Rules to Create...

From someone who hates rules

Can you relate to my Saturday evening - I had a few hours home alone and free to draw whatever I wanted, bliss. I poured a small glass of wine, stacked up Sandi Hesters YouTube videos, opened a new sketchbook, sharpened my pencils, and was ready to draw ... except... I didn't know what to draw. 

I've found that having several projects or ideas on the go helps. I love Draw Brighton's Wednesday life drawing and for catching up on portrait sessions from the sofa. I love Sarah Dyer's Patreon for narrative prompts and exercises. I love drawing weird and beautiful things with my own Patreon. I have a picture book project which needs working on. And, of course, I have thousands of reference photos on my phone from our trips around Devon and Cornwall. 

But far too often, I don't want to draw any of those things. Saturday night was that kind of night. After a few wobbly attempts, I very nearly closed the sketchbook and gave up and then I thought to myself, "I need some rules".

Rules help with drawing because it gives us boundaries to work within. With too many limitations, the work can be stiff (like when you're up against a tight deadline). If there are not enough boundaries, and we can sometimes feel a bit lost - if I can draw ANYTHING in the world, where do I start? (I chatted about this a little bit on The Goodship Illustration Podcast)

So I set myself a few rules, and if you're feeling stuck, why don't you try this for yourself -

1. You must fill the whole page with the drawing

2. You can use any materials you like

3. You must draw as much as you can within [time]

4. You must draw a ___ on every page

I planned to draw until Phil came home, around 2 hours, I went on a little bit longer than that, but after a few hours of frantically drawing, I was exhausted and knew it was time to stop. 

I chose "a cat in a garden" to draw on every page because I've got a clear image in my mind of a painting I'd like to do, but I can't find the right reference imagery, so I thought I'd just go for part of it. 

I used Pexels for my reference imagery. Pexels is a royalty-free site I found via Jodie Howard when she taught my students a few years ago about gif making. Once I'd found an image I liked, I clicked through to download it, and after I finished the drawing, I scrolled down to "more like this" and drew from these too. It made image searching a lot easier. 

There was no agenda to these drawings, just a few hours of playing with materials. Oh, but there was one more rule! 

5. You must finish each drawing. Even if it's going badly. 

This was an essential rule because I made mistakes in a few of these drawings and wanted to stop, but I learnt so much by pushing through. 

Bad* drawings often make you feel bad, but recently I've tried changing my mindset and thinking about bad drawings as lessons. I will always learn more from the drawings that go wrong than the ones that go right.

Let me know if you set yourself rules already or if its something you might give a go in your own work :)

Emma x

*there is no such thing as a bad drawing.