Well, that wasn't as bad as I thought it was gonna be.

[silverthorne]

So I did two things today in relation to my resolutions. The first was to go and get two new sketchbooks to replace the ones I had. Although it's wasteful, the ones I still had were old, musty, and quite frankly, were gifts from the ex and never had much in them to start with.

I'd already trashed my older ones before I moved, saving just the pages that had some little merit to them. I'd kept these at first because, well, wasting paper is not good.

And promptly ignored them. Sure, I sketched a few things in them. Nothing I wanted to keep, and I was uncomfortable with them in my lap. I dunno. Maybe another artist or mucisian would get it; trying to create anything with tools you don;t feel right in handling? Just doesn't help. I dunno, maybe that's just a mental block on my part. Whatever the reason though, they're gone. There was actually surprisingly little I wanted to keep--just a few clothing designs that I'm likely going to re-sketch in the new books before trashing what I tore out of the old ones. At least now, though, I'm happy with my tools. Even looking forward to a little work this afternoon. And I don't feel weird touching them, either.

Of course, the bad news is that I found out that Micheals is all of three miles away--almost walking distance. This could be bad for my pocket book. Especialyl since I found both a portable drafting table and a floor lamp that I am positively drooling for (and will cost me a sweet 500 after tax and the like. Yikes. XD. Yeah, I think those'll be on the 'not yet, dear' list.)

Anyhow, getting that part settled, came home and went through my art supplies to see what died in the five-plus years that I hadn't used any of it.

I was surpised to find out that only five of my markers, three of my india inks, and one of my inking pens had died horribly. Which means instead of the few to several hundred dollars I might have been looking at to replace stuff, I'm only going to be out roughly 50-100. Which is very good. Of course, if I decide to add acrylics and oils back into it, that'll become a few hundred. BUt I think that'll be a bit in the future yet--I need to reacquaint myself with my chosen mediums first. :) Although...there will be 70 going towards a nice pastel pencil set. *cough*

And just a note; both Higgins and Windsor & Newton inks hold up nicely. Just in case anyone cared. Likewise the Prismacolor markers and pencils. :)

Any, step one done. And now I'm gonna go play with the water color pencil set and see if I remember how in hell to use them. *g*

Comments

[chiss.livejournal.com]

Prismacolor is very nice, as far as I'm concerned. Expensive, but good quality for the money.

And I know what you mean about "the supplies don't feel right"... I get that way about art supplies I've just bought too; I hate using it until it's broken in, pencils and sketchbooks and etc. usually feel too stiff and pristine for me to do any quality work in right off the shelf.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

I've been a fan of Prismacolor ever since college (all one and a half semesters I took. XD), especially the pencils. I've had a few different brand sets of colored pencils over the years, but they just weren't...the same. Too hard, too soft, flaked when you layered them or went too thick, etc. Prismacolor also does a good job of keeping the pigment consistent from batc to batch and from pencil to marker, which is an added plus. I think I saw a pastel set out of them once, about a decade back, but never got a chance to try them out, and I haven't seen it since.

I don't really have a problem with 'new' supplies--for me, they're just a continuation of the old ones that needed to be replaced. I'd probably feel different if the brands I used were inconsistent in quality from batch to batch, but the only problem I ever had was with broken lead inside the pencils, and that seems to have been a problem with the store I was getting them from, rather then the pencil itself--because once I changed where I was getting my supplies from, I didn't have that problem again except maybe once or twice. Only thing I can figure is that their receiving and/or stocking clerks had some rage problems and took it out on the shipping boxes.

I think a lot of my problem is that, as with a lot of things, I managed to get a programmed aversion to actually doing anything. At first, I got a lot of support, and then as the art started taking attention away from the ex, we'd get into more and larger fights over me 'ignoring' her in favor of working on something. And then, later more fights developed over me 'not getting anything done' on that quarter because, well, I'd quit doing much of anything unless she wanted to see me do something, or if she were sick and/or at work and/or involved in her own activities, and at that point, my art was admittedly an avoidance tactic. Not only that, but if I got too into it and started using a lot of supplies and/or making a lot of prints on the computer, I'd get yelled at for 'wasting' money. Hell, I learned to use the computer programs because that, at least, was money already spent and I could get away with being parked in front of it for hours on end as long as she was parked at her own computer with only comparatively mild fights breaking out over it. As long as I didn't print anything, that is.

So that's the reasons why I'm sure that's what a huge chunk of the problem is, since yesterday (and several times since I moved out), I'd either get an idea or even start on one, and then get restless with 'there are other things you need to be doing' distractions...and then those 'other things' were usually either goofing off on the internet, watching TV, or the occasional chore.

So, yeah, definite programming going on, there. Now I have to work out of it. Getting rid of the trace indications of her presence, I think, is a good step towards that. The sketch books were from her, and I just...don't like them anymore.

They smell bad, they feel bad, they're not in the binding style I'm comfortable with (Hard cover, permanent bound. Which means I end up dealing with a flapping lid that gets in the way. Or else she'd get me the spiral bounds with soft covers, which means I destroy the cover and the first four pages of stuff fairly quickly. Me and my sketchbook tend to travel. *g*). I'm even considering trashing all the art I did manage to do while living with her, especially of characters we'd RP'd together.