Excuse the mess: a non-fiction visit to my studio
Pinterest can do one, I’m trying to get some work done here.
Hello and welcome to my beautifully photogenic, rustic yet cosy garden studio the spare room in my flat.
I’m calling this My Studio so you’ll think I’m fancy. Truthfully, I never call it My Studio. It’s called The End Room because it’s at the end of our flat, furthest from the front door. However, I do have a spare room so I am pretty fancy.
Today I’m making the first drawings for a non-fiction children’s book that has farm animals in it. I have a sketchbook filled with drawings I made at a farm a while ago, some pages are useful.
Others are not.
This morning I need to draw things that I don’t have in my sketchbooks. I need non-fiction farmyard action so I break out YouTube and watch videos at double speed showing the miracle of life and Mother Nature in all her glory . . .
Pretty gross, Mother Nature.
Pretty gross.
I make drawings translating reality as best as I can into something that is truthful but a little bit more palatable. I can’t be too Pinterest-y about it, this is non-fiction after all.
A sort of fictional non-fiction, if you will. (Like me inviting you into my “Studio.”)
The initial pencils of any project feel like an endurance race.
There’s thinking, researching, trying out compositions, and crises of confidence while seeing what communicates best. I do this on A4 printer paper because it’s cheaper than a sketchbook.
I keep motivated by using what I call a Bullet Journal, but anyone else would call drawing some squares in pencil, then crossing them out in colour. The brand of notebook I use is Artfan, but we could create the fiction that I use a fancy Leuchtturm.
This afternoon I drop the drawings on paper into photoshop. I flip them around, change their scale, make them fit. Then redraw the spread digitally.
Whereupon the drawings lose all their magic.
I’m caught up in making everything tidy and second guessing how polished the art director would like this to be. I want to present the fiction that everything was a breeze.
My phone alarm goes off to remind me to go for a walk.
But I ignore it because I’m not sure this spread is working. Maybe I’ve looked at it for too long. Maybe I should take a break. Just a minute…
I shut down photoshop, finally ready for a walk. I put on my son’s long-outgrown school raincoat, it still fits me fine (hashtag: outfit of the day).
I’m surprised to feel a sketchbook of mine in the pocket. Oooooh! I wonder what drawings I might have forgotten about!
I hope there’s a something in there I can share on the socials … Something I’ll caption with a fictional line about a random quick sketch.
I open it excitedly…
The sketchbook is empty. This is non-fiction, remember.
Does your desk look like something from Pinterest? Is your planning system instagram-able? Or are we all just pretending online?
✏️ Ps. This is a real, non-fiction look at my working space and working day. However, I have substituted images from other projects so that I’m not sharing client work which shouldn’t be in public yet.
✏️Pps. There’ll be another edition with a real look at what happens when I move to the colour stages of artwork - it isn’t tidy!
All my posts are remaining free and open for the foreseeable future! If you fancy getting me a cuppa tea that would be amazing! Totally up to you, we’ll still be friends!
Ha! Love this Nanette. This sounds like my non-fiction - Fiction drawing days too. Working on a lovely fiction one but it’s foxing the hell out of me and so my days are filled with very real non fiction worry 😂 xxx can’t wait to see your non fiction book. Back in the Olden days when google was brand new I googled farm animals for a picture book and was so horrified at what popped up - mainly naked ladies doing unspeakable things with bemused looking farm animals I shut off my computer and drove to the library convinced I was going to have the filth police banging on my door! 😳😬😆 good luck with your new project . Lovely to read all about your working day xxx
Ha! I love how focused you are, Nanette. My studio is also only called a studio when talking to anyone outside the household and I’m feeling fancy. Inside our household, it’s called “The Little House”. Except if the dog is listening. Because if he hears “Little House” he drops what he’s doing (usually sleeping, eating or staring at me in the hope I might drop spare food out of my pockets) and RUNS into the garden to the Little House. It’s his favourite place to be. Apart from in bed.