Daily Visual Journal

Curriculum

4 Sections
19 Lessons
Lifetime

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Introduction
On June 5th, 2009 I decided to start creating a visual journal on individual pieces of paper. This gave me a little more freedom with techniques since the pages were not bound together. You can absolutely use a sketchbook for this course! The idea of my daily visual journal began as a challenge to myself to create art everyday and generate my own inspiration. This course illustrates some of the techniques used to create my daily visual journal pages and how you can incorporate these techniques into your own daily visual journal. In addition, each technique is followed by a self reflection prompt for you to think about and write about on the backside of your visual journal entry. Sometimes while creating a visual journal entry I have a thought in mind and it informs the artwork, other times I’m just playing with technique and process.
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- 1.1
  Supplies
Preparing Journal Pages
To stay motivated and inspired, I recommend preparing a stack of bases before you begin so that you have materials ready to go for the week. (Or use a sketchbook!). I have outlined here four techniques I use the most when preparing my bases ahead of time. It works well and I’m not rushing or frustrated when I sit down to work on my entry for the day.
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Techniques
14
Inspiration
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- 4.1
  Inspiration

Paint

Another option is to cover your page with acrylic paint. You can start by covering the page with white gesso and when the gesso is dry, coating the page with a different color of acrylic.

You can prepare some pages with a solid color of paint or before the acrylic dries, you can take the back end of your paintbrush and drag lines through the acrylic paint, revealing the white gesso underneath while creating textured lines on your page.

You could use layers of different colors in acrylic paint and when dragging lines through the top layer, other colors will show through. This technique gives you a lot of options and can sometimes be a finished piece in itself.

Watercolor is also a great way to prepare some journal bases. Using watercolor paper cut to size, you can do a wash of one or more colors. You can also use old watercolor paintings that you no longer want to use for a finished piece and cut it into 4×6 inch pieces to use for your Daily Visual Journal.