by the book

weekly sketch

so i missed a post last week. i made a sketch, but, due to my habit of using loose sheets of cheap bond paper, i lost it somewhere. i started using bond because it was less precious...i'd scribble something out and not fret about it being good, because i could just crumple it up and throw it out if it wasn't. and, not being worried about drawings being any good (not surprisingly) makes them better.

sketchbooks made me nervous, because there is something so much more permanent about them, with their hard covers and neatly bound pages. they became stifling; i was far too self-conscious about having to draw something "good" in them. so i abandoned the format for a time, striving instead for a more free-form flow of ideas. however, after that lost sketch, not to mention the sad wrinkles that have plagued many of my recent drawings that i've actually really liked, i have decided to stop being such a scaredy-cat, and go back to keeping an honest-to-god sketchbook. i think i'll use it mostly for the drawings that i do from photos and from life, and keep using the cruddy bond paper for hashing out rough story and character ideas.

so this is the first drawing that i've done in a sketchbook in...a year? maybe two? i did find myself being more mindful of HOW i was drawing, not laying down lines that were too heavy or dark...so it works out well in the context of careful observance of drawing what i am seeing, but i don't think it will translate well for the reckless abandon of raw creation. but, who knows? perhaps i just need to drop it in a mud puddle, or splatter some pages with a good slosh of my morning coffee.