I have a slightly different post for you today. I recently took a Skillshare class by Dylan Mierzwinski which explained the elements and principles of design. The homework for the class was to pick three of the topics covered and create mood boards for each using images off Pinterest, or from things around you that appealed to you. Going into this task, I was expecting to be submitting loose lines, lots of movement and watercolour for my homework pieces. However, I surprised myself! Compensated affiliate links used.

I used my Pinterest boards as the source of my inspiration and scrolled back through my pins looking for images I still found inspiring in the topics colour, repetition and contrast.

Colour

I know I am always drawn to muted shades, but I was amazed looking back at my pins that so many of them gravitated to a mustard/teal/neutral palette. I think of all the design features mentioned in Dylan’s class, colour affects me the most and determines whether I like a project and the emotions it evokes.

Repetition

If you had asked me what I liked before doing this homework, I would have said defined focal points, loose lines etc. Yet when I look back at what I have pinned and what still speaks to me now, I see a lot of repetition and if anything a lack of focal point with the eye wandering from one element to the next.

Contrast

I certainly seem to be drawn to images with lots of contrast particularly light vs dark in defined blocks of colour.

I’ve found this an interesting and enlightening experiment. Instead of the loose lines, lots of movement and watercolour, I find instead I’m drawn to a more graphic style with lots of repetition! Certainly food for thought moving forward.

Experimentation

With my newfound focus on what appeals to me, I’ve been experimenting with my discoveries. I am currently doing the #the100dayproject on Instagram. The basic idea is to pick a project you want to work on – something you want to learn or improve on is ideal – and every day spend a few minutes working on it and sharing your progress on Instagram. I’ve been keeping up with the project in my Instagram stories, and I have added a ‘stories highlight’ under my Instagram profile if you want to catch up or look back at what I’ve been up to. For my 100 day project, I’m aiming to improve my watercolouring. I took the mood boards above and here’s a couple of quick phone snaps of the watercolour practice from day 17/100.

I pulled out the colours from my mood board and mixed a teal (Blue Apatite Genuine, Cerulean Blue Chromium + Ultramarine Turquoise), a mustard yellow (Quinacridone Gold + Quinacridone Violet) and a neutral (Sepia). I then played around with cubes for repetition and used different values of the colours for the three sides of the cubes for contrast.

While painting this, I was chatting with my daughter about which University place to accept and my mind wasn’t totally on the job at hand – can you spot the mistake? The neutral cubes of the second row are painted with the shadows in a different orientation to all the other rows LOL. However, I found this experiment very rewarding as I explored my findings from Dylan’s class.

Sneak Peek

I’ve followed this experiment through and made a card based on my findings. I’ve filmed a video too, and I hope to get that edited and up on my blog this coming week.

I’d be interested to know if you found this type of post interesting? Or whether you’d prefer I just shared my card making? For those interested, you can find Dylan’s Level Up Your Art Game here.