Inktober was coming up fast and I looked to my lovely community group for an idea of what to draw this year, they picked 9 monsters on a poll I put out.
I had also thought about doing a pre existing inktober prompt list but I didn't want to overload myself. After a few discussions some of my community said they wanted to join me drawing so I decided to create my very own, very first version of Inktober, I named it The Tinkertober Challenge, longwinded but Tinktober was taken.
My aim was to allow anyone who wanted to join a dnd fun versi0n of Inktober with weekends free and a theme for the week. There was also the option to do just one drawing a week using all the prompts from the week. I included the nine monsters spacing them out at the beginning and end of the week then added items and places to create individual weeks. I think it works well and I aim to run it next year.
WHAT HAVE I LEARNT
I have definitely learned a lot doing this challenge, the big one being that doing a drawing everyday inspired me to get other drawings finished or surface patterns made. I also learned that if I want to carry on running this challenge in the future I need to either pick a different month or advertise way sooner. I am thinking possibly a different month.
I also learnt it doesn't hurt to be prepared and draw up a few in advance. I drew up the majority in pencil in my sketchbook before taking them to digital media. I think next year I might try drawing them just on paper.
BREAKDOWN
So here is a breakdown of each week, what I drew and where I got my inspiration from and whether it impacted my work going forward:
1st Oct - YOUR OWN FAMILIAR
I sat down with some lovely friends online a couple of nights before this needed to be drawn and drew this two tailed fire fox, it was so fun to let them watch some of the process and get their opinions on colours and such.
Instead of drawing my own familiar which we discussed during our call and decided mine would definitely be a cat, I drew my wildfire druid Jenni's wildfire spirit or her familiar one could say. I wanted to draw them for ages, both because I needed a token image for roll20 and because I wanted to give this two tailed fox a face. My aim was to draw them in mid air as they float and we feel this is them guarding Jenni from harm. I have since gained another fae summon that looks like a white ermine and is one of the fire fox's tails.
4th-8th Oct - GENIE WEEK
I had recently played a oneshot where we all got to be Goblins and defend our lair from Adventurers. It was hilariously good fun and my character Effi was a Genie pact Warlock who made an accidental pact with an air djinn out of fright. She now carries around her genie vessel which she is completely in awe and also scared of. I based all my drawings for this week on this character and it was so fun. I also love that at the end of the week I had this set of drawings and an over whelming urge to make a surface pattern based on the items, which I did.
11th-15th Oct - DRUID WEEK
I loved doing Druid week, I was very inspired with lots of nature colours. I will admit that I am working on drawing animals and people so drawing an Owlbear was a challenge, personally I think he is adorable, and if Jeni had her way, Patch (my husband named him) would be her pet. I would love to do something with the antlers drawing.
18th-22nd Oct - WIZARD WEEK
Wizard week was a bit tougher or more out of my comfort zone, I really struggled with Mimic but thought my bottles were pretty cool in the end. Unfortunately I didn't finish the week as I went down with a horrible cold mid week and by the Friday felt absolutely drained. I do love my spellbook and it's definitely another illustration I want to do something with. I added the wizard tower to my xmas rapping paper which was fun.
25th-29th Oct - SORCEROR WEEK
This week I was so busy I didn't get round to doing any of the drawings.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I am proud of how many drawings I did and aware that I did not finish my own challenge. It is very easy to burn out when faced with so many prompts. My drawings take me hours to do so I think the next time I do this I want to use pen and paper and see what I come up with.
I hope you enjoyed this little overview of the challenge. I plan to make a video of all the drawing process to put on my Youtube channel, when I do I will add it to this post.