Riddhi Doodles

It’s a beautiful Sunday to treat yourself to some pretty fall themed art. Check out my new paintings :) 

My art prints and original paintings are now for sale! They’re high quality prints on 260 gsm matt paper and quite cheap, and I ship worldwide. 

Go to my Etsy store if you want one :)

Back when I was 14, I decided to learn the guitar. My teacher got us a sweet deal on a “Yemaha” guitar. “It’s only 2500 bucks!” he said. And we fell for it. After all, it was only my first guitar. We didn’t even know if I’d even develop an interest in it. Hence, it made sense to learn on a cheap one, right? Wrong! Not only did I have to endure the constant embarrassment of owning a “Yemaha” guitar, the guitar itself was extremely scratchy and unsightly. In addition to sounding horrible, it was so difficult to play, that my fingers almost bled the first few months. Four years later, I bought my Yamaha F320, and I finally experienced the pleasure of playing a good guitar! Is it supposed to be this easy to play!? I was puzzled. It’s a miracle I stuck to playing even though I had made it so much harder for myself in the beginning than it could have been.

The same thought applies to art supplies. Whenever I try a new medium, I always try to buy the best quality artist grade supplies. Because that’s the only way I’d get a complete and real experience of the medium. That’s the only way I can experience the true possibilities and capabilities of the medium. Starting with cheap art supplies, I know I would get sub par results, and I’d never love the medium. When I first started with acrylic paints, even though the paints were high quality, I used the worst brushes. And I immediately formed this opinion in my mind that painting with acrylics is hard! Turns out, brushes are important, and my entire experience of painting was being compromised due to the stupid wiry brushes. Now, I am able to get much better precision, and paint easier because I switched to good brushes.

What do you do though, if you can’t afford artist grade paints? Save up, and buy fewer of them. You don’t need the 24 colour set. Get the three primaries, and a white, and get going. Experiment. Experience the feel of the medium, and if you like it, save up more and buy more! But don’t start with bad quality supplies. Use good paints, good brushes, good pencils, and most importantly GOOD PAPER!

Cheap Art Supplies = Difficult to use, okay results

Premium Art Supplies = Easier to use, much better results

On my drive to work the other day, I listened to an interview of someone who does copy-writing for artist websites and blogs. I absolutely LOVE getting to know about niche professions, and I don’t think you could get any more niche than this. Her name is Hannah Scott and her website is clarityandflair.com. Basically, if you’re an artist (or any creative entrepreneur) and have a website, you can hire her to write the text part of your website and compose blog posts for you. Her process seems thorough because she spends time understanding your process, your goals, your branding, your product, your thoughts and ideas, and then crafts her words in a voice seemingly close to yours, which is brilliant!

As I was thinking about her profession, I realized that this woman has not compromised on any aspect of her passion to make a living. She is the true example of doing what you love doing. I’ve seen people who love to write, who work for editorials or advertising agencies. As day job, they write whatever is the assignment, whether it is the copy for a washing machine brochure, or the delectable description of a gourmet cookie. They might enjoy doing it, but they don’t get to choose what to write about. Any writing that they do purely out of pleasure has to be done outside of work. For many people, this is enough! At least you get to write for a living, and that’s what you love to do, which is fair. But Hannah, she loves writing, and she’s really good at it. At the same time, she’s an artist, interested in interacting with artists, and more importantly she understands the business of art. I didn’t even know “Copywriter for Artists websites and blogs” was a profession. And maybe she didn’t either? She just combined all of her passions, and created this new “position” or profession for herself.

What amazes me is not her ability to create a profession for herself like this. What amazes me is that she’s able to find an audience for it. She’s able to make a living off of it. (I checked the prices on her website, and you’ve got to be fairly serious about your business to be able to afford her). And that led me to thinking about how evolved the consumer is, in other, more developed countries. I frequently read about art pricing in the US, and I realize that if the same prices existed in India, artists wouldn’t be able to sell anything (of course I’m talking about independent non-famous artists – not ones who are public figures). 

If you remove the geography bias (India vs. the US), on one hand I see someone offering something as niche as textual communication elements for an art business, being able to find clients, yet on the other hand I see people with skills as broad and generic as “General Management” (which could theoretically be useful for thousands of companies) having a hard time finding a job. Maybe it’s not about the size of the market. Maybe it’s about identifying that niche group of 100 people who want what you’re giving, and making sure 60 of them come to you. It’s not about being in a popular profession. It’s about being popular in the profession of your choice, no matter how small it is.

Things I didn’t know back then, but I do now:

To draw hair is not to draw all the different strands of hair. Hair is ONE entity, to be drawn as one shape.

If you don’t get the proportions in your basic drawing right, no matter what you do, your final output is going to be awful (see left.)

Smudge sticks are your best friend, USE THEM MORE THAN YOU USE PENCILS!

Cheeks have shapes too.

Draw shadows, not objects.

Use the darkest, softest pencil you can get your hands on.

70 GSM printer paper DOES NOT last.

Use a camera which doesn’t add a red coloured time stamp to the picture.

I’m out of canvas boards. I think to myself. 

Then follows a long, elaborate planning process. If I leave work by 6, I can rush to the art store on the way back, and still be home on time. The entire day is spent in a jittery excitement of getting my hands on those damn canvases.

It’s 6:05. I’m at the art store. Soaking in the beauty of my surroundings. I look at the canvases, and if someone observed closely, they would see me drooling. I resist picking up the largest one available, and modestly pick up what I had come for. Eight by tens. Yup, those are the ones I need. How many, you ask? As many as they’ve got in the store.

And then as I casually walk towards the billing counter, I can’t help but notice (because I’m seeking it out) the paint aisle. Didn’t I use up all my white paint!? I don’t recollect, but decide that I have, and pick up a tube. What about texture white? Yup, picked a jar. Oooh would you look at that beautiful turquoise? In the shopping basket.

As I decide that it’s time to leave, I remember that there are only a few blank pages in my travel sketchbook. Walking towards the sketchbook aisle is like opening a can of worms. I know what’s gonna happen, and yet I can’t resist it. Gotta pick up a tiny sketchbook that can fit into all of my purses. So, what do I do? I pick up an A3 watercolour block. Perfect. Oh would you look at that charcoal!? I think to myself, having never used charcoal successfully. I will now. Of course I will.

… my painting of Lili Reinhart, a.k.a Betty Cooper 😊

It’s funny that more than half of the time that I spend drawing a portrait, I’m not even using a pencil. Smudge sticks are something I absolutely can’t live without. My portraits were transformed the day I discovered them.

I usually draw the initial outline of a portrait with a faint 4B pencil. I fill in details with a much softer (8B or 9B) pencil. Giving depth and drawing shadows is done entirely by using a smudge stick.

Check out this tiny video of me drawing an eye.