(Draw) Awesome Mix

Just before retiring I signed up for the Draw Awesome year-long art course. Taking up art again was one of the things I'd been looking forward to in retirement but I needed something that would (a) keep me motivated and (b) not take up too much of my time. Last week saw the end of the course and I've now added a new portfolio page to the site with a gallery of my favourite projects during the course.

The most attractive aspect initially was the monthly payment and the ability to cancel at any time if I was not motivated or struggling to keep up with the time commitment. Each month had three weekly projects followed by a challenge and then a free week. Also I'd completed some other short courses with the tutor, Phil Davies, and liked his teaching style.

There are thousands of people on YouTube, Patreon and dedicated training sites that offer training, for free or otherwise. I've found that there are many very good artists out there but only a minority can teach well. Watching someone create in real time is interesting but doesn't teach you much; often 'why' is just as important as 'how'. Phil's method is based on the tried and tested method of watching him for a short period while he explains both why and how, then a pause while you catch up. As the weeks go by, and without you noticing, there's less narrative on the basics because you no longer need it.

Things I've Learnt

Although the word 'draw' is in the title of the course, it's also about a variety of different media. When I was at school I almost exclusively drew with HB pencil or ink pen, and pretty much hated painting, especially with the awful powder paints we were given. For the first time on this course I had to use charcoal, pastel pencils and watercolour. Charcoal is great for very quickly laying down tone across a large sheet of paper. Contrast that with coloured pencils, which take a huge amount of time. In fact, only one project in Draw Awesome is completed solely with coloured pencil and it's the most time consuming one by far. It's the picture of a robin on a branch.

Far better then to lay down the initial colours quickly with watercolour or pastel pencil and add the detail later. I'd never used pastels before but some of the pictures we created with them - the avocados, tiger, girl with bubbles - are among my favourites. The only annoying thing with them is they go blunt very quickly and the only way to get a decent point is the slowest way: with a craft knife and sandpaper.

Then there's watercolour. Not the easiest medium to use: it has a mind of it's own and you just have to accept that. Not easy for us control freaks. But, again, two of the watercolour pictures turned out to be favourites - the old car (above) and the old man with cigarette.

Perhaps most surprising of all was that I completed the course. There's something about having a target to complete, and knowing the next project will be released the following Monday that keeps you on track. I didn't attempt every weekly project though. Some just didn't appeal to my personal taste, which did affect my motivation. Any course that has to cater for students with a wide age range, from a variety of countries and with different interests has to offer varied subjects and that's fine.

What Next?

I'm not sure I'd use charcoal again, it's too messy for my liking, but watercolour and pastels are useful tools in the arsenal. I still love graphite pencil and, especially, pen and ink. The artwork that inspired me as a boy was mostly high contrast - black india ink on bright white bristol board and I still love that type of image now.

What I've learnt technically from the course should improve my drawings going forward and I know that I'm most dedicated to completing a drawing if the end result is something I want to achieve. Not so easy when there's only your visualisation of the end result and not a completed drawing to work towards. A couple of years ago I set myself a project to recreate some of my favourite frames from Marvel comics and I did a number of those. Unfortunately I can't share them publicly due to copyright, but it's something like that I'm looking to do.