fysmFYSMfysm

Hello, been a while, and welcome to the mandatory blog post about my next new wacky project!
Excited? You should be!
Maybe.
No pressure.
This project is called indieVISUAL FYSM which stand for ‘Fill Your Sketchbook Month’ and means very much what you probably think it means; we’re going to try and fill our sketchbooks….in a month…. Colon-zero!!!
It feels odd even trying to further explain it but I’ve never been one to discourage curiosity, so if this sounds like something you’d like to be involved with then read ahead. Also be aware there are other ways to help if you know you won’t be able to produce a sketchbook so…go on….read ahead anyway.

When does it start?!
The official month is January 2011. I’ll be starting on January 1st and hoping to complete by the 31st. It’s a fresh new start and a good idea if you’re stuck for creative resolutions! If you haven’t started by January 1st, read on.

IT’S ALREADY JANUARY AND I HAVEN’T STARTED!
Probably my fault more than anything for not telling you sooner (the new year snuck upon me like a sneaky snake wearing sneakers). I’d like as many people to be finished by January 31st but if you start a little late, it’s fine to finish a little late too. But don’t see that as an excuse. As soon as you buy/own an empty sketchbook; your month starts from there! I’ll be WATCHING*!!!!
*Not really.

How big do our sketchbooks need to be?!
In this project, size does not actually matter. I’m using a fairly thin A5 landscape (that I made by cutting a A4 one in half) sketchbook because I know that’s a realistic size for what I’m going to be able to achieve. If that seems too big or too small to you, by all means use whichever size you think you’ll be able to fill. I think the key is not to be too ambitious and also take into consideration if you’ll want to take your sketchbook around with you, you’ll need to be able to get it out the door. (I’d recommend no bigger than A4)

Is it just sketches?
No no no and….maybe. If you want it to be. Just like the journal challenge last year (drawing once a day, every day, for an entire year) it’s entirely your own ‘indievisual’ choice of what you put in your sketchbook. Hopefully the video will show you some methods if you’re really stuck but just…relax…have fun! Sketchbooks can be all about the ideas rather than the finished product. Don’t try and make every page a masterpiece and just go with the flow, go crazy!…I filled an entire page with pencil sharpenings once but perhaps that story is for another time.

So…do I have to do it like…everyday?
Nope! The beauty of this is that it’ll help you to understand how to work a considerable amount of art into your busy lives. You could –and I know people who do- fill a sketchbook in a day and slack off for the rest of the month. But learning a healthy pattern of when to do art is something only you can know how to do. This is a time to really experiment with a fresh new start to the year.

What do I do with it/Why am I doing this?
Well no one is forcing you to do anything and sadly I haven’t trained a group of singing monkeys to spring from your sketchbook on completion and juggle for you. What you’ll have is a record of a lot of thoughts and feeling in your first month of 2011 and I think that’s exciting enough!!! …I know, I know….I’d prefer the monkeys too…

Hey, how does this fit into the Journal Challenge/Is the Journal Challenge happening this year?
The journal challenge is DEFINITELY happening this year by all means. But I’ll focus on that a little more after January. You can do one and not the other but you can also do both! What I’m hoping will happen is some people will be pleasantly surprised by how much they can achieve within a month and therefore be encouraged to draw a lot more over the next year. If you want to talk to me about your thoughts then I’m easily contactable by email; indievisual@live.co.uk
No idea what I’m talking about? Check the FAQs!

Derp. There’s no way I can do that. How else can I help?
As I’ve said before, sketchbooks are all about ideas! And to fill an entire sketchbook? You need LOTS of ideas. If you’ve got thoughts or ideas on what you want others to be drawing (including me obviously) share them with each other! You can even collaborate with friends to create one whole awesome sketchbook. As long as you fill a sketchbook, the rest is yours to decide.


I hope this helped. If you have any more general questions or suggestions then don’t hesitate to ask me (emailling is good) but this little challenge really isn’t about me. It’s about developing your own skills and making sketchbooks something personal to you.
I wish ye the best of luck with all your creative endeavours!
Oh and Happy New Years and stuff.

-Mx

http://www.competitionhunter.com

I think I've lost my camera and I'm trying to win it back. :[

NEW SUMMER PROJECT! :}

HELLO ALL.
Gosh gosh gosh, long time no type!

I have a video for you.
CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO.

Then come back here an we’ll have a good ol’ chitchat.

So the indieVISUAL Sum-Up My Summer project has been unleashed unto the world! But chances are, in order to make the video fast-pace and entertaining (-ish), I didn’t clarify a lot of things so you’ve probably got a ton of questions. Please browse through this to see if I’ve cleared up anything at all. This may be added to if other questions persist!

Pre-emptive Frequently Asked Questions based on the ones people had for the Journal Challenge. :]

How long does this go on for? 1^st June – 1^st September 2010 is how long I plan to do mine for, however I’m not going to get too violent if you start earlier. Finishing by September 1^st would be helpful if we want to have a big showcase!

What is a disposable camera? Disposable cameras are cameras that have a set number of photos to take (around 20-30 standard), then developed (more on that later) and then never to be used again. They may also be called ‘Single-Use’ Cameras. Because of this, they are fairly cheap.

Do I HAVE to use a disposable camera? Just like the Journal Challenge, nothing is obligatory. If you like this idea but wanna run free on your own turf than absolutely do so! Another alternative is if you have any analogue cameras (the old type with film) they work just as well but I wouldn’t suggest investing unless you really know what you’re doing.

What price are the disposable cameras? This does depend on where you get them from.(more on this later) Here in England, a standard one will cost anything from £3-£10. Even higher depending on what you want it to do (I would suggest you get one with Flash). If you don’t mind splashing out, I’d suggest a £5 camera WITH FLASH is a safe bet. I’ve had cheap ones be a little unreliable but that’s more to do with my luck than anything. For other parts of the world you might wanna do research.

Where do I get the disposable cameras from? In England, they’re everywhere in the Summer! Supermarkets, Boats, Pharmacies. If you’re in another part of the world and you’re finding it difficult to get hold of one, I’d definitely suggest cruising through Ebay! I’ve seen some pretty cheap ones. God bless the internets.

Where do I get the photos developed? In England (sorry, I am in England though) most Boots stores have a place to get photos developed as well as the usual camera stores like Jessops and Kodak. Sadly things in life aren’t free and you have to pay a little bit of money. In other parts of the world, I’m sure camera shops do similar deals. I also saw in a film with Robyn Williams that they do that sort of thing at Wall-mart? Creepy film though.

Are you getting paid by any camera manufacturer?/ ARE YOU A MAJOR CORPORATE COMPANY?!

I wish! ;P But no, this is just a simple idea that I had one day and wanted to share it with you guys./I am a 17 year old girl.

Why are you doing this? I’m not a photographer and I’m not particularly good at using cameras because I have been somewhat spoiled by the use of digital photography being care-free and easily delete-able. With a disposable camera you can really take time to think about your shots and by summing up your summer you know you want to capture a moment.It's just to improve and have a little fun too, really.

Is this a competition? Is there anything I get from this? This is a ‘project’ and because its ‘indieVISUAL’/individual you get your own sense of self satisfaction! I simply don’t have the funds to give out prizes right now and this is all about your own development in photography! :]

So what are we doing after September 1^st? In September I want everyone to go get them developed and then? It really depends on how many people get to this stage. More information will be released when the project is underway so hold onto your hats!

How do I keep in-the-know about this project? I’d say follow me on Twitter if you don’t mind getting bombarded with other updates about my life too (I try to keep them interesting!) You can also follow my Journal Challenge Tumblr or of course Subscribe to my YouTube and I’ll put any changes etc in a bulletin.Wow, quite enough self-whoring I think!

I have another question that has not been answered! Cool! You inquisitive little mole, you! Feel free to email me (this blogs commenting system isn’t great for replying) @ indievisual@live.co.uk! I also have a formspring because I am down with the kids!

That is all for now folks. I am excited to hearing responses from you! :]

-Bai bai!

-Maddyx

indieVIDEO

Hullo popsicles! Some genuine news for you. Unlike all that FAKE news that infiltrates the media these days. Sorry, writing a political play at the moment and it’s hard to keep it out of ordinary writing-ma-goos. So WHAT is this news, you ask avidly? The news that I finally got a video up on that there site called YouTube! Yup, it’s finally happened! In my spare time recently I been figuring out a whole LIST of videos I want to create for your peepers –that on a completely unrelated note look absolutely beautiful today and subscribe. :] This video isn’t really very exciting due to it just being me explaining a few things and I like to remind y’all that it’s my first video I’ve made so sometimes it doesn’t work as smooooth as I want it. But hopefully I shall soon inject hypothetical Poly-filler into those gaps and have something joyous to watch throughout the Summer. Joyous and creative! So enjoy, until Summery time acomes.
GO HERE DUE TO EMBEDDING BEING SILLY.
Thanks for watching! Until some other time when I have something mildly amousing to say. :]
-Mx

subNOTsunday

Right, here’s the deal-i-o Beanie Babies,

My submitSUNDAY may have to be a thing of the past.

No no, don’t cry! I know it’s devastating and only lasted for a month. So, I’m not gunna pretend like I’m particularly busy on Sundays because it’s just a blatant LIE. But my internet connection is being SUPER fail right now. Like it takes me atleast 5 attempts to upload daily onto tumblr! But my blogspot literally REFUSES to upload images. It has a massive toddler-like tantrum and I simply can’t go through the pain every week!
So for now anyway, if you want to check out my drawings, you go to my tumblr! Doesn’t mean I’m not daily checking out everyone’s art though! :]

And then there’s the prospect of managing this stuff on a YouTube level. I wish wish WISH my internet would upload the videos. I just don’t know what’s wrong. I’ve tried, literally, EVERYTHING. And so I have no drive to film anything else before I’ve got more up!

There’s also talk of a Wiki-group so we can keep track of who’s definitely in the project and who’s not. And then if you decide to quite you can just delete yourself off the list. Sound like a good idea? Thanks to SquiggleTag for setting that up. Hopefully we can get something sorted in the near future. I’ll keep you posted!
I suppose that’s what this account will be for, for a while. Important notices and what not. When I’m not drowning in schoolwork maybe I can get some interesting entries here too. :]

So hope you're all being creative!
Keep drawing!
-Maddyxz

submitWHAT?

Guys, I've been trying for the past 6 hours to upload the damn images to this page but my internets giving me a lot of grief and I think I'm finally going to give up for now. I'll try to do a submitMONDAY tomoro even though that doesn't have ANY ring to it!
The internets been very bitchy this week. For those who don't know I've edited my first video for Youtube but it will not let me upload and I've been trying all week.
Internet....you're....you're mean! ;____;
Lovingest regards, Maddyx

oneMONTH?!?!

AN ENTIRE MONTH Y'ALL!
We made it! Absolutley fantastic WELL DONE. I hope you've all learnt lots and are even more inspired to continue the whole year through!
We've lost some people, we've gained some people but all in all I've achieved what I never thought I could; inspiring masses about art. Even those who cannot do it every day, Ihope this project has made you feel like actually, you could be a little more creative in your day!
QUESTION OF THE WEEK: So I asked a few tumblrinoes this but I thought I'd open it up; What has surprised you most about this challenge so far?
For me, I've been surprised by the community spirit of everyone and I've already felt small improvements on a few things like lettering and composition. Still got a lot to go but I'm confident this time next year I'll have improved! So comment with what you've learnt so far!

submitSUNDAY time: A very colourful week. Been kinda ill but produced some good stuff. Finished my big commision and done lotsa school work. Kinda. Should still be doing more actually...


So I wanted to share another image with you! It's a screenshot I took of all my days so far. I've organised folders for each month and this is my January folder, full up!

Anyone else doing anything this ridiculous? xP
So, what will February bring? Valentines day? YouTube? Tinsel-decorated CATS?
Maybe...
Whatever happens, keep all the creativity up and know that you're all awesome!
-Maddyx

sexy(submit)SUNDAY

Ahoy hoy lovelies,
Here's my submitSUNDAY within a week of a lot of pressure and rice krispies.




I won't add todays one because the symmetry is too pretty.

Not a lot to say this week! I've been working really hard on a lot of other artistic nonsense so haven't had a BUNCH of time. I'm CRAVING summer.
See you next week beauties.
-Maddyx

failNOT

Hi Coolcats,
Some people have come to me or posted elsewhere that recently it has been hard for them to keep up with the project and that they’ve missed days out. They start using the ‘F word’ (Fail) and even the ‘C word’! (CBA) Just to say if you miss a day out it does NOT mean you fail and it does NOT mean you can’t carry on. Do not get into a stress about missing a few days, all you gotta do is CARRY ON. Especially as it’s only January! It’s when you start missing months where you should start worrying if this place is right for you. :]
All you have to ask yourself is; do you really want to better yourself in art? Do you think it will enrich your life by doing so? I think it will, but who am I to tell you what to do? ;P
Submit Sunday Time!


It's been such a crazy busy week so colour is lacking.
I’m up to date with followers again and I’ve been flooded with creativity from all you guys recently which is great to see so keep it up guys!
Hope you have another fun-filled week, keep drawing!
-Maddyx

submitSUNDAY

Hey fellow iVJ-ers (I love how some of you have shortened it, that’s so cute!)

Not much to say this week apart from....IT’S BEEN OVER A WEEK. CONGRATS COOLCATS. If you’re still going –and I know many of you are- then I reward you with a genuine hypothetical imaginary pat on the back! It’s been a great amount of fun sifting through everyone’s work –all you guys are so talented now imagine how good its gunna be a YEAR from now. Or now, 10 days LESS than a year! HORRAH. And I’m always glad to hear that you’re having such a great time with it. It makes my rather chilly day that little bit warmer!
And yes, it has been snowing in most parts of England! If you wanna check out what rainbow-assortments I made click here! :] There have been some brilliant pictures floating around the internets!

I think some people are dwindling on inspiration a bit. (I know for a while, I was!) So here’s some random themes that you could use in those days lacking in excitement:

-If you could make anything out of snow; what would it be? Draw!
-If you could invite anyone to a tea party (celebrity etc) who would they be? Draw your tea party!
-Draw yourself in an opposite dimension on this day.
-What Resolutions have you broken ALREADY (hopefully not this one!)
-The Christmas Present you haven’t used yet.

Hopefully that’s got some thoughts pumping if you were running a bit dry. Remember, if you’ve got any ideas for THEMED DAYS. Then send your thoughts in to indievisual@live.co.uk

So here is my week in pictures! Lots of being at home and moping. :]

If you wanna keep up to date with my latest entries on the day I do them CLICK HERE to see my tumblr and down the side you can check out all the other cool’ns that are following the challenge!

That’s all for now folks. Hope you’re all having EXTREME fun and....
KEEP DRAWING. :3

-Maddyxz

PS. Thinking of a bit of a redesign of this place. Any ideas? Comments and emails, people!

lovelyTIMES

Hello my soupy dragons!
(....just....*sigh*)
Exciting topics of conversation for today:
-Submit Sunday (OPTIONAL)
-Funny Sentence Friday! (ALSO OPTIONAL)
-Provoking Prospects (well...I guess optional too.)
-Social-Networking Such-likes! (Urm...hellooo.)
Submit Sunday is going to be the official day of Uploading! HOWEVER if you think you’ve got into a rhythm where you can upload every day and that’s easy for you then ABSOLUTELY go for uploading every day still. For me, my tumblr account is where I’ll be uploading every day as much as I can and on my blogspot you’ll see I’ll submit on a particular Submit Sunday! Whichever way you wanna do it is fine with me. It’d be good, if you do chose to upload on Submit Sunday that you tag it or put it somewhere in the title. Just so others can know there’s more pictures on the page! Also, this is useful to those who go on holiday and are unavailable to upload their picture for say, two weeks! The next Sunday when you get home you can do a MASSIVE submit Sunday, you see? As long as you draw every day! Try not to cheat!
Funny Sentence Friday is one of many themed days I’m planning this year! If you want to join in all you have to go to is THIS site. And chose how you want to structure your sentence and automatically you have an interesting scenario to draw! You can keep clicking until you find something funny to draw. I’m going to try and incorporate it THIS Friday into my drawing. And, unless anything interesting happens otherwise, do it for the first Friday of every month! You can join in too! Of course you don’t have to do it every month. But I think it would be fun to know that EVERYONE in the project has at some point this year done a Funny Sentence Friday. Again, when you do one; tag it!
Kudos to my real life friend Luke (I know, I totally have real friends too!) who came up with this!
You can have fun with these theme days. You could also introduce What You’re Wearing Wednesday and Munchkin-related Monday! Well...maybe not the latter...
If you have any ideas for themes you’d like to suggest; totally send them into me through email! indievisual@live.co.uk!
Lastly, on this note, I need to mention that this doesn’t mean you can’t use this sentence generator/show us what you’re wearing/show how many munchkin-related lunchboxes you own every other day of the week too! Go crazy with it if you’re inspired!
Provoking Prospects huh? I mainly just used the word ‘Provoking’ because everything else used alliteration. What I really mean to think about is the FUTURE. Keep you getting excited about what a year of going through this could bring for you!
The answer to that is; frikkin’ awesome YouTube videos THAT’S WHAT!
Imagine watching a video where 365 images flash up on screen. Each one a different drawing for every day of the year! This kind of video will be the EASIEST thing to make if SOMEHOW you managed to get a drawing for every day of the year....hmmm....but how?! Oh wait! You’re already doing it!
So for those YouTubers out there; this could be a yearlong project for simply making a really awesome film! So hopefully that’s grabbed a few more of your guess attention spans and rattled them into shape; don’t give up!
We’ve also got some other exciting projects underway for the closing of 2010 (long way off but...a girl can dream!) so if you stick around until then, you might be in for some treats!
Social-networking Such-likes (alliteration fail!)
A number of you have been asking for a twitter and various other pieces of internet ways to stalk me. :]
I guess I see no harm in telling everyone my twitter. It’s @Maddyology and it’s not always indieVISUAL related but occasionally I’ll say something relevant. Something other than my view on different flavour poptarts.
There is an indieVISUAL Facebook group that has been set up by someone other than me. Haha, your efforts have been noted! However, if you do happen to come across a few comments by me I would ask you to please to not add me as a friend on facebook. I feel like I need a little place to run and as much as I love making mega-friends with you all I would greatly appreciate it if it stayed indieVISUAL free for the most part. Sozzles!
Other places?
I have a Myspace but I set it up for the lols when I wanted to do CD art design. Incidentally I’m still open for ridiculous cheap commissions. ;P (Nothing like a bit of self promotion!)
Urm, I don’t really hang out many other places. Apart from deviant ART which a lot of you have found already to my surprise. :]
So to be honest the best way to contact me is through here, through tumblr and through email. And if that’s not enough stalking for one day then...well....umm....you’ll just have to cope?
That’s about it for today. Just would like to thank everyone for keeping up the effort! It’s fantastic to see a real community growing amongst people! And it’s nice to see a few new faces trickling in! Right now it REALLY isn’t too late to join in with the fun!
Reached over 100 on tumblr and 100 on here! That probably doesn’t mean THAT many people are doing it for real but still a massive boost to know that you were interested enough to check it out. You couldn't be making me happier right now really, you lovely peoples you!

-Maddyx