cbc - days 1 & 2

The Creative Boot Camp started on Sunday.  We were told to pick one medium to work in.  Sure enough I could have picked say, I don't know, crochet?  But then where's the challenge?  Crochet is something that I do anyway.  I thought it would be best to really feel the effects of the e-course, and do something "a little outside my comfort zone".  Those were my words on flickr.  I chose to watercolour and what I have learnt so far, is that it is very much outside my comfort zone!

The course has got me thinking a lot more about my levels of creativity.  When they increase, I mean really increase, I feel as though I am going back to the real me but as I have lost my way a bit, returning takes some time and some getting used to.   

From Day 2 of the CBC:

Journal Prompt:

Do you shy away from calling yourself an artist? If so, what do you think makes someone else an artist and not you? What are some ways that you can start today to outwardly reflect your inner artist? Name three people who you would be comfortable sharing your creative work and projects with.

Although I mainly blog about crochet, there are other creative avenues that I venture along.  Watercolour is not one I go down often and I don't usually share either.  This has made me think about blogging and creativity.  I blog about crocheted creations and I get wonderful comments ma sha Allah. This gives me the confidence to do and learn more.  I am definitely more comfortable with sharing my creative work and projects in cyberspace than I do in real life.  I think with creative people stopping by, the feedback, if any, is generally positive and enouraging.  I'm shakey with watercolour and lack confidence with it, but this just takes me back to reality.  Most people start at zero and work there way up.

Today, we are supposed to look at the "creative buzz kills" in our lives.  These can be things in our heads or people in our lives.  As a mother of four, I could blame that but in reality, creativity needn't come to halt because of motherhood.  There are so many women that channel there creativity via their role as "mother".  Having said that, to be able to use creativity in earning an income needs a lot of discipline.  This is something I often think about.  Do you or have you considered, using your creativity in this way?       

Enough of the philosophical chit chat.  What did I come up with?  As well as a journal prompt each day, we have a random word that should be incorporated in to the day's project.

Day 1: ivory

I was really just playing with colour.  But watercolour is so much more than that.  I really enjoyed familiarising myself a little more with transparency, wet and dry colour and their effects. 

Jeddah landmark, The King's Fountain from dawn to dusk. 

Oh by the way, the ivory is in the water!

Day 2: picnic

Again I was playing with colour and unusual ombinations.  I also realised that transparency is a lot easier to fiddle around with on Illustrator than it is in watercolour!

This is a picnic blanket that I might expect to see in Africa, or maybe North Africa?  I think I have Africa on my mind with the World Cup around the corner and for the very first time on the African continent! Speakng of which you can see the ten stadiums on one of my favourite design sites.   

The word for today is "multilayered" and I just don't know if I can step away from the concept of layering that I'm so comfortable with in AutoCAD, Illustrator and Photoshop.

I am also finding that as I work through the days tasks, I find myself making notes for future projects in sha Allah.  I have an "Ivory" idea using AutoCAD and one using milk(!) and more picnic ideas in watercolour too.  I don't know if they will materialise though.