With this theme ("perspective"), I wanted to take a double approach: to express the traditional geo-physical perspective that things have in the 3D space, as well as the more abstract meaning of "seeing things in perspective".

It's a known fact that children and young adults see things differently than older people. When young, curiosity, enthusiasm and faith in success overwrite the disappointments and distrust of a positive outcome... It's also an age when we are not yet tied down by material things and possessions... As older adults though, it's like we completely forgot that we are free to change our life, if we are not happy with it. It doesn't necessarily mean that it will became great (or even better), the point is that we don't even try. Because we have to take care of too many things and there is too much to lose... at least that's how we perceive it from the low vantage point we stand. And that makes change look not only scary, but dauntingly impossible or simply unattractive.

The image was also about that, learning to hold tight while letting go, embracing the scary thrill of a powerful swing thrusting us up in the sky... That "happy scary" of a new exciting adventure, the feeling of being light on your feet and thoughts, trusting and hopeful... at peace with your mind and heart... and just live your life, not somebody else's.

In creating the illustration for this theme, I wanted to use as reference a photo taken in the arboretum, of a little white flower bush (don't know its name, unfortunately). I really liked the delicacy of the flowers and how dense they grew to each other, forming a white beautiful carpet.

Despite the beautiful setting though, I still didn't have a story. Simple pretty flowers were not good enough to make an interesting image. Something needed to happen there, so I started sketching some bunnies in the hope some idea will jump at me. And it did! It was that of a bunny looking straight up, like he's being caught in the act of doing something mischievous, and now he's playing the candid innocence card... low-lying ears towards the back, big wide eyes fixating on you without a blink, and of course mouth stopped from chewing...

That's how "I wasn't doing anything" line came up, and it kind of cracked me up... :)

This week's prompt was Garden. I used as source of inspiration an image from my thesis presentation, which in fact was an aquatic scene. I really loved the color combination from there and even though it wasn't the "right" one for an "earth garden", I still decided to use it in the image. So the result was a bit of surrealist color combo...

Week four's theme was "Ode to favorite children's book".

From all the children's books I read, none of them spoke to me as personally and profoundly as The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Even though, come to think of it, I didn't even read it in my childhood, but later on in my 20s...

I debated a lot in my head what subject to represent in the image, and I finally decided to go with the most essential idea that the entire boy's adventure is centered around, that of LOVE. The Little prince, on his small planet, sitting on a chair and watching a beautiful sunset together with his loved one.

I leave you with the gift the fox gave the Little Prince, before they parted:

"Here is my secret. It is very simple: It is only with the heart that one can see clearly; what is essential is invisiblee to the eye."

So this week's theme was kind of tricky for me, as somebody not familiar with Australia. So finding the right subject to paint took a bit of head scratching...

After the first few fiasco ideas like kangaroos, Opera house and boomerangs, I remembered a scene from Finding Nemo, when Marlin and Dory arrive in Sydney with the "help" of a whale, and Marlin finally grasps the concept of "letting go", which literally sets him free...

The film uses a stunning night scene of Sydney flooded in the silver light of a gorgeous full moon, while the whale is swimming away playfully.

And that idea clicked.

The background story for this image...

There is a birch tree in front of my window, that used to have many little birds as visitors over the summer. For about 3 months now I put on the windowsill seeds for them and watch their crossed lifts and landings so similar to an airport. Over time, I even come to recognize some of them, by how they look or behave...

All these little birds bring so much color and hapiness into the grey cold days of winter... I wanted to dedicate them this image, as a thank you and appreciation for all they offer to us.

The background story for Whimsy...

For those who know the Friends series, there is a song that Ross was singing as a little boy:

I am Bea,
I drink tea,
Won't you dance around
With me?

For some reason, when reading the week's theme, this little song started playing in my head. What followed was "Bea" metamorphosing into "bee" and then the two ideas (of Bea drinking tea and of Bee) merged into one and created the image you see here...

Hello there, long time no see...

So what's new with you? Me, I have decided to try out some of the prompts in the 52 Week Illustration Challenge. As the title suggests, there is one topic for each week, going on for an entire year.  Below is the list of the 2017 prompts.

After reading around so many incredible stories of success and professional discovery that were middle-manned by Instagram, I said to myself (as an aspiring illustrator): this is the way to go. I went on and created an account, uploading illustrations with well thought hashtags.

About two weeks later I discovered an interesting challenge and felt excited to join in. Said and done. A friend of mine, also an Instagram user, became curious about the entries and used the challenge's hashtag to see the images that were posted. As they were less than eighty at that point, it was very easy to browse through all of them.

He scrolled down to the last post and said to me: "your image is not here, did you upload it?" I answered that yes, about six hours ago. Long story short, he was right: my image simply wasn't appearing on his list, even though we were mutually followers to each other's accounts. Thinking that something went wrong with my upload, I deleted the image and uploaded it again. The same thing happened, my friend just could not see it.

Because the challenge was weekly, it had a different hashtag each week. I decided to pay attention to the following week's entries and make some tests from my personal account. And sure enough, there it was again, the same problem dressed in different cloths: when using the hashtag, the message read "41 posts" but when counting the images, I could see only 35.

Now the question was: did my account had limitations both in my visibility to others, as well as my ability to see other accounts?

In trying to figure out what was happening, I made three more accounts and posted in each of them the same image with the same hashtag. So all three were identical. To my surprise, their functionality (i.e. visibility) was different: depending on which account I was logged in, I could see different posts when using a hashtag search. Which proved that not only the visibility was partial, it was also quite random.

I reported the problem to Instagram (twice) and nothing happened.

Now it makes me think, what is it? Is it a software bug? If yes, why don't they fix it? And if it's not a bug, but a feature (meaning that it all works as it's supposed to) and there really are some levels of visibility that you need to climb up, why is this not made public? And what are the rules for raising your visibility level?

The way I see now working with Instagram is similar to the situation when somebody recommends me this great professional business-man, who makes things happen and launches you to success. Of course I am ignorantly trusting and thinking "oh man, I really can make it with some help from this guy". And then I catch him red-handed and unapologetic in messing up people's businesses.

Now, on one hand I know he truly is an influencer and a potential step to achieving my dream, on the other hand though I know he is also sloppy, unprofessional, and simply doesn't care. I don't know which of these two personalities I will have to deal with. Maybe he will help, maybe he will just waste my time. Do I want to work with him?...

Here are a few work-in-progress images for the 2nd picture in the series of Seasons, namely Summer.