Inktober 2023

I have been participating in Inktober, the challenge started by illustrator Jake Parker, for some years now. The idea is pretty simple, there is a list of daily prompts that you can use as inspiration, and then you make a drawing every day.

My own interpretation has been more loose: though I do try to have about half of the drawing in ink, I also like to use digital and even VR tools. What I noticed this year is that as I posted images to Flicr, in some cases, when I used even an AI render engine on a drawing that I made IRL, some people got a little upset. People are very upset that AI will take over the creation of art, and I am in the minority of artists that are trying to find a balance between traditional and AI tools. 

This 'Castle' was inspired by a recent trip to Poland for work, where I stayed in a manor house just outside of Wroclaw for a work retreat for a few days. It reminded me of Italy, which resulted in the drawing above. 

A few other Inktober images were done completely in my sketchbook, with a mixture of watercolor pencils and crayons to add color and depth. 

For a few of the days, I used virtual reality tools such as Kingspray Graffiti, using an image that I had sketched as a resource in the application. 

Where I seemed to cross the line in some people's minds, was to use Gravity Sketch to make 3d models in VR, then use an AI render engine to add details, then finsih 'by hand' digitally in Sketchbook Pro on my PC with an XP-Pen screen tablet. 

Really belated update...

It's hard to excuse such a long absence, but I don't mind saying that the rest of my life took priority, but that did not mean that I was not creating, and if for no other reason that catharsis, I will start a bit of backtracking, to pick up where I left off in 2021. I fee like there are quite a few of of who lost some time in the last few years, so many of you will understand. It was at the end of that summer that I picked up a slightly used XP-Pen tablet, as I thought it was worth trying one of the Wacom competitors, as Cintiqs are both hard to find, and very expensive here in Sweden. Though I will say that it took me a while to get into a rhythm with the way that I use the XP-Pen 22, overall I love it, and that love has resulted in me just drawing more.

For 'pure drawing' Sketchbook still remains my go-to application, though I was still experimenting at an early stage with Gravity Sketch, a VR drawing and modeling application.