well. Messes are good. I'm putting the colored pencil on its side. I'm actually going to come on top of this. This is a kind of a yellow oak grey. What is this? I don't know. Gold rod, prisma color. And I'm just gonna give the whole thing a little texture because it really makes it look a little more sandy. Here we go. Maybe a little more here. Sometimes I'll use an eraser with colored pencil just to lighten it a little bit. I'm not happy with my sandcastle, but I'm just going to keep adding details, and it'll all work out fine. Castles oftentimes will have lags on the top, so that'll help to pull this together. I'm not sure what colour flag. Maybe I'll go ahead and use a blue flag like this. It's a big flag. Yes, we need these details. I think this kitty's dry enough, then I'm gonna start adding some features, 'cause it needs to be able to see in order to work on its sandcastle. I got my molotaw one for all. I got my piece of paper to try it on so that I don't mess up my painting. Shake, shake, shake, get it running, and then move to the art. Well, I'm down here, I'm going to give this little guy some eyes. Guy or girl. We don't know which or they them. Oh. Give this one some eyes and of course, the star of the show mixing up the eye shape a little bit here. And this pen is not opaque, so I'm going to have to come in with a second coat, which is what happens 99.9% of the time with Posca pen. You can see how it's just not opaque enough. You got to shake and tap. Get it moving. I'm going to do a little bit of detail on this. Whatever this thing is that's supposed to be to pick up cat. I actually made a mistake here. So I'm going to get up as much as I can. But I do want to use some white dots in here to signify more sand. You can see how I work is pretty messy. And I prefer that. So you work however you work. I have to wait for these to dry and everything else to dry. There is a technique for getting some of that moisture out. You can dry out a brush, kind of splay it a little bit, and come back in and grab up some of the wetness of the paint. While I'm waiting, you can see we kind of lost those legs there, but that's okay. I'm going to come in with This is Posca pen. I'm going to give some details to our friends. Okay. Take this flag. This wasn't on the way dry, but that's okay. Needs its flag pole. Very happy cat, 'cause it's done a fine job. Ckoning up these legs a little bit. Little herd feet. You must have whiskers. Oh I'm going to use a smaller pen to do these toes and whiskers on the mouse. I know I'm going to maybe want to ground all this with a little shadow. Usually, I use Pains gray for my shadows. It's just a really nice gray, dark gray or light gray, depending on how much water you add. It'll be a little tricky getting the shadow around on these pieces of sand. And this is where I ran my hand through the paint. I'm not gonna worry about it too much painting over the sand bits because they are in the shadow. A little shadow for the mouse shadow behind the shovel might come in with a little more shadow to kick things off a little bit more. Maybe there's a little hint of more shadow here. See how nicely that grounds things. It feels like it's gonna be a little too dark. Um, little bird needs a shadow. And there probably would be a little bit of a shadow here on the side of this against the cat. That did not work. And since we have a shadow happening with everything else, we need to put a shadow in with the sand castle, as well. My light source is sort of coming from this direction. It's not completely technically correct that I'm doing that, but that is the aim. You can see the shadow on the side of this. And actually, there should be some shadows back here, too. So while I've got this blue, I'm going to come in and I know there's a shadow on the side of this structure. I got a little underneath the tower tops. And at this point, this is looking really dirty to me. But I'm just gonna keep going and not worry about it. Might put a little bit of a shadow under these sands. And we see this little bit of stuff here, paint. I'm going to get some nice clean water and add that and see what will come up with this. That took off some of it. And the way to go further with that is to possibly get a more bristly brush that can take off a little bit of the paper. You have to be really careful with the scrubbing technique so you don't end up with a blemish on your paper. See, I sort of takes off that top layer. So that lightened it too. Like I said, that paper is different now than it was. No longer has the fresh surface. Time for some more mola too. Another way you can do this. If you have just little spots, you could come in with this. Hit those spots with the white mola too pen or Posca pen. Se eyes you definitely needed another coat. Looking around here, I feel like I could do more with this castle, but I don't know what it is right now, so I'm not gonna put you through my process on that. When I do black cats, I like to use a light colored pencil. This is a GriseFrancois, blah. I don't know. Use French names throw me. And I'm gonna give this a little ear treatment. Little mouse needs a mouth. Sappy mouse likes the job we've done here. A few details on this flag. While I'm waiting for things to dry, I'm gonna sign my work. And actually, I'm gonna look a little bit. Where do I want to sign this? I could do it over here or I could do it in here. It's up to you. I'm just going to go ahead and do the typical at the bottom, left or right. Bottom left in this case. I think the white is dry, so we can come back in. This bird is checking out what's going on over there with that kitty. This is this mouse is admiring the job it did. And Kitty is just proud looking straight at the viewer. Yeah, there we go. Last vestiges of fun here with these pink cheeks. I think it just gives it a little something. With the bird, I got to go darker 'cause the pink won't show. And it's probably hard to see that, as well. So it's good as we can do. Okay. Sometimes when we're doing our art, we don't love everything that's going on, and for me, I just it's just the way it is, right? I notice these things. I let them go. If someone else notices them, that's fine, too. And I know I can make another one of these, so it's not precious to me. So yeah. Uh, 4. Final Thought: So with Idea Generation, if you want to start with the prompt, you can join the Daily creating group. If you'd rather just wing it, I recommend what I do is I kind of go through visual images. Either you can do that in Pintris or you can do that in Google Images. You can look at photos. You can look around your house. Maybe something there will inspire you, but take in as much as you can. And this last little piece of advice from someone who used to totally overdo it with researching. Like I wouldn't do any art. I'd be researching all the time. When you get a sense of inspiration, when you feel that spark, stop researching and go to your paper and jump in. Researching is fantastic and it's fun, but it can fool you into thinking you're achieving something with your art as far as production. And a little prep is good, but a lot of prep can kind of kill your productivity. So get that spark and get out and start in. I can't wait to see what you create with your sandcastle sand playing in the sand thing. And please share your project to the project section. And I look forward to seeing you next time around.