Author: Portfolio Oomph

sketchbook ideas.Great news once more! Our 'Idea and sketchbook development' at Off the Rails Arthouse in Ladybank is running again in November 2014 due to the success of the previous workshops in July and October last year.

Individuality of ideas or even just generating art sketchbook ideas and what to work from can be a real problem when creating artwork. Once you've decided what you are going to work on there also comes that really scary question of 'what I am I going to do with it?'

I've heard it so many times "but I just CAN'T draw". If you want to improve your drawing skills, read on. It's almost like someone has resigned themselves to not being able to draw or believes that you either can draw or you can't. I don't believe that anyone can't draw, learn how to draw, or improve their drawing skills. It is a skill and like any skill, it can be learned. Being creative is perhaps someone a little more complex and I can understand more why some believe they aren't very creative. However, there are still ways that creativity can be encouraged and nurtured rather than just accepting that you're not a creative person.

#SBS winner.Some wonderful news came our way on Monday evening. We were announced as being one of 6 winners of the Small Business Sunday scheme as established by Theo Paphitis in 2010. Each Sunday between 5pm and 7.30pm Theo invites small businesses to tweet to him including the #SBS @TheoPaphitis telling him about your business. He then selects 6 from those entries to re-tweet to his 435,000 followers the following evening; this provides a massive boost to the chosen lucky businesses.

Life drawing or not, that is the question?! You might be wondering what to put in an art portfolio for success. I feel compelled to write this blog post as we've been running a portfolio preparation workshop which included life drawing classes in Haddington for school pupils applying to art college. This is a great opportunity for students as it is a thorough academic session in developing and strengthening looking and recording skills. This is relevant to any art or design project to varying degrees.

We are delighted to be able to offer life drawing in Midlothian in the new year. Having spent a bit of time liaising with the schools we have now finalised our classes which will be taking place at the new Lasswade High School Centre. We've talked about life drawing and how it can be a great addition to any art portfolio for art college but it is not essential. However, if you enjoy it or have never done it before and can get to class then by all means get on down there and get drawing.

[vc_row css_animation="" row_type="row" use_row_as_full_screen_section="no" type="full_width" angled_section="no" text_align="left" background_image_as_pattern="without_pattern"][vc_column][vc_column_text css=""]Life drawing can be a great addition to any art portfolio for art college but it is not essential. If you enjoy it and can get to class then by all means get on down there and get drawing. If not, don't worry, but find some other way to demonstrate your strong drawing skills in your portfolio.

Picture this, you are dead set on going to one particular college/university and you know exactly which course you want to do. It is really competitive and there are only a small number of places each year. 'How do I get into art college?' is something we are asked all the time. What is the best strategy to following your dreams and getting accepted onto this course? Read on to find out about articulation agreements.

Here at Portfolio Oomph we are totally committed to helping you with your portfolio and all our products are shown below. We also show how our products work together to making applying to art college as straightforward and painless as possible! We've spent a lot of time researching what help there is currently out there online for potential art students like yourselves. We've done searches for 'portfolio development tips', 'art college portfolio', 'interview advice for art college', and many, many other scenarios. I think the answer is clear; not much. That is why we have developed Portfolio Oomph.