We don’t know about you, but we are ready to slooooow down around here!🐌
It’s time for Slowvember, the art challenge created by Lee White, (who is also one of our founders). The idea is to slow down and spend the whole month of November on making one thing beautiful 🌺
He created the challenge in 2017, as a follow up to the hustle of Inktober. It’s about taking your time and making something that you really care about, like a new portfolio piece, or an illustration you have been thinking about for a long time.
Sounds easy, right? But it’s not! Most of us aren’t used to spending that much time on a single image. How do you even spend a month on one image?
Here’s Lee’s week-by-week approach to Slowvember (he goes into more detail in the video⬆️):
Week 1: Research and development. This is all about finding inspiration, no output at this stage! Find art that you love, and do Lee’s art questionnaire.
Week 2: Thumbnails, value studies, color comps. This stage is for trying out different compositions and designs and seeing if they really work. If you follow Lee’s YouTube, then you’ll know that he recommends you do at least 50 thumbnails before deciding on a composition. Explore the options!
Week 3: Paint and evaluate. You’ve done the legwork, now it’s time to go to a finish. Make the image, then evaluate. Is it working? Are there problem areas? Get feedback!
Week 4: Paint the final! And enjoy the process 😄
Can you work on other art during Slowvember? Yes, go for it! The challenge is not about working ONLY on one thing, it’s about taking one thing and really taking the time to explore it before taking it to a finish. All too often we rush into drawing without really thinking through the concept and playing with the possibilities.
Be sure to post your progress with hashtag #slowvember and #slowvember2019 so we can see all the steps along the way 🐌
And if you want some social media love, tag us too! We’ll be reposting our favorites 💖💖💖 You can use either #svslearn or @svslearn. We’ll be on the l👀k out!