How to create MORE art easily!

The best piece of advice I've gotten as an artist is this:

"Take a single idea and stretch it over several images!"

Sounds easy? Well, yes it is.
For the longest time I would create an image by sketching out one composition. Then I would ink it, draw it out with color pencils, or paint it and move on to the next image. But this would often cause me to hit a creative wall, "artist block", and not be able to create something new.

So, to fix this I went back to that great advice.

I started with sketching out a bunch of different compositions for a single idea.
Let me give you an example:

This is a recent concept I developed for my "Skellies" where they are in a cyclical loop of self-consumption.
So I started with one image, one concept, one color, and then I sketched out more ideas.




I started with the idea of branches and berries growing out of my Skellies with a monochrome color palate.

Each composition is the same as the first one while still being different enough to stand on their own.



 I also used gold leaf for each image to tie them together.

In each skull there is metallic gold, silver, or rose gold leaf. This is a simple way to make the series consistent.





But I started to get a bit bored of create the branches and fruits with the Skellies. It felt very redundant.
So I changed up the composition again while still keeping with the overall idea.

 

I altered some of the Skellies with their skulls sliced in half. The metallic leaf still coming from the skull.

Here is where the first concept of these pieces naturally evolved during the process of the artwork.



I even used the colors to alter the imagery to fit better. I couldn't find good examples of blue and green fruit, same with the black skull above, to make the theme work. 

So I changed them to bring a different emotion to the art and a different concept.





So you can see how taking the first idea and altering it allowed me to turn 1 image into 9 pieces.

This trick has helped me to make more artwork throughout my career and I would highly recommend it to anyone who has the dreaded "artist block".
Go back thru your artwork and find an idea you loved. Then do another sketch idea with a different composition, extending on the concept.

I hope this advice is as helpful as it was for me!

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