Sketchbook Project: E-zine and Giveaway

Congratulations to Frauke, the QuiltHexle who won the e-book!

The sketchbook project is a collaboration of 16 artists who are all keeping individual sketchbooks and sharing ideas, tutorials and their art. The project

Jane LaFazio's pinecone

started in January 2011 with a monthly project and encouraged anyone who wanted to keep a sketchbook to join the exercises. The project included a Flickr site to post results and offered prizes. It was hard to resist.

Here’s how the sketchbook website describes it: “Each month we’ll announce a new theme on this blog and throughout the month we’ll be showing you images from our sketchbooks and talking about the intention and inspiration behind them.  Along the way we’ll be sharing tips, techniques and tutorials.  We hope that by giving you a peek inside our sketchbooks and showing you how different they all are that we’ll inspire you to start keeping a sketchbook of your own.”

Make a sketchbook cover with Sue Bleiweiss.

If you missed the challenge, you can catch up with the new Sketchbook Challenge E-zine –83 color pages of projects with step-by-step tutorials by 13 popular artists, including  Jane LaFazio, Sue Bleiweiss, Carol Sloane, Carla Sonheim, Diana Trout, and Susan Sorrell.

Jane LaFazio shows you how to draw a pinecone, from the rough outline sketch to the completed painting. Want to cover your sketchbook with a colorful fabric cover? Sue Bleiweiss will show you how to sew a sketchbook sleeve, with a fun fringey spine and a front pocket.

Carol Sloane helps you fill blank pages with mixed media;  Susan Sloane takes art out to dinner by combining contour drawing and stitching to create an art quilt; and Carla Sonheim shows you how she creates those delightful creatures that live in her imagination.

Each tutorial shows you not only how, but also why–telling you the important part of each step so you don’t take a shortcut that won’t work. There are colorful photos for each important step, and words that you might not know are defined in context.

The only trouble I had was the 2-column format–I had to scroll back up to start the second column of the page. If you use a big monitor, this won’t be a problem. I also had the image size set to 110 percent to enjoy the color photography (OK, and because I need new glasses), but clearly, that’s not everyone’s necessary adjustment.

Giveaway: You can peek at the E-zine here, and can buy it for $9.99 here. But wait! There’s more: You can win a free copy of the E-book. Because it’s an e-book, anyone in any country can participate–all you have to do is leave a comment, letting me know you’d like to win.  You have till Thursday morning at 6 a.m. PDT. Then I’ll pick a random winner. No anonymous comments, please.

Full Disclosure: Sue Bleiweiss asked me to review the E-zine, and I agreed. She sent me a copy so I could review it. No other compensation is involved. Sue will send the winner the printable E-zine.

–Quinn McDonald is a writer and creativity coach who loves to drool over other artists’ work.