I have this creative blank when it comes to art. Specifically, drawing art. When it comes to putting colored pencil or crayon to paper, I cannot seem to create something completely original unless it is a set or costume design. Otherwise, I am an excellent “copy artist”. When I use this term, I do not mean that I am a “plagiarist” because I do not copy others artwork and claim it as my own divine creation. What I mean is that I can look at an existing piece of art and do a relatively good (by no means photographic) representation of it. This has come in handy for the game Draw Something which I have recently become a fan of like so many millions of other doodlers of varying skill.

I know that some folks might be inclined to say that I’m cheating and that the point of the game is to draw your own best example of the word presented. But, here’s the thing, if the word is “Vader”  I can’t just spontaneously draw an image of Darth Vader. I can picture him clearly in my mind, but I can’t translate that image in my head to the screen. What I can do, and am pretty good at, is actively look at a picture of Darth Vader, and then draw that image on the screen – much like an artist looks at a display of fruit and cheese and then creates a still life.

For Vader, I referred to the original Star Wars movie poster.

One thing I love about Draw Something is the lack of a time-limit to create your doodle. You do have an “ink limit” (which may in fact be a time limit, I’m not sure how they wrote the algorithm) but I don’t feel the pressure to hastily scrawl something out, like in Pictionary. I like that I can take my time and get as detailed as I want (ink allowing).

Alf of… Alf.

Once in a blue moon, I am able to create something truly original, like my drawing here for “Iron Chef”, but it’s seriously rare.

‘Allo! I am ze Iron Chef. I make out of zis world grilled cheese!

Am I showing off my artistic skill? Well, if I’m honest, yes. A little. But mostly I’m trying to see just what I’m capable of pulling off. The other day a drew my best impression of one of Van Gogh’s self-portraits and I almost blew my own mind. I just sat there for a few minutes in awe going, “Holy Crap, how did I draw that?!?!” If asked to recreate the drawing I’m not sure that I could.

I don’t know how I did this… fortunately, no ears were lost in the process.

But as nice as it is to be able to do reasonable copy work, I am constantly frustrated with my inability to create an image entirely from my imagination. Those that can are the artists that have true skill.

If you’d like to play a round of Draw Something with me, my user name is (predictably) Jen_Tidwell.

Please note that not all of my drawings are as decent as the ones I’ve shown here… sometimes I’ll use stick-figures to get across a concept – but once in a while, I get an opportunity to try and doodle something really detailed and those are the word clues I live for 🙂

And this week’s addition to the TESTIMONIAL GALLERY is…(drum roll please):

Jen Yates of Cakewrecks and Epbot!!!

How awesome it that?!?! I mean seriously!! The “geeky hats” she is referring to can be found HERE. Jen was a huge help in my “Geeky Beanie” quest and it is still such an honor to have her presence here on my humble little bloggy-blog.

Thanks, Jen!