On acting and drawing

We went to the Doctor Who festival held in Sydney last year. It was a lot of fun and I'd certainly do it again if it comes back.

One of the sessions we attended had audience Q&A time. An audience member asked Peter Capaldi if he thought acting was an innate talent or something that you could learn.

He compared acting to drawing. A lot of people think they can't draw so they don't try.

But if you want to learn it, you can do so by drawing every day. You may not end up as a great artist but you will be able to draw. His conclusion, acting is also something that you can do by practicing.

I don't know about acting, but the drawing thing is dead on. I find that many people insist they can't draw and so they don't draw. I actually didn't think I could draw either. But after doing a round of 30 days of sketching, I went from pathetic to all right. More practice and I've gotten better. Much better in fact.

Right now, I'm filling in a sketch a day journal. Each day is a small sketch. I spend maybe 5-10 minutes on them. By the end of a year, I expect that I'll be that much better. And even more so when I take my time drawing on a larger surface than those small sketches.

Drawing on the right side of the brain

I inherited a copy of this book some time ago now.

Now that NaNoWriMo is done for 2014, I can afford to spend some time doing things in addition to writing.

I have decided to try this book. I did once have some informal art instruction back in about 1999 (give or take a few years there) which possibly was based on this book.

So, the first exercise is to be completed before you actually begin learning the techniques. There are 4 but I’ve only done 3 of the four. One was to draw a person (no pictures), one was to draw a person doing something (no photographs to be used), one was to draw your own hand (you could look at your hand) and one was to draw a chair (from looking at a chair)

So, this is the start of the journey.

Wish me luck.