When do you produce your best creative work?

This week at Cartoon Club for Kids and Discover Your Inner Cartoonist we you were transported into a sound studio for our online art classes. Actually it was a monster cartoon character who was at the controls but hey who’s checkin’?! I really liked this scenario because it gave me the freedom to really mess about. We were doodling sound words – onomatopoeia is the technical term so I gather.

It got me thinking… how is it that sometimes drawing the cartoon narrative can be so difficult and other times, it just works so easily? I’ve come to see a pattern to my behaviour that occurs when I’m producing my best work. The monster brought it out of me … can you guess?…..

Let’s focus on one creative thought – PLAY

See the great thing about monsters is that you have no control over them. They just mess around, they PLAY – exactly what you want when you are in a sound studio.

Since we were doodling words and cartooning these words to look like they sound I wanted a wide and unrelated variety other words to cartoon. I thought that would be more fun and diverse room to PLAY with the lock of the letter and designs. And hey isn’t that what the sound studios for PLAY?!

We came up with some super inspiring words to cartoon. Everything from bang to boom to scratch and tweet. How about slurp and boing, crunch, ah-ha, yeah. I told you this was good PLAY!

Here you see one of my sketches I do in preparation for class. I keep it messy and just play around with the ideas until a composition starts to take shape. 

How does PLAY improve our ability to produce creative work?

While it may seem like a bit of a silly exercise for our online art class, to imagine a monster in a sound studio, the great thing about it is, it gives you freedom to PLAY with your drawing.

I always do a lot of sketching and doodling in preparation for my online art classes for both the kids and adults. This is where I do most of my PLAY. It’s where I feel the freedom producing a final drawing. This is when my drawing doesn’t need to be perfect or beautifully done and it’s not work. It’s well … it’s PLAY.

I find that the more I give myself the license to mess around, more my drawings spiral out in interesting directions. It’s in this PLAY mode when I get my most creative ideas. I’m not worried about one of my drawings looking ‘good’ so to speak, but instead I’m allowing myself to PLAY with the topic and for the ideas to flow. I’m always a little bit apprehensive when I start working in this mode, worrying that it won’t result in a final good design, however I know that exactly my indicator that I’m doing the best thing to build my creative mindset. And hey isn’t that what it’s all about?!

So if you want to draw more creative pictures and fun filled illustrations yourself, why not have a go with a monster. Put him in a sound studio. Think about what he might PLAY around with and have a go for yourself. Nothing like a monster to give you permission to PLAY.

Ready?… Let’s Get Creative!

Online Art Classes

for Kids and Adults who love to Doodle!

Are you always doodling? Do you love to create cartoons? These are the art classes for you! I've created a small, friendly group that works together in our online art class. We’re open to anyone who likes to sit, doodle and dream up cartoons. There are drawing classes for kids (ages 8 - 12), young children (ages 6 - 7) and even adults.