Ryan Maloney shows how he generates drawing ideas by starting with a blank page and pushing through the "valley of despair" where most creators quit. He treats drawing like physical exercise, uses reference images, and breaks work into short daily sessions with basic tools: pencil, ink pen, Posca pen, and markers.
Chapters
Today I'm going to show you how I go from a blank sheet of paper to a full finalized drawing. And when I started this, I had no idea what I was going to draw. So let's tape down the paper, grab your pencils, and let's start sketching. To me, drawing is an exercise. Of course, I want a pretty picture, and that's why I start. But it takes a lot of work and repetition to get there. A lot of pain and failure. It's like doing pull-ups or push-ups or squats. The drawing is the practice that eventually will yield results in the future. And just like any hard practice or exercise, there comes a point in every creative project where you hit the valley of despair and you have to make a decision. Do you want to move forward or do you want to throw in the towel? I got to a point in this where I decided I was going all in. So where do you get ideas for drawings? Ideas are the easy part. Those will eventually come to you. It's the doing that's the hard part. I recommend you just put your pencil and pen to paper and start drawing and let the ideas chase you. As you build up your skill, more ideas will flow. You'll be able to execute on those ideas ideas better, and that will make room for more and better ideas. I— I create a sharky. Ice skate! You gonna eat it for breakfast? I'm always checking reference images to get inspired. I like to look at regular photos and then draw them as crazy as possible. For this drawing, I started with a blank sheet of paper and I wasn't 100% sure that I was gonna commit to this drawing fully, so I really didn't have a full plan or process in place. I sort of wanted this drawing to be difficult.
My favorite thing to do is go to the beach. He brings a picnic basket, fills it up with sweets. He puts up an umbrella to stay out of the heat. Later, he hits the buffet. It's all you can eat. Well, Freddy has a cousin and his name is Ed. He's half Freddy's size but with a bigger head. His favorite thing to do is eatin' bread with butter and jelly and that cream cheese spread. Now do you know what happened? I woke up one night.
I'm using really basic tools for this drawing: pencil, ink pen, and then a Posca pen. Let's take a look. Refresher break and these Prismacolor markers. There's a musician, Jack White, who talks about how he wants his studio to be messy and how he wants it to be difficult to get to instruments when he's recording because he wants it to be stressful and frustrating and he wants to be able to work through that. I think the exercise of art and drawing, it shouldn't be easy. I really don't want things to be easy. I want it to be difficult. So when you get through the other end, you feel like you accomplished something. This drawing took me a few days to make. It can be really easy to get impatient and want to finalize drawing right away, but I find it's easier if you break it down into short periods of time. Just make sure you draw for that same amount of time every day for a few days in a row. I need something for highlights over the top of the markers, so I decided to use a little bit of paint on this drawing. There are absolutely no rules when it comes to combining different mediums for your drawing. So go crazy with it and figure out what works best for you. I think we pushed this drawing as far as we can take it. If you haven't yet, hit that like and sub button. So let's sign this drawing and enjoy the reveal.
