Creative Recess — Simon and Derek face off with human-generated prompts

How do you think of that so quickly? — It's called panic. I just have random cues. — Yes, and I lost track of what you draw. Can I say no? I'm so sorry. Oh my god, I don't eat breakfast. Pick my favorite shape. You always got to follow the brief. You know what? That's good enough. I don't have time. Welcome to Creative Recess, where the prompts are human and the chaos is creative. Let's meet our creatives. Hi everyone, I'm Simon. I'm an illustrator, artist, and top teacher on Skillshare, and I'm living in Montreal, Canada. — Hi, I'm Derek. I'm a motion designer based out of Vancouver, Canada. Simon, do you use prompts in your practice or for just regular doodling ever? — Actually, there's two prompts I'd like to use whenever I create fun characters. I like to focus on a noun. So, random list of nouns and an action, and that allows me to create as an exercise quick character quick prompts. Cool. Derek? — Yes. Unprompted, what are you likely to start doodling whenever you're just doodling on your own? Unprompted, I love to draw from observations. So, one of my favorite things is going to cafes, for example, sketch people very quickly before they notice I'm sketching them. Derek, what are you unprompted likely to be doodling? So, whenever I doodle, it's usually during meetings or if I'm sitting on a train or sitting in a cafe, and I'll have a pen on me and I'll just draw something on that side of a piece of paper. And a lot of the times it'll be stuff that I drew when I was a kid, so like Mario or the Batman logo or you know that cool S where you write Yes. — and then connect it. The cool S I make all the time. It's just like random stuff from my childhood, usually. What are you bringing to Recess as your tool of choice today? So, today for Recess, I'm bringing my faithful iPad with Procreate on it. Today for Recess, I am also bringing my iPad with Procreate on it. And also the cool drawing glove that I noticed we both have. Oh, yes. — People often think that I hurt myself whenever they see video of me wearing this glove, so yeah, I'm glad you have it too, Derek. — Same. They're always like, do you have carpal tunnel or something? I'm like, no, no, it's just so my hand doesn't move around on the iPad. All right. How are you feeling about what's about to go down? So, I'm actually super excited to start drawing and also to draw with my fellow Canadian, Derek. So, let's get started. Derek? I'm very nervous because I usually work in, you know, mouse keyboard, and then I'm I'm here with a real illustrator, so I feel the pressure. But also, I'm not a lot of pressure because again, we're both Canadians, so we're both going to be super nice. Yeah, we're going to apologize a lot, so get ready. Sorry. — I'm so sorry. Your first prompt is two truths and a lie, breakfast edition. Time on the clock is 8 minutes. Off you go. Oh my god. I don't eat breakfast. So, I don't often have time to eat breakfast, so I'm trying to think of three lies. I'm kidding. when I actually do have time to eat breakfast. What do I normally eat? Simon, are you a morning person? Um yes. I think I'm a morning person. I'm also a night person. For some reason, I always have a lot of energy in the morning, at night, and I just crash in the afternoon. So, I'm everything but an afternoon person. Uh same. I'm definitely a night person. Like, my energy kicks in around 11:00 p. m. Um afternoon is Yeah, I crash as well. I got to get that coffee in or else I'm done. The menu seems to be shaping up. We've got some beverages, some fruit staples. So, every time that I set timer, I always panic a little bit. This is a fork. It looks like a pitchfork, but it's a fork. I'm going to draw a knife, too, then. And that's time. Time's up. Instruments down. Talk us through what you drew and play two truths and a lie. Okay, I'll go ahead. I love breakfast, and while I was working at the office, I didn't really have time to eat breakfast, but now that I'm a freelancer, I have more time to enjoy making bread in the morning. So, lately, I'm really into making my own sourdough bread. I don't do it every day. Uh but I do it at least once a week. Yeah. I make my own sourdough bread. The second illustration is

uh my favorite type of breakfast. Well, there's two smells that I really like, and it's the smell of grapefruit and the smell of coffee. So, these are whenever I want a very fancy breakfast, I will have a grapefruit. But coffee is always a must. And the last illustration is that I am slightly allergic to kiwis. So, whenever I eat kiwis or there's trace of kiwis in fruit, it happens mostly whenever I go to hotels, I can get a little bit of a itchiness in the back of my throat if there's contamination with kiwis. Hence, the skull. Oh. And these are my three facts. Oh, okay. No one's lying today. No, with one lie. — I believe that you make your bread. love the smell of coffee cuz who doesn't? I believe you're trying to throw me off with the skull and crossbones. I think you love kiwi fruit. I I don't think you're allergic to it at all. I I'm I feel like you eat that on the regular. So, your lie is the kiwi. Are you sure? 1,000%. All right. Well, Derek, you're very lucky. I'm actually a very bad liar, so it's true. I am not allergic to kiwi. I actually panicked while I was drawing because I just love drawing things that I like, and then at the last minute, I'm like, I only drew things that I like. Now, I need to kind of implement a lie amongst them. So, yeah. I am not allergic to kiwis. Yes. They're beautiful drawings, by the way. Thank you. All right. So, this is what my two truths and a lie for breakfast. What I again, I mentioned I don't really eat breakfast often, but when I do, it's something super easy, super quick. Orange juice, scrambled eggs with ketchup, and avocado toast. Things that can be made super quick, super easy cuz who has time? This sounds delicious and it looks great, also. And we don't have any lie in these three illustrations, right? Oh, there's one lie. One lie. You don't put ketchup on your scrambled eggs. I do put ketchup on my scrambled eggs. That was a good guess. No, my lie is the avocado toast. I can't afford avocado. It's very — I would never eat that, ever. Well, I'm sorry to Let's move on to round two. Fresh screens. Our next prompt is something tiny. However, in this round, there's a little something extra. You must draw only using a specific shape. And that shape is a square. Time on the clock is 5 minutes. Ready? Hands up, and start. Pick my favorite shape. Huh. So, something tiny, and we must start with a square. You must draw only using a square. Oh, one square or multiple squares? Multiple squares. So, you can only draw using the shape of a square. Easy peasy. Derek's off to a start. He claims to love squares. Hm. Simon, do you have a favorite shape? No, I don't have a favorite shape. But you think I think I think I'm a shape positive person, and I believe that every shape is beautiful the way they are. they are. — Yeah. Great answer. Yes, and I lost track of what you drew, Simon. Something tiny, only using squares. A rectangle's a square. Is it though? Oh. I will say it is. Oh, okay. Yeah, we both got some rectangles up in here. And time is up. Hands up. All right. Let's see what we made. Simon, talk us through your creation. All right. Uh I started with not knowing what to draw, and I think that's a really good prompt, actually, when you're a little bit destabilized and you're trying to think with your hands before thinking with your brain. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to draw a red square and see where it leads me. I drew more and more squares, and I felt like it looked like a little bit of a pathway, and I decided to create a little bit of dirt on top, little bit of grass, and the prompt was something

tiny, so I added a little tiny ant in that little maze. How are you feeling? I feel like I cheated a little bit cuz I drew a lot of rectangles, and then at the end I'm like, you know what? That's good enough. I don't have time. And you and Derek kind of instituted a new rule that rectangles can be squares. Yes. Yeah, thank you, Derek, for being on my side. Great job, Simon. That's so much fun. Derek, walk us through your creation. So before I do, if it has four sides, it's a square. It's It doesn't matter the shape. I mean, the shape is a square. I drew something tiny that I love playing with on a daily basis, and that's LEGO man. And I love squares because LEGOs are basically all squares. Um and then even his little word bubble, the letter forms, technically, are squares. He's saying, "I'm tiny. " Which is reinforcing the smallness of my LEGO man. Amazing. Way to exemplify following the brief. It's what I do. As a designer, you always got to follow the brief. You can stray a little bit in your explorations, but always come back. You got to read the rules. You got to give the client what they want. Our next prompt is, well, not mine, cuz I'm not drawing. It's yours. A sound. However, in this round, let's switch things up. Please change the creative medium you're using. Whatever you have lying around. Get out of here right now. Let's go. This is crazy. All right. Time on the clock is 6 minutes. And go. I should have thought this through. I do like this ASMR, Derek. — I just have random pieces. It's okay. You can do this. Push through. Push through. What do we got? We got a couple of wheels. We got almost the a pre-built car shape. Oh, hot. I feel silly cuz I In the previous prompt, I built it up. I was like, "Yeah, I play I build LEGOs every day. " You're expecting me to make like a masterpiece. But there's time constraints. When you're building LEGOs, you know, it's you do it on your own time. You take the entire afternoon. You really just zen out. You can't build LEGO under pressure. I mean, I'm sure there's a pro level of LEGOs, but this is not where we're at right now. Honestly, Derek, this is the best uh unconventional tool that you're using. I'm just listening to it, and I think it's great. Sorry to do this. 1-minute warning. You already fulfilled the prompt. It was a sound. Yeah. There we go. Okay. Okay, we're good. All right. And we're at time. Wow, this round is epic. Derek, do you want to talk us through uh your spontaneous combustion into LEGOs? For sure. Uh so, what I built here is a sound that I absolutely love hearing, and that's the sound of electric cars driving by. So, you know how cars go but electric cars are all like When I hear that on the street, I get so happy cuz it makes me feel like I'm in the future. So, here I built kind of like an electric car. There's a little dude driving. You can tell it's electric because it has a plant on it hanging off of it to let you know that it's, you know, not gas-based. And then you got a little charging station. I've never heard what a charging station sounds like, but I assume it's also cool. Great job, Derek. Thank you. Simon, over to you. I just want to preface that this whole exercise was very therapeutic to me because I was listening to Derek playing with the LEGOs, and just this ASMR

the sound of blocks was very satisfying, so I was really in the zone. I actually feel like I didn't talk a lot while I was drawing, but it I definitely enjoyed the sound of the LEGO in the box, so thank you so much, Derek, for that. From my end, I used some pastel that activated with water can also work as a watercolor. And because I feel very poetic lately because it's the beginning of spring, I decided to draw a bird singing, so that was the sound that I was focusing on. Beautiful. I Yeah, watching the transformation of both your screens was really, really entertaining and so much fun to watch. For this round, creator's choice of materials, our prompt is childhood imagination. So, for this round, you must create your prompt while trying to win a staring contest with each other. Eyes on the screen. And time on the clock is, here's the last twist, 3 minutes. Pens up. Your time starts now. — This might be the longest 3 minutes. It's a quiet round as our creatives try to focus on hand placement and paper. This is the illustrative version of a Draw and Ember documentary. Is there a color story? Is there a theme? I feel like this pen I'm using doesn't have any ink. Is ink coming out of this thing? Yeah. Mhm. Okay, sweet. So, so silly. I had the same problem. — All right. And just like that, time's up. Pens, papers, colored pencils down. Talk us through your creations or what you were trying to attempt and what you ended up with. Simon, go ahead. All right. So, when I was a kid, I really had a vivid imagination, and bedtime for me was kind of difficult because I I'm a scaredy-cat. I get afraid of everything. So, when going to bed, you know, the everyone has this one chair in the corner of the room where you just end up piling up all your clothes. But at night, this pile of clothes actually turns into some type of monster, and you start seeing faces in it. So, I started using my darkest black ink cuz I wanted to create some type of obscurity. Well, this big block, basically, I think I wanted to create a closet, and that's probably me, but I couldn't draw in a lot of detail. And then I thought I needed a little bit of color, so I decided to add a little bit of purple, light as if I was shining a light into it, and this is just a mountain of clothes that's flying everywhere. Basically, the message is, kids, always clean your room before going to bed because if you just put your clothes everywhere, you start seeing faces in the dark. So, that's my drawing. Water warning, Simon. Thank you. — Before I jump into mine, I want to say that was a genius scene to make because you're allowing yourself to draw anything anywhere on the page because it adds to the whole messiness of your of your room and your whole description there. That's awesome. How did you think of that so quickly? It's called panic. Yeah. I'm very good to improvise, so thank you, Derek. Uh so, what I drew, I think I mentioned this at the beginning, but these are the kinds of doodles that I drew as a kid in my the entirety of my childhood, so things that, you know, I have muscle memory with, like the Batman symbol. Um I was trying to draw the cool S, but I couldn't spatially put in my head, and I thought I almost had it. Like I started with the six lines, and then as soon as I got to the diagonals, I was like, "Okay, this is Hopefully somebody gets this. " We got Ninja Turtles, and then Mario, which came out not bad. I think. First question, what surprised you about this? What surprised me about this challenge is that it was actually fun. Um and it's that sounds actually bad, but you know, you forget that when you start doodling or getting to

something unprepared, uh, you start improvising. This is really when you start pushing your imagination. In our life, we're trying to control everything and trying to have things ahead of time and before logging on the call, uh, I didn't receive a list of prompts prior, so I couldn't practice or think about what I was going to draw. So, yeah, Skillshare really kept me on my toes. So, what surprised me about the challenge, uh, it was like you said, it was super fun. I also didn't expect to go on such like a nostalgia trip. It's so interesting how random prompts will get you thinking about your childhood or, uh, your environment or just things outside of what where you are and what you're doing right now. It helps you like break out of what you're doing to think outside of, you know, that and that that was very cool. Let us know what you've got coming up or where people can find your art or your work, Simon. First of all, I have a brand new class on Skillshare and it's about drawing from imagination and also getting back into your drawing, uh, routine. So, check that out. And second of all, you can find me on Instagram at Sip Cozy Art. Right here. And I'm excited for you to create at home. Stay creative. Uh, I work for you guys, so I don't really have anything to promote. — I- If you want to see some of my work, uh, you can go on the Skillshare's YouTube page or Skillshare's Instagram. I do a lot of design work and animation work for, uh, a lot of their YouTube series and ads. And if you want to catch some of my work, I probably will be doing the title sequence for this series. Um, I do a lot of design and animation work for Skillshare. Thank you so much, Derek and Simon. See you guys next time. Bye.