Wellness Collection: Creativity

"Without The Artist's Way, there would have been no Eat, Pray, Love." --Elizabeth Gilbert The Artist's Way is the seminal book on the subject of creativity. An international bestseller, millions of readers have found it to be an invaluable guide to living the artist's life. Still as vital today--or perhaps even more so--than it was when it was first published one decade ago, it is a powerfully provocative and inspiring work. In a new introduction to the book, Julia Cameron reflects upon the impact of The Artist's Way and describes the work she has done during the last decade and the new insights into the creative process that she has gained. Updated and expanded, this anniversary edition reframes The Artist's Way for a new century.

Inspirational ideas for advertising, animation, and digital design from a leading creative director. Mario Pricken's previous book, Creative Advertising, sparked the imaginations of countless advertising, marketing, media, and design professionals. Now Visual Creativity goes one step further. This practical guide is filled with tips and techniques specifically designed to create whole new worlds of visual ideas. Creatives from the fields of advertising, film, photography, computer animation, and game development will find a wealth of exercises and methods to help them hone their creative capabilities, produce inspirational campaigns, and move in new directions. Interviews with leading names in the industry such as Ben Snow, Daniel Kleinman, and Volker Engel give an insider's perspective on the sources and strategies of visual creativity, while their methods are vividly illustrated with hundreds of full-color images.

Comprehensive, popular guide by renowned artist and teacher presents a full course of watercolor painting, from basics to creating landscapes; painting portraits and figures; drawing; following design principles; and matting, framing, and selling completed works. Two full-color sections show how to create 7 of the author's watercolors. 37 color illustrations, over 100 black-and-white illustrations.

Fresh new ways to create fabulous paintings with mixed media techniques! Acrylic Solutions provides the "hows" behind a multitude of effects you've admired in other artists' works--and then some! Based on the popular online teaching collaboration of Chris Cozen and Julie Prichard, this book illustrates a wealth of layering methods and techniques. Mix and match to achieve countless variations, building layer upon layer to create unique and wonderfully complex abstract art.    * Learn more than 30 step-by-step techniques for developing texture and visual interest, including collage, monoprinting, carving, color blocking, paint skins, raised stencils, glazing and so much more.    * Chapters explore the phases of a multi-layered painting, from surface preparation through adding structure, developing complexity and adding finishing touches.    * Follow the development of two paintings as each layer adds to the finished result, with tons of additional artwork throughout.    * Gain insight on how to make paints, mediums and grounds work for you. Embracing a spirit of freedom and spontaneity, Acrylic Solutions is a stimulating guide for contemporary artists of any skill level. Beginners will learn how to make visually compelling paintings from start to finish, while more experienced artists will find the tools and inspiration to take their work to the next level.

Both a popular hobby and a recognized art form, collage encompasses a wide range of creative styles and techniques--explored  here by the creator of the popular A Collage a Day blog. Offering step-by-step instruction, visual inspiration, and even a library of copyright-free images, this hands-on guide covers all the necessary materials, tools, and know-how, from adding color and transferring images, to décollage (tearing away layers). And to spark the reader's imagination, there are 52 creativity prompts, such as a collage using the letters of a single word.

Angwin believes the secret of good creative writing is a combination of creative imagination, the form or vehicle it takes and 'factor x'. This book addresses not only style and structure, but also the core, the imagination and the creation of conditions in which factor x may occur.

When a tree is felled, the wood is green and is easy to cut, split, shave and shape. As it dries, the wood shrinks and hardensQand it becomes vastly more difficult to work. In the old days, wood-workers relied on the ease with which green wood could be worked to make the parts they needed, and on the way wood shrinks to hold these parts together. These old ways have almost been lost, but are revived here for the modern woodworker. Make a Chair From a Tree is a lively and informative introduction to the old ways of splitting and shaping wood straight from the tree to make a light and beautiful, yet rugged, chair. Author John Alexander presents a complete guide to making this elegantly simple chair. He tells you how to fell a tree, split suitable pieces from it and shape those pieces into the parts of the chair, how to finish it, and how to weave a bark seat. Each step is carefully described and thoroughly illustrated with drawings and photographs.

The ultimate guide for all guitar enthusiasts from beginners to seasoned musicians wanting to build up right-hand ability to play a wide range of musical styles from bluegrass, country, latin and bossa nova to rock, folk, jazz and blues. Building on alternating bass techniques, thumb patterns and special fretting techniques, the book contains a series of graded exercises that will build confidence and speed. While fingerstyle guitar is primarily thought of as a technique for acoustic guitar, it sounds just as cool on electric guitar. With this in mind, all chapters contain material that sounds equally good on either type of guitar. Fingerpicking Techniques for Guitar also offers a tour of musical genres, showing how even guitar players at beginner level can use these techniques to unlock the secrets of some of the most iconic sounds in the guitar repertoire.

A practical book for the absolute beginner. Learn how to compose your pictures for more visual effect, understand the camera controls that will allow you more creative freedom, tackle different subjects and difficult lighting conditions, photograph in a studio and process and print your own pictures in the darkroom. Each chapter is fully illustrated with colour examples and suggestions for practical exercises allow you to practice and explore different effects. Features include: * how to select and compose a good shot * how different cameras operate: whether film, digital or APS * how to use camera controls; shutter speed, focus, zoom setting, use of flash etc. for creative effect * advice on tackling different subjects * visually identifying and overcoming common faults * exploring simple special effects and unusual images * setting up an indoor studio * processing and printing your own black and white prints in the darkroom * ways of mounting and presenting your work 'Starting Photography' is an authoritative start-up guide written by a leading photography writer with an international reputation. This edition is eminently suited to practical photography courses and has been updated to cover the latest City and Guilds 9231 syllabus. It also includes projects designed to encourage experimentation.