I’m a creative, experienced, multi-purpose artist and art director
who can take projects start to finish in a variety of styles.

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Sunday, May 16, 2010

"Equipment"

"Is there such a thing as a bad inspiration?" I asked the question, then thought about the answer.

My brother came over Friday, right after I got IF's word of the week. He did his laundry and doodled lovely imaginations while I made a lame attempt to create a printed circuit board for my concept of "equipment".

I told Brian about my complete ignorance of what makes a computer go, while assuring him it was my most important piece of equipment. I printed out a reference photo of a circuit board, and he explained the parts as best he remembered from a job he held for a week 10 years ago. Transistor, battery, capacitor...

I said I didn't have a clue about any of it, and preferred to think of it all as a network of roads for mice to run around on. I said maybe I should come up with another idea, and he asked the critical question, "Maybe it was a bad inspiration?"

Is there such a thing as a bad inspiration? I have to doubt it. Bad ideas maybe, but not a bad inspiration. If the circuit board idea wasn't working out, maybe I wasn't following the inspiration properly. Regroup, rethink, start over...

Brian eventually went home with clean clothes, and I pondered his doodles. He specifically told me I could not put them on this blog, or I'd let you ponder them too. I figured he had the right idea and watched tv while making my own doodles. It was a pleasant way to spend the evening, far better than trying to beat an imaginary circuit board into submission.

Over the weekend I took various watercolor parts that I made when Brian was over, scanned them, cut them up, and put them together again in PhotoShop -- which all sounds pretty simple, but I seemed determined to do everything the hard way this week. In the end, I just wanted to look at some pretty colors in a pleasant design.

After all, there's no such thing as a bad inspiration!



7 comments:

  1. Your little mouse is cute. Some topics come easier than others!

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  2. I love your thought process! I agree, no bad inspiration. Just different expectations perhaps. I think you accomplished you goal. It has beautiful colors and a great overall design!

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  3. Thanks! Yes, some things come easier than others, and that's especially hard when my brother was in his flow :)

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  4. I think it's worked, love your colours too!

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  5. Thanks. It's been a cold, wet spring and I needed some bright colors :)

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  6. Love this sketchy mouse-y computer analogy, Linda! So much more interesting than the printed circuit board... take it from someone who worked for six months in a shop that made them. I can never look a lunch truck without smelling trichlorethylene (the de-greaser for circuit board manufacturing.) (Wonder how much I still have in my system...?) Lucky for us, we can just use these wonderful machines without understanding them! And thanks for the vintage artwork on your blog, a stroll through memory lane... and the compliments on my own post this week... it WAS a difficult word!

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  7. Mmmm... memories of trichlorethylene :) I had a job where I stood over a barrel of the stuff and cleaned windshield wiper parts. I had some very good daydreams until I realized I was very high and the job was probably going to kill me. Thanks for your comment!

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