Start by making random dots across the paper with the point of a pen or pencil, as if you are creating an elaborate dot-to-dot picture.
I wasn't sure about this course as it felt to be somewhat similar to the exercise in part one with filling a page, however, I chose to work differently on this and I'm really glad that I did.
In this exercise I opted to use ProCreate. I had this feeling of wanting to do a painted surface, full of texture and layers then incorporate the dots. I find that I can find myself in the zone quicker when painting than anything else, something about applying the paint and mixing the colours on the canvas or palette that resets my stress levels, and so combining this with an exercise such as this felt to be a good way to work. What was uniquely different about creating the dots and creating doodles on ProCreate meant that I could try one way of connecting the dots, and then see something else that could work better, or equally try a few different ways to connect them until I saw something interesting.
Having explored this idea digitally, I feel I could attempt something similar on a canvas. It would be really interesting to see this.
in the end I had created this piece
I think my background colour choices could have been pushed a bit with the saturation and brightness as the lines are rather lost. Adding the black pencil colouring around some of the shapes helped to bring them out, and by blocking it created nice concentrated pockets of texture in the drawings, and is also noticeable through the black colouring where I deliberately left gaps.
Here is a quick time lapse showing the process in cresting this piece:
I really enjoyed this exercise as it made me see things I wouldn't typically see when connecting the dots. It flowed really organically and as a result, I easily identified animals or objects once I had done a shape that worked. Filling in the little doodle details was then quite easy, especially when not trying to draw something perfect.
Perfection is something I struggle to let go of, even when I am trying to create an imperfect piece on purpose, I want it to be perfectly imperfect! So this did force me to get over it, and just be mindfully adding lines between dots.
With the dog catching pizza concept I decided to take this idea and redraw it alone. I chose a thick consistent outline for this and honestly, it felt great to just zone out with this silly drawing.
I felt surprised at how this exercise finished. It connected with me more than the previous exercise in part 1 as I felt as though I was actually doodling something that was completely random, without plans. The only plan I wanted to try and incorporate was creating a textured background to work on.
I would absolutely try and create a large traditional piece using this technique and would be very interested in seeing the result. It might be a case of laying down the dots on the canvas then photographing it to connect the dots digitally, however I understand the purpose is to just freestyle
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