Wrap-up for #Inktober 2017

Today is October 31st! That means two things:

  1. At midnight tonight, #NaNoWriMo starts.
  2. At midnight tonight, #Inktober ends.

This is the first year I’ve done Inktober, and I’m happy with the experiment. I had fun, I made some skill progress, I pushed myself, and apparently I pushed a few other people too, in a good way, as a couple of people have told me privately that they were inspired to try something new because of my Inktober posts — and I think that’s fantastic. Being authentic and trying to improve a non-existent skill was the original goal.

I hope you enjoyed accompanying me on my inky journey!

The final prompt for Inktober, appropriate to Halloween, was “mask.” So I drew a seasonal masked pumpkin.

inked drawing of masked jack o lantern

pumpkin with mask

Tomorrow I’ll jump into NaNoWriMo and try to complete a draft for a new novel. I’d planned to write one project which I was excited about — and even made notes and such beforehand, which is not how I usually approach NaNo — but my muse seems to have staged a coup and wants to go back to an old, mostly abandoned project. We’ll see how it goes!

 

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2 Comments

  1. I’ve enjoyed your Inktober blogs. I believe you’re much more the illustrator than you give yourself credit. Still, it’s only a skill if you continue to dedicate your time to it. As a writer, you may find that difficult. I draw and write. When I’m doing one I’m constantly pulled toward the other. The creative juices of writing make my brain want to draw and vice versa. The struggle makes it easy to be creative, but difficult to finish anything. I’m not a fast writer, so I’ve never done NaNoWriMo. I’m ready to start my next book, so I’ve decided to participate this year, but I’m not going to put a word count on the venture. I’m just going to write for the fun of writing. Thanks for being a creative inspiration. Keep up the good work.

    • Thanks! I’ve definitely improved over the month.

      And yes, I find I can’t split between creative venues as well as many of my friends seem to. I really enjoy making costumes, and I don’t believe we have a finite amount of creativity that we need to ration out, but I don’t do well trying to write and make cosplay pieces at the same time (not in the same session, obviously, but in the same mental project space). I focus on just one or the other. Writing pays, cosplay doesn’t, and I have more career goals for writing than cosplay, so that’s what I’ve been doing more of in the last few years. :)

      My first NaNo I didn’t accept the word count goal, either, and I wrote a story which was complete at novella length. Go for it!

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