Mimi's Illustration Club! July Prompt and First Activity (Patreon)

Hello my lovely flowers!

It's the beginning of July which means that I need to share this month's illustration club prompt with you all 🥰

Come on and join us over on Discord at any time to take a look at what other community members are creating for the challenge or just to chat! I love being able to see what you create, it honestly makes me smile every time I see your art pop up on Discord.

If you're new here, here's how the club works (you can skip this if you already know):

At the start of the month I'll share with you a prompt phrase and the goal is for each of us to make an illustration from that prompt by the end of the month (joining is totally optional though!)

There are three creative activities each month that will lead us to the final illustration, and they reflect my normal illustration process but split into more manageable chunks

I'll share what I've created for each of the activities to give you some ideas and tips, and then you can complete the activity for yourself with your own ideas

Join me over on Discord to be able to share what you've created for each of the activities so we can all admire your work (or just join in privately at home if you prefer)!

You can complete the three activities at your own pace at any time during the month (or just skip straight to the final illustration), but I'll be sharing what I've done for them once a week over the first three weeks of the month.

Every Patron is welcome to join, and so are all mediums and experience levels!

The three activities each month are:

Activity 1 - Filling A Sketchbook Page

Activity 2 - Exploring Compositions

Activity 3 - Final Illustration

So the prompt for this month is 'under the sea' and I'm excited about it because I don't draw too many ocean scenes!

The first activity is 'filling a sketchbook page' and you can watch the video above to see me completing mine. The aim of this activity is to have a pressure-free space to draw all kinds of ideas that come to mind when you think of the prompt, and see if you can fill a whole sketchbook page with them.

I really enjoyed drawing this page of ideas, there are so many things to explore under the sea and I don't often draw ocean environments or animals so it was really refreshing for me. I drew lots of fish and animals, some seashells with cute patterns, and a couple of little scenes like a coral reef and a sandy beach.

Now it's your turn! Grab your sketchbook and pencils (or iPad) and sketch out your own ideas for 'under the sea' and if you like you can take a photo of your page and share it with us in the #filling-a-sketchbook-page channel on Discord.

If you're not sure where to begin with your own sketchbook page for this prompt you could think about the following questions to get started:

What critters would you expect to find under the sea?

What different ocean environments can you think of?

Think about the types of homes that ocean critters have and see if you can draw one

I hope you enjoy my little video, looking forward to seeing what you all draw this month! ❤