Clip Studio Pro

Today I used Clip Studio Pro for the first time, software that came with my Wacom Intuos. I love the variety of brushes and pencils and how well the pressure of the pen is captured. I was able to recreate a fineliner drawing where I coloured in the lines, with single strokes of a digital pencil. For some reason, Photoshop is very uncalibrated and lags, so it was great fun using the tablet with all these new tools.

The software includes 2D and 3D animation, vectors and many other features. I prefer it so much to Photoshop for digital drawing and I’ve barely touched the surface of what the software can do. I am excited by the prospect of creating comic style pieces and creating digital collages of my drawings which could potentially move!

Both drawings are inspired by this time of global change and quotes by Alan Watts. Times of change always bring both good and bad, but we can do our best to make the current moment okay. Also, it really does help to get up and dance around the room, be silly for a little bit. The second image is about how we are apart of this world, encouraging us to feel held and connected with the world around. We spend a lot of time separating and categorising everything and this can make us feel alienated, and I think it is important to ground ourselves with the world around.

I’ve been reading Alan Watts’ ‘The Book’, which is really helpful for seeing how we (especially Western Society) categorise everything and see ourselves as separate ego-centred individuals with rules and ways of thinking so ingrained we don’t even see them. I have found that during this weird time globally I cannot solely focus on my non-binary identity, and would rather focus on this idea of how we are all apart of this world, how categorising things makes us forget the are not separate and how we can find harmony in such a busy society. The idea that gender is not binary, extends much further than gender; we live in quite a binary society in many ways. Categorising of opposites as separate things lead to much confusion when we try and have one without the other and can lead us to become increasingly frustrated and overwhelmed while trying to achieve happiness without sadness, or organisation without chaos, or rush around without stillness. This time has made many people realise just how fast they were going and has given us the opportunity to slow down but it can be hard to get the mind to slow down with the body when it is so used to thinking in overdrive, and there are still outside pressures to achieve something great in this time of lockdown.