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Writer's pictureDan Woodward

Illustration Sketchbooks - Exercise 5.1: Making an action plan, visually

I like to work visually, and a large part of my professional work involves helping people to visualise their work. For this exercise, I thought I should take my own medicine so created a simple kanban task board in my studio to help track all the work that I need, or want, to accomplish.

But I do appreciate that this 'visual' approach isn't what the exercise brief is calling for. In taking stock I had a good chance to think about what I have taken away from this module, and where I would like my practice to go. I also know that I can't do everything in the time allowed, so I need to be selective. In the end, I have decided that I would like to use the final assignment to:

  • Practice fundamentals of colour and light

  • Work with narrative and sequence

  • Use words with my pictures

  • Make mistakes and move on

  • Draw figures and expression

  • Experiment with gouache

  • Put more of myself into my sketchbook

  • Steak and tweak from other artists

Instead of just drawing these on a sheet or a random page in my sketchbook, I decided to create a small dedicated book instead. The sense that I got from the brief was that I needed to select what to weave through my assignment sketchbook as a representation of how far I have come, and also where I will go.


So I thought it might be fun to create a book that represented that woven nature. Using a page of bristol board I used contrasting acrylic paint to create a pattern on both sides of the paper. I then folded, cut and fixed it into place. Then I went about adding some spot illustrations to each of the views. I made a bit of a mistake getting the folds in the right order, so I had to improvise and re-order. I suppose I am putting one of my goals into practice already!


I worked quickly and without being precious - it is a sketchbook after all and I was having fun. I used a combination of a blue POSCA marker and a black brush pen. It still felt a little flat, so I experimented using an orange highlighter as an accent colour. I think it went pretty well.


Normally I would scan in my work to show in my learning log but in this case, the physicality of the mini sketchbook is integral. So I have created a little video to demonstrate the sketchbook:


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