Thumbnail compositions and idea generation

08:48

So I've been feeling kinda guilty about not doing any art the past few days and playing games instead- I have this wonderful superpower of guilt tripping myself for things I shouldn't really feel guilty for. But I figured I had to do SOMETHING, so I opened up photoshop and had a brain fart.. What do I paint?! I eventually decided on a 'colour study' as studies are generally the right way to go for me when I feel like I need to do art but have no creative vibes.

So I scribbled this out.. getting very frustrated along the way. Probably shouldn't have referenced such a complex picture.

Rage-quit aside, a little bit later I decided to do some composition ideas; not focusing on anything but shapes and form (hopefully) in order to practice what works and what doesn't and hopefully generate some ideas.

I created myself some rectangle frames and zoomed right out and got a big brush and just blocked in some shapes, trying not to have any ideas before I painted something. The results turned out pretty well- I didn't pressure myself to create 'good' studies again so was able to focus on the important parts.

Once I had done this I zoomed in on a few of the compositions and refined some (not massively but enough to work something out) and I came out with some ideas that I wouldn't have done before. The entire process was pretty good for me as working with random shapes forced me outside of my comfort zone of things I'd usually paint. They're not groundbreaking but it's a step in the right direction and I enjoyed doing them!