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Jazz and Bill Evans 🎶


I didn't know anything about Jazz but my husband (check his blog hopstrains.com excellent short name) has been researching and finding a lot about different musicians. 

For me, it has always been difficult to listen to Jazz because I always considered it as something that people that are highbrow 🧐  and full of themselves listed to, until recently when I noticed one of my favorite illustrators (Frannerd) listened to it and I was humble and open enough to finally give it a try and I loved it.

Mapping to understand Figure Drawing

I have been learning about Figure Drawing because I would love to learn how to draw bodies and Mapping is one of the techniques that has been the most helpful to understand how to place something on a white page.

Mapping is just selecting points as in image 1, connecting them and create a map on a white page as shown in the images below. I would recommend you just to repeat and practice and you will understand little by little more about mapping.

The materials I'll recommend you to use are old magazines with full body poses that have more movement and Posca PC-1M or PC-1MC bullet shaped 0.7 mm.


The mapping that I created during different days was this:

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Story


I remembered when I was little, back in Mexico, I loved playing with my cousin to be one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 🥷 (in Spanish Las Tortugas 🐢 Ninja). 

Why a "No" is a "Yes" to myself?


"A question is just an opportunity to be honest" –Byron Katie


I started wondering why it is so hard for me to say "NO". Sometimes, I say it but I feel guilty afterwards, like wrong and I was wondering why it is so hard inside my mind to be honest. So I started researching on google and I found this article:

25 Ways to Say No by Kim A. Flodin

I liked it, I think that is a good introduction to the main question: "Why is it so hard to say "No"?" but for me it wasn't completely clear, so I continued with my research and as always I decided to look for Byron Katie's experience and I found this video:


Video 1: How to be grateful for the opportunity to be honest — The Work of Byron Katie

My favorite Illustrators from "Making Comics" by Scott McCloud


Making Comics by Scott McCloud


This is a list of Illustrators that caught my eye in the awesome book
"Making Comics" by Scott McCloud which I read recently and is full of important information if you are a self-taught illustrator or comic artist so I definitely recommend you to check it out.

New Video: Mossery Unboxing Sketchbook

Hi blog bunnies!

In this video I share the unboxing of a Mossery Pastel Sky Sketchbook that I got back in 2018, I don't own it anymore because the paper it has wasn't what I was looking for to use with my watercolors but the cover and the brand is so beautiful that I wanted to share.

Back in 2018 Mossery created a Zine which I showed in the video, if you want to know more about the Zine just go to this link: https://www.mossery.co/blogs/news/to-inspire-and-encourage-inktober-2018-zine 
and if you want to know more about the artists that collaborated in this project you can go here: https://www.mossery.co/pages/mossery-inktober-2018


Do you own a Mossery sketchbook? What do you think about the paper?

Paola

My second stationery haul from my trip to Philly

Hi beautiful you!

There are four amazing stores that I visited in Philly:

  1. Philly's AIDS thrift @ Giovanni's room (Very curated thrift store)
  2. Atomic City Comics (Comic store)
  3. Omoi Zakka Shop (Stationery boutique and pen shop like Goods for the Study here in NYC)
  4. Kitchen Kapers (kitchen and food supplies) 
Where I got multiple items:


Weekend No. 10: Around Philadelphia, PA

 Hi!

I just wanted to share our last weekend trip to Philly. I took some pictures, well a lot of pictures, sorry for the amount, I'm experimenting and finding the sweet spot for the right amount I suppose, maybe not. Enjoy. 

Weekend No. 9: Around New York City

Did you know there are numbers for the weeks of the year? I didn't 👀

Two weekends ago my husband and I went to for a classic Saturday walk, we started eating in a restaurant called Raclette, where we ate a delicious burger with lots of cheese 🤤

Video from my phone

My first stationery haul

My first stationery haul!! This is pretty exciting, short but exciting. Also this week was my stationery week, that's why I wanted to share this with you ❤️.


This is all I bought that day.

Goods for the Study: The stationery boutique and pen shop that you have to visit

A place that I love to visit in the New York City when I want to just browse around or find new Japanese stationery is Goods for the Study. They have two locations one in in the West Village (pretty big) and another one in Nolita (two shops one next to the other). 

Kinokuniya: The Japanese store you have to visit in New York City

Yesterday, I went to Kinokuniya and I remembered I had to tell you about this little jewel in the middle of Manhattan.


How to make your own notebook

 Hi lovely people!

Today, I posted a video where I share how I created my own notebook (now I realized it was a sketchbook but well what'll I do at this point haha) with my favorite paper so I could color with my Copic Markers. It's hard to find the right size and quality, that's why I created my own.

Here is the video:

About changing my blog posting schedule and Instagram

I wasn’t sure if I should post about this in my blog because "it doesn't fit the aesthetic I'm following" but I remember that one of the things I promised to myself from the beginning was allowing me to experiment, to fail to try and fail and try again. That’s why I’m writing this. 

Just this morning in the description of my blog it said: “Paola | Illustrator | Posts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday” but today for the first time, after finishing work at 8 pm I noticed there was something not right and it was the hours that I was imposing to myself so that’s why for March I decided to change my posts from 3 days a week to 2 days a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays, in honor of my free time and respecting myself.

Update: After 2 more days ending work at 8 pm and today waking up at 6 am to continue working on my blog, I noticed I didn’t want to do Instagram anymore, although it looks crazy for a visual artist is what my heart ❤️ is saying and didn’t want to do, now I understand is the right thing. Instagram believe it or not takes a lot of time and interaction and I want to give that to my YouTube channel for now. So officially I’m planning to have just this blog if you want to see more free constant posting and Patreon if you want to see more personal everyday interaction . 

I just wanted to put this out there, maybe you’re doing this to yourself too and you need a reminder that you’re the one who decides how to take care of yourself.

Tons of hugs,

Paola 


Why drawing is so difficult?


Video 1: Why is drawing so hard?


I always thought drawing was easy because I did it since I was little but when I started doing illustration more seriously I noticed that what I saw in my head wasn’t as easy to represent as I thought it would be. Then after drawing and practicing for months I stopped because I couldn’t understand why I wasn’t improving 😡. So I started researching on YouTube and found this video that explained that it isn’t just about practicing...