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In today’s episode, we share lots of ‘general tips’ for artists. It follows on quite nicely from Episode 15 about making the best of your creative space.

We cover a lot in this episode. Just in case you’re not aware, Sandra is an experienced oil painter who paints highly detailed still lifes. Prior to discovering her love of oils, she used to paint in watercolours. So Sandra has a wealth of tips to share, plus I throw in a few tips of my own that I’ve learned over the years too.

One of the biggest things you’ll learn is to take your bathroom cabinet out of the bathroom and transfer it to your art space. It appears that Sandra has miraculously found a use for everything in hers for painting. Even I found some of the suggestions a little eye-opening!

Some of the tips we share include:

• How to stop your paint from drying out so quickly
• How to clean and preserve your brushes, including the magic of Murphy’s Oil Soap
• How Gamblin oil paints are better for your health (also check out Sandra’s blog post about oil painting safety)
• How to stop dipping your brush in your coffee and drinking your painting water/medium
• How to stretch watercolour paper, including modern watercolour stretchers and watercolour boards.
• Some great apps for artists – including one that can replace that ridiculous wooden mannequin that would never stay in place
• A very ‘unusual’ way of removing dust from a painting!

We also include art tips shared by members of our Facebook Group, Page and our followers on Instagram.

Here’s the list of apps mentioned in the podcast

• ArtPose is an app that is a much better alternative to one of those wooden artist mannequins. With Artpose you can choose a figure, pose it in virtually any position, look at it from different angles and light it too.
• ProCreate is a fantastic app on the ipad that allows you to paint digitally, Some artists do the most amazing things with it. One of the really clever things about the app is it also automatically makes a video of you creating your art.
• Jackson’s ArtGrid lets you create an instant grid over a photograph which you can then translate onto your canvas so you can create an accurate drawing
• The ipad app Graphic – creates vector graphics very much like you would on a computer with Adobe Illustrator. Vector graphics are good as you can blow them up to any size without the quality deteriorating.
• Autodesk Sketchbook – this is another comprehensive drawing app available on desktop and tablet.
• Paper app by Fifty three – is an app for digital sketchbooks. It’s also beautifully designed.
• Adobe has a suite of apps for digital art on a tablet or phone which you can use for free.

This week’s question

What do you listen to while you create?

The best answers will be read out on the next podcast.

You can Tweet us your answers @KickCreatives or let us know in the Facebook Group, which by the way if you haven’t already joined, I highly recommend that you do! We will put the question up there and also on the facebook page… and of course, on our Instagram page @kickinthecreatives.

If you have any suggestions for the podcast or our challenges please feel free to get in touch.

Note: This post contains affiliate links. This means that if you use the link to make a purchase we will receive a very small commission, without any extra cost to you. This will help to support our website and podcast. Thank you so much.

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We are delighted to have the incredibly talented artist and co-founder of Sketchbook Skool, Koosje Koene on the podcast today.

Koosje was born in the Netherlands and lives in Amsterdam. She studied Graphic Design but later went on to become an award-winning photographer.

After 10 years as a photographer, Koosje got itchy feet and her pencils began calling her. She quickly re-discovered her love for drawing and started her blog.

Koosje then began developing online classes and not only is she now a highly talented illustrator, but also an online teacher. She also hosts ‘Draw Tip Tuesday’ where she offers weekly drawing tips, encouraging people to draw every single day. She shares how she gets inspiration for both Draw Tip Tuesday and her own personal art.

In the podcast, you will hear more about Koosje’s creative journey on the way to co-founding Sketchbook Skool with Danny Gregory in 2014. She also shares her hopes for the future of Sketchbook Skool and her own creative work.

Don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast and our newsletter so you get notified of all our challenges.

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Today’s episode is all about making the best of your creative space. Now that includes keeping your stuff organised and tidy. Anyone that knows me well, will know that tidiness is definitely not my forte. In fact, my partner (who never stops hoovering) would be rolling around laughing at the thought of me giving anyone else advice on this stuff. Hands up who else has an “I don’t know where to put it” drawer?

Now if you were panicking and thinking why on earth would I listen to someone so untidy, fear not. Fortunately, Sandra, who says herself that she is a little OCD in the clean and tidy department, can help balance out my messiness.

So just like you, I will have to listen back to this episode to see what Mrs Tidypants (as Sandra will be known from this day forward ) has to say about creative space organisation.

We discuss:

• What our dream art spaces would be like
• Tips for working in small areas
• Storage ideas, Sandra has a great way or organising paint
• Easels
• Home art studios
• Lighting
• Working in less than ideal conditions – ie a shed with limited light.
• Anything else that pops in our heads (sorry)

We also include tips for making the best of your creative space shared by members of our Facebook Group, Page and our followers on Instagram.

This week’s question

What is your Favourite art or creative book and why?

The best answers will be read out on the next podcast.

You can Tweet us your answers @KickCreatives or let us know in the Facebook Group, which by the way if you haven’t already joined, I highly recommend that you do! We will put the question up there and also on the facebook page… and of course, on our Instagram page @kickinthecreatives.

If you have any suggestions for the podcast or our challenges please feel free to get in touch.

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This week we are delighted to have Danny Gregory from Sketchbook Skool on the podcast. In fact, delighted is pretty much an understatement, especially for Sandra who had to decide what outfit she would wear for our voice-only podcast.

I’m sure if you love art and drawing you’ll know all about Danny Gregory, but just in case you’ve had your head buried under a sketchbook for the last few years, let me tell you a little more. Danny spent three decades working as one of New York’s leading advertising directors. When his wife had a tragic accident which left her paralyzed, Danny started drawing and keeping a journal as a sort of therapy to help him come to terms with what happened. He has been drawing ever since. He also used drawing to help him cope with the death of his wife through another accident years later.

Danny has written several books, some of which show his beautiful journal sketches alongside his words, we talk about some of them in the podcast including A Kiss Before You Go and Shut Your Monkey.

A few years ago Danny got together with Koosje Koene to form Sketchbook Skool. Danny never dreamed he would end up teaching people to draw, but now he is inspiring people all over the world to pick up a pen or pencil and start drawing again.

You can find out more about Danny Gregory on his blog or at https://sketchbookskool.com

Note: This post contains Amazon affiliate links. This means that if you use the link to make a purchase we will receive a very small commission, without any extra cost to you. This will help to support our website and podcast. Thank you so much.

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Our guest for this creative podcast episode is realist artist Callum Stephen, who you may remember from the BBC Big Painting Challenge. Sandra takes the reins today as she interviews Callum while I’m off on holiday in France, which funnily enough is where Callum is now living.

Starting to paint

Callum only started painting a couple of years ago. He has an absolutely fascinating story about how a book, a chance encounter and someone whispering in his ear while travelling in Australia kicked off his artistic passion.

Back home he started experimenting with a cheap set of oil paints bought from a local shop. He chose oils as it was what the old masters had used to create highly realistic pieces that he admires.

Callum taught himself to paint by reading countless books to learn the old techniques. He also watched Youtube videos and now looks at contemporary realist artists on Instagram. From the behind the scenes pictures they post, he notices the types of materials and methods they use.

Artists Callum loves

A realist artist that Callum admires is Tjalf Sparnaay, a self-taught artist. He also likes the work of Bernardi and Spence

BBC Big Painting Challenge

You may have thought like we did, that Callum applied to be on the Big Painting Challenge, but in fact, they phoned him to ask him to audition. The only problem was, he thought it was his friends playing a joke and hung up on them. You’ll find out more in the podcast about how he did finally end up on the show and how he felt about painting in ways far outside his comfort zone. It’s something that Sandra herself knows only too well from her experience of art college.

Art college versus a mentor

Although Callum doesn’t like the ideas of going to Art School he would love a mentor that he could get tips from. He likes learning in his own time and own way, but sometimes wishes there was someone he could call on to learn techniques that he is not quite sure about.

Becoming a full-time artist

It’s Callum’s dream to eventually become a full-time realist artist. At the time the podcast was recorded Callum had full-time day job as a stonemason/bricklayer (although I saw on Social media he may have just given that up). You can tell his determination to learn his craft from the hours he was putting into it, getting up at 4 am to paint before work and painting into the night after work too.

Connect with Callum

You can find out more about Callum on Facebook and Instagram @callum_stephen_

PS. Sandra also talks about our latest creative challenges coming up for July

• Kick Time July a Month Long Creative Challenge
• Quick Kick July
• 31 Printed Photos
• Draw on Junk July
• Half Past Christmas

Find more info on all the July challenges here

Don’t forget to join our Facebook Group too.

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Today’s episode is all about idea generation, a topic we love. I have to try and keep Sandra under control otherwise she comes up with bizarre ideas like inflatable knickers (don’t ask!).

If you have ever sat with a blank sheet of paper not knowing what to create, then this episode is for you. You really don’t need to wait for that Eureka moment to have an idea. There are lots of different creative techniques you can try.

Some of the creativity techniques we cover:

• Mind mapping – but we put our own twist on this
• How to get ideas out of your everyday life
• How to use a random word to get ideas – we also try this live to show you how it works – yikes (we don’t even cheat by picking the random words first! )
• Freewriting – Sandra shares a scary app for this too
• Sandra talks about how you should carry a notebook at all times, but hasn’t got one when we need one on the podcast 🙂
• Idea mash-up – Its a bit like making a cheese and potato pie, but completely different
• Moodboards and White-Boards
• Poetry and Character Tear-Ups
• Oh my god I am still writing, and there are more creative techniques we shared that I haven’t even mentioned…get your coffee ready.

We also read out some of the answers to last week’s podcast question asking people what their favourite piece of art is, which reminds me of a bag of broccoli I once bought. Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to answer.

This week’s question

What is the best art exhibition or creative event you have ever attended and why?

The best answers will be read out on the next podcast.

You can Tweet us your answers @KickCreatives or let us know in the Facebook Group, which by the way if you haven’t already joined, I highly recommend that you do! We will put the question up there and also on the facebook page… and of course, on our Instagram page @kickinthecreatives.

If you have any suggestions for the podcast or our challenges please feel free to get in touch.

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This week we are delighted to have Mike Young, better known as Youngman Brown on the show. Youngman is the creator of the popular podcast Your Creative Push.

Now Youngman has a lot to answer for, in fact, he is the reason that this podcast even exists. He’s the one to blame when Sandra and I are warbling on in your ear, as we met via Youngman’s Your Creative Push Facebook Group.

Why Mike started the Your Creative Push Podcast

Youngman originally started his podcast because he tried to find a podcast about pushing yourself to be more creative, but couldn’t find one. Mike is a great writer but he found he wasn’t motivating himself to write as much as he wanted to. Originally Youngman was putting out one episode of the show a day, which is quite an achievement. Finding guests, interviewing and editing a podcast takes a huge amount of time and Youngman was doing all that alongside his job of being a poker dealer.

Youngman’s creative projects and challenges

Youngman shares some of the creative projects he is working on including Words plus music http://wordsplusmusic.com/ and Creative Push. He also speaks about some of the challenges he’s taken part in. One was NaNoWriMo – a writing challenge, but Youngman put his own twist on the Challenge. Cramuary was another challenge that Youngman invented himself. The idea was that he would “cram”/do as much work on a creative project (his book) during January as he could. However, it didn’t work out quite as planned which Youngman explains more about in the podcast. Youngman offers his tips for anyone else who is considering taking part in a creative challenge.

Find out more about Youngman Brown

You can find out more about Youngman and listen to his podcast at www.yourcreativepush.com
His writing can be found at www.youngmanbrown.com and WordsPlusMusic at www.wordsplusmusic.com/
The Creative Push facebook Group www.facebook.com/groups/yourcreativepush

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As a follow up to our episode about dealing with negative feedback, today’s episode is about imposter syndrome.

If you haven’t heard the term before, it doesn’t mean you have to disguise yourself with a pair of googly eyes and fake moustache. Instead, it’s that feeling you get that you get when you feel you shouldn’t be in the position your in. That you aren’t knowledgeable enough to be where you are, even though you have all the expertise and experience that you need.

How to spot if you have imposter syndrome

• Feeling inferior amongst others in your field
• A fear of being ‘found out’… or people realising that you’re not really as knowledgeable on the subject as they’d thought
• Lack of self-confidence and self-belief
• Procrastination
• Feelings of self-doubt

Our experiences of imposter syndrome

We share our experiences of imposter syndrome. Sandra talks about having Imposter Syndrome when her art was featured on the front cover of a magazine. Tara’s art hasn’t yet achieved such notoriety, but she did once win a hamster cage, (plus a teddy bear and Star Wars model kit that she forgot to mention in the show 😉 ). PS. she was only about 7. Tara has also experienced imposter syndrome on many occasions, including the time she worked at a design agency and the most amazing designer worked there too – yikes.

How to overcome imposter syndrome

Hold on to your hats, we got some ideas for you here, hint – that was one of them, but you can hear more in the show.

Have you ever had imposter syndrome?

Share your experience in the comments

June Challenges

We give a quick mention to the three challenges we’ve got happening in June:

Copyist June

Replicate a sketch, drawing or painting by a master or from an art book, every day throughout the month. One of the best ways to learn how to draw well is to copy from other artists who are masters of their craft. By replicating their style you will learn a lot.
To find out more about this challenge click here

Cartoon in June

This is a challenge to create a cartoon every single day throughout the month of June. Your cartoon could be a single character, or an entire comic strip! You can use any medium.
To find out more about this challenge click here

Quick Kick June

For ‘Quick Kick June’ – Create a COLOUR sketch in 10 minutes or less. This challenge is particularly suitable for those who have a tendency to overwork their sketches or those who have limited time.
To find out more about this challenge click here

This week’s podcast question

Q. What is your favourite famous painting and why?

The best answers will be read out on the next podcast.

You can Tweet us your answers @KickCreatives or let us know in the Facebook Group, which by the way if you haven’t already joined, I highly recommend that you do! We will put the question up there and also on the facebook page… and of course, on our Instagram page @kickinthecreatives.

If you have any suggestions for the podcast or our challenges please feel free to get in touch.

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Today we are talking about dealing with negative feedback and we’ll be sharing some of our personal experiences. Now, I am sure if you have listened to the show before you’re thinking…’But Sandra and Tara are way too fabulous to have ever had any negative feedback.’

…That is was what you were thinking, wasn’t it?!

But it’s true, we have both had some gut-wrenching experiences – I don’t think I need to elaborate anymore other than to say the words “nose whistle” and “the teddy bear got its revenge”. It will all make sense when you listen.

Why are you receiving negative criticism?

Often it means you stepping out of your comfort zone and trying something new or stretching yourself, which is actually a great thing. It’s just that people aren’t always that tactful about giving criticism.

Tips for dealing with negative feedback

We need to try and remember that feedback, whether good or bad is only someone’s opinion. Sometimes the criticism can help us learn something and improve what we do, but other times it’s best to ignore it and realise it’s more about the other person’s insecurities, jealousy or downright tactlessness. We share how our negative feedback affected us at the time and how we might deal with it if the same thing happened now.

Ideas for ways to boost your own confidence

Along with dealing with negative criticism, we also make some suggestions on how to boost your own confidence and make yourself feel better. This does not involve eating copious amounts of chocolate, although we are open to testing if it has beneficial effects.

Our supportive Facebook Group are busy creating

We also give a mention to some of the fantastic members of our Facebook Group who are creating and sharing regular art in the group. You are welcome to join us.

Thank you for all of your answers to our previous question. It was fun reading some of them out.

This week’s question

What would be your dream creative project?

Please put your answers in the comments below or get in touch on social media – via the Facebook Group, Instagram or Twitter

We’ll read out the best answers in the next episode.

Don’t forget you can subscribe to our podcast in lots of places including – iTunes, Stitcher and Podbean

If you enjoyed the podcast please consider leaving a review on iTunes which will help us get found by more listeners and we’ll love you forever (or something like that)

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Today we share some tips on how to make your sketchbook more interesting. Plus, as usual, we go on a few tangents and talk about other things that pop into our heads, usually art related, but we can’t completely promise that!

We also mention our April Art Challenges which had just started as we recorded the episode – Abstract Art April, Imitation April and Quick Kick April. Quick Kicks are our monthly challenges that you can complete in 15 minutes or less, so most people can fit them into their day.

Making your sketchbook cover more interesting

Anyway, just like the podcast, I have already managed to divert my attention away from the main topic of sketchbooks. First, we discuss different suggestions for making your sketchbook cover more interesting. Sandra is a big advocate of this, but I prefer to concentrate on the insides. It reminds us both of having to cover exercise books when we were back at school in the dark ages. Does anyone else remember Fablon that sticky plastic stuff or is it a figment of my imagination? Do kids still cover exercise books? Do exercise books even exist anymore or have they been replaced by holograms?

Tips for your sketchbook pages

Next, we look at the inside of your sketchbook. There is something really satisfying about pre-messing up your sketchbook pages. Maybe this isn’t a very eloquent way to put it, but starting with a bit of collage or a wash on the paper can take away your fear of the blank page. We have plenty of suggestions for things you can try. Apparently rather too many as it took hours for Sandra to edit us down to a reasonable time. If that’s not your bag, we also have some ideas on how you can use different marks, borders and effects to add interest to your pages.

Ideas for what to draw

One of the problems some artist have, especially when they’re short of time is deciding what to draw. We have some suggestions here too, plus you can always join one of our challenges where we give you an optional prompt and reference each day.

Thank you for all of your answers to our previous question. It was fun reading out your answers.

This weeks question

How do you get over the fear of the blank page?

Please put your answers in the comments below or get in touch on social media – via the Facebook Group, Instagram or Twitter

We’ll read out the best answers in the next episode.

Don’t forget you can subscribe to our podcast in lots of places including – iTunes, Stitcher and Podbean

If you enjoyed the podcast please consider leaving a review on iTunes which will help us get found by more listeners and we’ll love you forever (or something like that)