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| These are the art supplies I had to use this time. |
As with all my lucky dips, I use a spreadsheet that lists all my art subscription box supplies and RANDOM.ORG to decide which items I'll use. I always pull five different numbers, no more or less, though a single item on my spreadsheet might actually contain more than one thing. That's what happened this time when I drew number 48, the PanPastel set. This set alone contains five different pastel colors and four different smudging tools, all in one compact unit. I consider it one item, which is why, even if I had drawn its number first rather than last, I still would have chosen four more numbers.
For reference, here are the other rules I set myself for these challenges:
- A pencil for underdrawing is allowed, but all marks must eventually be covered/erased.
- Extra tools such as paintbrushes, blenders, and erasers are allowed.
- Substrate can be selected freely, based on appropriate use of the Lucky Dip items.
- Final piece must clearly show use of all Lucky Dip items.
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| My tools and selected paper. |
Since the pastel set had so many different colors to use (and my rules require me to use them all) I decided to go with pastel paper as my surface. Pastel paper isn't great for markers, but it works fine with all the other tools I needed to use. It turned out that the marker would have done poorly regardless of what it was used on...but more on that later. I have various colors of pastel paper I could have used, but since I had so much color to work with anyway, I chose a white sheet.
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| Lucky dip plans! This was a good idea; donno why I didn't do it sooner XD |
This lucky dip is kind of unique in that I pulled the numbers and sketched out my ideas a year or two before I actually started creating the piece. This is another one of my many projects where I felt overwhelmed by all the little things I needed to do in order to follow through properly. I was already two blogs behind, I didn't really enjoy creating my second lucky dip piece, and even though I sought to make things easier on myself by planning ahead instead of deciding on-the-fly how to use each of the materials, I just sort of dropped it after the sketching stage.
Lucky for the project (the lucky Lucky Dip project XD) I decided to try livestreaming my art on Twitch this year. I'd never livestreamed anything before, or even posted videos of my art, but I knew I wanted to go in with a schedule and a plan. I had first learned of lucky dips thanks to YouTube videos, so it quickly came to mind and I actually ended up scheduling it as my very first livestream. You can watch it on YouTube now, to see the entire creation of Lucky Dip III from start to finish:
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| All done! This dragon looks glorious! Table's a wreck XD |
It felt really good to do this lucky dip. I had enjoyed my time working on the first one, but the second one felt like I was fighting with it the entire time, so I was a little worried about that happening again this time, especially since it was going to be broadcast live. I did some deep breathing before I hit the start button on my streaming software XD Once I got started though, none of my worries came to pass. Everything went smoothly and the final piece turned out even better than I imagined! This piece restored my confidence in the Lucky Dip project.
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| RIP Touch Twin Marker in Marigold |
The one real hitch in this lucky dip was the Touch Twin Marker. It was an item I received in my second ArtSnacks box, back in April 2014, nearly four years ago. I only used it a few times before this lucky dip, but despite being properly capped and stored, it was almost completely dry when I used it here. It had enough left to do what I originally intended--give the dragon its undertone--but I knew I would have to retire it after this. I took one last photo before tossing it XD
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| Ink, marker, pastel, and white charcoal, 9x12", completed January 2018 |
I'm really glad I came back to this project, even though it took me so long. The lucky dip idea--randomly drawing a limited selection of tools and then using them all together in one piece--is a great way to force myself to think outside the box, to use tools that I've spent money on but generally don't consider, and to liven up my video channels and blog with interesting content that you all can come to expect from me on a regular basis. I hope you enjoyed this lucky dip and that you'll continue to look forward to them in the future!
