My First Online Digital Illustration Class - The New iMac M1 for Artists? & Does Social Media Detox Work?
Happy Tuesday! In this edition I'll share a bit about the online class I'll be releasing @Domestika. My new iMac M1 for Digital Artists & Will break from Social Media hurt your engagement!?
Hi everyone, and welcome all of you that are new here! Today for the 6th publication of The Creative Draft, I have some really exciting news. On top of that, as most of you have seen, I took a few weeks off the online world to recharge. I will be talking a bit about that as well in this edition and why creators and artists need to slow down, take some time off from the pressure that is being present everywhere.
And Yes! After much consideration, I decided to buy the new iMac M1 for many reasons. I will be sharing some of those core reasons here and why I believe it’s great for artists. I will be sharing more on my socials! Mostly if you already own an iPad.
Also, I have been asked a lot to create an illustration online class for the last two years. Finally, this year, for all of you that requested, I will be partnering up with Domestika on this adventure, and together we are going to create an amazing class for you guys!
Remember to follow me on Instagram and YouTube, as I will be posting some cool stuff about the process - at least all the details I’m free to share - the rest is a secret :)
The Menu for This Week
👉 Creating my First Online Class with Domestika.
👉 Creative Burnout - Will Social Media Detox hurt your engagement?
👉 What about my New iMac M1 (for artists)
About Creating a Class with Domestika
After considering different ways and platforms, I decided to partner up with Doméstika!
During the past year or so, I have been contemplating the idea to create a Digital Illustration class, as I was asked every time I posted a new illustration tutorial video on my YouTube Channel.
I cannot disclose much about the class, but obviously, it has to do with digital illustration. I will be posting regular updates on this; follow my Domestika Profile (it’s free) and you will be notified every time I post a new project.
The idea of making a class is super interesting, as it will allow me to show the full process of creation, share tips and techniques in a very structured way. This is something hard to do on YouTube, for example. So I’m super excited to share this news with you guys; I hope that’s something you’d like to look into when the class is out this year.
Also, one of the reasons I chose Domestika is the quality of the classes, how fair they are with creators, and how well structured those classes are for the students. You know that I’ve been taking their classes for quite some time now. If you haven’t done any yet, I highly recommend you to check them out. Domestika has great teachers, and the production quality of the work is amazing. Also, in most cases, you get a certificate signed by the teacher at the end of the class, there are project reviews and feedback from the teachers given to you—a full learning experience.
Creative Burnout & Social Media
This can affect all creators! And it’s not your fault plus you are not alone.
If you follow me, you might have noticed that I’m not as active as I was a few months ago, and there’s a good reason for that. Creative burnout is real, and it’s affecting more and more creators. Knowing that and people coming out telling their story, I’ve decided to slow a bit down and focus on organizing better my work-life balance. At the end of the day, I need to be energized to work on my projects and my clients. Sometimes, creators end up working for the social platforms in a way to feed the algorithm, and I don't want that.
Back when I started my YouTube Channel, I was making 4+ videos a month, one every week. On top of that, I was working with my clients and posing personal projects (client work can’t be shown) regularly for Instagram. But after a few months of doing so, the exhaustion became real. Don’t get me wrong, I love YouTube and how open they are with creators, and I have 100 ideas for upcoming videos for you, but in order to get the things done well, I had to slow down a bit.
I love the fact that I was able to build up my YouYube community as I did, and I believe that YouTube does a lot of great things for creators. Sure, they can improve here and there, but I feel it’s a good platform to be on if you are a creator. YouTube allowed me to get to know a lot of you, chat in the comments, and, what’s more important for me, share all I know about illustration and the illustration career. If I had to start over, I would do the same, but I might just pace it a bit differently.
I realized early this year, just around the same time that I went for a full month without posting on socials as part of a Social Media detox experiment, that platforms like Instagram do not care about our health. But we all knew that.
For example, my YouTube videos started to do great during my Social Media detox month, but Instagram was silent. On YouTube, I was getting more views, but the rest of the platforms wanted me present all the time. All the time.
Even the older videos were doing great on YouTube, and that’s because the platform has more logic to it content-wise. As a creator knowing this is rewarding, it takes the pressure of being present all the time. So I wanted to share that with you.
On Instagram, you never know what you are going to get. It now seems Reels is the thing. But is it really? What I can share is that I can imagine that today is harder than ever to build a community on Instagram; there are no clear rules. And even if you post every single day, nothing guarantees you are going to succeed. So please do not stress out, and diversify, try new things. If you burn yourself out, as someone close to me did, it’s not good and definitely not worth it.
Bottom line, if you want to share your view and control your creative process, I highly recommend you share it on YouTube; it’s never too late, no one has your voice or unique view, as there’s only one of each one of us.
Hello @New iMac and …
After a lot of consideration, I went for the new M1, and I’m making a video about it.
About a month ago, I received at the studio my new iMac. Initially, I was quite reluctant to buy it, being a PC user forever (I get you, Microsoft), but I decided to give it a go, as the reviews were so so great.
Fast forward to this day; I decided to share my full take on it from a digital artist’s perspective. So if you are reading this and you want me to cover any particular angle in my video, please be sure to leave a comment below.
Without disclosing much about the video, I can say that these M1 are not for everyone, so depending on the use you are going to give them, it might or might not be for you. That being said, I’m quite happy about it for many reasons I will be sharing in the video. But it has its cons as well, as you can imagine.
Disclaimer: this is a newsletter, and you can opt-out at any time; there’s a link below where you can automatically unsubscribe. I wouldn’t like to see you go, but you have the option. Also, some links, not all, might be affiliate links; when you click on them, I get a small commission at no cost to you.