INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK guides artists and designers to create their next body of work or collection with confidence. 

You’ll spend focused time diving into LIVE training, recorded video, mindset sessions, open studio painting sessions, ideation, and exploring sketchbook exercises to jumpstart your creative project.

By the end of this course, you’ll have brainstormed an idea for your next creative project, mind mapped your collection theme, researched your idea, created color palettes from photos, mixed paint swatches, explored mixed media techniques, played with digital collage & sketchbook prompts, and explored working in a series PLUS so much more!

You’ll walk away with a series of sketches, paintings, ideas and strategies to create a consistent art practice and a plan to complete your next artwork series.

MOST OF ALL...you'll have focused time to paint & PLAY in a guided experience with a creative ROADMAP for your project or collection!

My inspiration sketchbooks are the foundation of any project or product I create. They house a collection of ideas, notes, stories, writings, scribbles, color palettes, images & photographs, paint swatches, collage, motifs and sketches related to my creative projects. 

It’s a place I often come back to throughout my creative process as I develop a collection or product. 

I take notes, brainstorm ideas, draw mind maps,write about my studio practice, write about the project, create thumbnail sketches, PLAY with mixed media techniques, composition, color, and use it to develop my larger paintings and limited edition products.

• What is an inspiration sketchbook?
• Elements of an inspiration sketchbook
• How it can enhance your studio practice
• IDEATION & mind mapping YOU
• A peek inside Traci’s inspiration sketchbooks
• CREATIVE PROCESS: From idea to collection
• What is your creative project?
• mind mapping your project 
• Creating a consistent painting practice
• working in a series & creating a body of work
• Using the digital canvas in your creative process
• The possibilities mixed media & Procreate
• Procreate collage: designing an inspiration board
• Creating a color palette from photos
• Mixed media & watercolor swatching
• INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK process PLAYbook
• Exploring sketching & motifs in Procreate
• strategies for completing your next body of work
• Procreate + mixed media sketch challenge
• mixed media technique sampler
• Examples of sketchbooks and studio journals 
• PLAY: 15-min sketchbook warm up exercises
• Capturing images for your project
• Gathering inspiration for your project
• Designing an inspiration wall
• Designing a mood board in Procreate
• COLLECTING COLOR for your project
• creating a color palette from photos in Procreate
• CREATIVE ROADMAP & STUDIO PLANNER

We kick off the program with MODULE ONE talking about YOUR VISION, the creative journey and artistic process. I’ll share about my creative process and how I approach creating art, products and anything I design using an INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK.

How do you create a body of work that is uniquely YOU? You’ll write about your own creative process, we’ll talk through ideas to make you practice more fluid and talk about the vision. 

You'll create a MINDMAP YOU as I lead you through a creative exercise to discover your stories, memories and passions and how to use them in your artwork. These discoveries will be the jumpstart for your next body of work.

I'll share a number of ideas and talk about ways to leverage your artwork by incorporating the digital canvas into your practice. You’ll learn about all the possibilities for creating digital art using Procreate.

Each module includes a mini mindset training. In module one, we'll tackle fear and starting a project and talk about developing confidence. 

BONUS: Procreate possibilities & sketchbook prompts

During the bonus session, I share IDEAS for what you can create and what the iPad makes possible. and lead you in a fun sketchbook prompt challenge. 

During MODULE TWO, we'll talk about the evolution of an idea through creative PLAY. How do you approach your art process? I'll share how I take an idea to a final collection using an INSPIRATION sketchbook.

What’s an INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK? You’ll learn about the foundation and catalyst for every project, product and art collection I design and how you can use it in your own artistic practice. It's a signature framework/PLAYbook that I've developed over the past 30 years of creating artwork.

Learn about my signature INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK process and how you can use this PLAYbook to design your next creative project, painting series or collection.

Sketchbook formats…working physical vs digital and how to combine them in your work. 

TWO CREATIVE APPROACHES: Free flowing PLAY intuition vs. idea theme based projects. We'll talk about letting your work unfold naturally though play sessions then discovering the idea vs starting with an idea in mind. 

What's your CREATIVE PROJECT?You'll decide on what project you'll focus on during this course or season.  You'll explore preliminary mark making exercises to start experimenting with materials and techniques 

Mini mindset this session is all about...creating a consistent artistic practice. How do you make time for art? What can you do to keep showing up and following through to complete your project?

BONUS: INSIDE my inspiration sketchbooks

Inside my inspiration sketchbooks...get a peek inside my creative process as I talk through some of my studio notes and flip through my journals & sketchbooks

MODULE THREE is all about IDEATION...you'll brainstorm your project with an ideation session, create an adjective bank and start to gather stories, images and colors for your artwork. 

Create a MIND MAP of your idea and creative project using your sketchbook, Procreate or Notion. 

We’ll talk about strategies for researching your theme or idea using Pinterest, hashtags, creative field trips and online resources.

BONUS: mixed media technique swatching

In this painting session, you'll be exploring mixed media and watercolor swatching

In this session, you'll explore creative exercises for storytelling with images, COLOR, words, symbols and mark making.

You’ll GATHER images and get outside for a photo inspiration hunt. We’ll talk about how to use these images to jumpstart your mark-making and visual vocabulary

Learn a number of ways to collect color, create color swatches for your project theme.  Mix a color palette and swatches using mixed media.

Create a color palette from your inspiration photos using Procreate. This will be used as a guide as you pull together colors for your paintings. 

You'll explore working in a series, using thumbnail sketches and on multiple pieces to experiment as you develop your ideas and body of work. 

PLAY with found tools and brushes with watercolor and inks to create your visual vocabulary and personal mark making library for your project.

MASTER the importance of PLAY in your creative practice...let your ideas unfold naturally as you experiment with color, images and marks.

I’ll talk about ways to explore your artistic style using your sketchbook during our mini mindset training and how to be open to exploration as you develop a body of work.

BONUS: storytelling with photos

Create an abstract collage in Procreate. Explore digital collage using your images and create abstract pieces that can be used as image transfers, book pages or as collage sheets

During this session you’ll pull together all your resources, research, color swatches, images and mark making to create an INSPIRATION BOARDS.

We’ll discuss various ways to collect your project inspiration from flair trays, to color clipboards and creating a project inspiration wall.

Learn how to create a digital mood board in Procreate which incorporates your photos, motifs and ideas for your artwork

Experiment creating abstract digital collage with your photos using Procreate to use as jumpstarts for your paintings

Get a BTS peek into a few of my digital and physical INSPIRATION BOARDS.

Gather all your project resources, paint chips, ephemera, notes and ideas...these will be your guiding inspiration as you develop your series or collection. 

You'll create a project inspiration board for your new collection, pulling together all the work you've done in the previous lessons.

BONUS: idea to series: Thistle project

In this bonus video, you’ll get an overview of a commissioned licensing project as I talk through the process of developing the artwork and working in a series from ideation, to sketching to final artwork.

We'll wrap up MODULE SIX with planning our CREATIVE PROJECT roadmap. 

 In the final module, you’ll create a roadmap for your project using a creative planner and start building out your collection of artwork

We’ll talk about creating collections and how to incorporate the INSPIRATION SKETCHBOOK PLAYbook/framework as you move forward to develop your body of work.

Explore the possibilities of how to leverage your artwork to create digital or physical products, licensing, teaching and writing.

How to document your process and make it repeatable so each time you come back to start a new body of work you can dive in with confidence

Mindset: sharing your creative journey. Ideas and prompts to help guide you to share about your project and creative journey

We’ll talk about next steps and make a plan {roadmap} to complete your project and how to keep yourself accountable. 

BONUS: handmade color: the LANIKAI collection 

In this video lesson, you’ll get an overview of how I develop a handmade paint collection. I walk you through the inspiration behind one of my most popular paint collections, LANIKAI and talk about how I use an inspiration sketchbook as I create the products.