For many people, artists and illustrators included, getting a new sketch book or journal is an exciting moment. A whole new book of lovely, crisp white (or off white) pages just waiting for your first marks. If you are anything like me, you may stroke the cover and sniff the paper. Oh, is that just me then?

Then you get ready to start.

You heart is beating a little faster. Maybe you feel a bit joyful. Yes, joyful! You get comfy, pull out the pens, pencils or paints and - that first page stares at you like an terrifying, anaemic cyclops.

You know what you want to create. You have drawn/painted hundreds (OK, lots) of pieces in the past. Yet, you are paralysed by one sheet of paper.

I have been there many times over the last few decades of artwork. I own about a dozen sketchbooks and journals and the same thing happens every time I start a new one. It's paper, for goodness sake! How hard should it be to put a mark on it?

However, I found a way round about the problem.

For journals something as simple as writing a title on the first page helps me make those first marks. I like to open a journal and see something nice on the first page. A title gives a nice aesthetic to it and sets up the purpose of the book.

Although you don't really need to have a title to describe the contents of a sketchbook, there is no reason why you shouldn't use the first page for that. By adding a title and date you know what your artistic tastes were at that specific point in time. If you don't need or want to track your artistic habits, something as simple as making random marks on the first page is great. By giving yourself permission to just make a random, pointless mark it makes it easier to start. Doodles are great - a random leaf, flower or pawprint and you've made your first mark in the book.

As a bonus tip

I often have the same problem when starting a new piece of art. The white page can be rather intimidating to fill, especially if it costs as much as some of the fancy watercolour papers out there. So I take out some scrap paper and draw a random piece or do some practice strokes just to warm up and get my brain into the right groove. I have pages of badger heads, squirrels or fox anatomy that won't ever see the light of day but that have helped me get to the starting point for a new painting.

At the end of the day, it is only paper and pencil, ink or paint. Just let go, believe in the magic of art and have fun.