I have a serious problem with perfectionism getting in the way of me getting any better at art.
Funny, I was just reading an interview with Will Wright today about how he puts together his teams, and it seems relevant:
When I’m managing creative people, the way they relate to failure is very important. Because there are certain types of failure that you really want to celebrate. I personally learned a lot more from my failures than from my successes. And if you look at it that way, then all my failures, you know, in some sense brought me to my larger successes, because I recognized why I failed, and I learned from it. And so, at that point, you can even argue that it’s not a failure. It’s part of your learning process.
And so, even with interns, it’s kind of interesting to see how they relate to failure. Does it motivate them, do they go a different direction, do they give up or do they learn from it and get some insight and add it as part of their tool chest? In some sense it is an award that they’ve earned.
...
Q. What’s your two-minute commencement speech?
A. I would first of all talk about the value of failure, because I think everybody’s leaving school kind of with a mind-set that, “Oh, I’m going out and I have to succeed. You have to succeed.†And if they hit a failure it has the potential to, you know, de-motivate them, and push them in a bad direction. But, if they can embrace and celebrate their failure, it kind of gives them a totally different outlook on what they are doing.
Failures are inevitable. But the only failure that matters is the one that you allow yourself to be defeated by.
The people that are considered successes are also, inevitably, the people with the largest number of failures under their belt- this means they have had the greatest number of lessons from which they've learned. The only way to equal their successes, is to have to stomach to also equal their failures. The only way to do so is to work, and keep working- to focus on the learning to be had more than the results. If you do a absolute shit drawing but you learn something, that is a success.
It's hard to lose sight of that when you're all angry and pissed off at a drawing, but it is the truth.
I doubt any of this is coming as much insight, as most motivational phrases generally boil down to the same shit, ie: "JUST FUCKING DO IT.". And don't accept the idea of "oh I can't get into my school's classes" and let it slow you down and become another example of a failure either- whether that means taking a class at another school, or finding a tutor, or starting a sketchgroup or having your mom thwack you with a ruler if you don't pull out 2 pages a night, or any number of other things you can do- take an action to take you past that one setback. And if that action doesn't work, try another. Again, you only lose by giving up and doing nothing.*
*I wish I could say these things without feeling fairly hypocritical, considering I've let myself get frustrated and knocked back by failures over and over again- but I am trying at least to keep in mind the ideas of people that are much smarter than myself so I don't continue to repeat those mistakes.
Also go read The Book of Five Rings if you need some motivation. Or, if you need some semi-vague philosophical advice regarding how to kill samurai with some swords.
Well, I guess that's one reason i'm glad to be a obsessive freak that enjoys looking over things for the sake of discovering and annihilating what made me do that which made it not work and fail. I cant wait to see what my stuff looks like once i finish studying cloth and gravity on the figure.
I got an email from the job I was applying for! They loved my portfolio and asked me when was I planning on moving to Japan! Followed by "Please let me know as soon as possible"
AHHHH!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! God, I hope I get that job!!!!
I got an email from the job I was applying for! They loved my portfolio and asked me when was I planning on moving to Japan! Followed by "Please let me know as soon as possible"
AHHHH!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! God, I hope I get that job!!!!
Congrats and good luck duder!
Secretly though I'm still betting this turns out like an O. Henry story; where- having failed to move to Japan through legitimate means- at Christmas you end up hiding in a steel drum kit and mailing yourself as a surprise Christmas present to your girlfriend in order to illegally immigrate there, while at the same time she jumps into a 6 foot tall secondhand plastic Gundam store display statue and mails herself to your doorstep with the same idea.
... i just got asked to do character concepts and background designs for a company that's pitching a tv show in 3 weeks... fuck.
Sweet! With all that character concept and background design experience, you're sure to be able to compress months of work into a mere three weeks and successfully ensure a winning pitch!!*
*Dramatization! May not have happened!
i've asked about half my class if they want to help me with this. lol.
bad idea.
you should be doing it yourself if you're the one getting paid for it unless you're willing to split the cost with your class.
I got an email from the job I was applying for! They loved my portfolio and asked me when was I planning on moving to Japan! Followed by "Please let me know as soon as possible"
AHHHH!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! God, I hope I get that job!!!!
... i just got asked to do character concepts and background designs for a company that's pitching a tv show in 3 weeks... fuck.
Sweet! With all that character concept and background design experience, you're sure to be able to compress months of work into a mere three weeks and successfully ensure a winning pitch!!*
*Dramatization! May not have happened!
i've asked about half my class if they want to help me with this. lol.
bad idea.
you should be doing it yourself if you're the one getting paid for it unless you're willing to split the cost with your class.
so far there is only one girl helping me. which is cool because she's cool and really determined to get out and do some work.
there is no money to speak of. only the chance to do work experience and have our names attached to this TV show if it get's up off the ground.
... i just got asked to do character concepts and background designs for a company that's pitching a tv show in 3 weeks... fuck.
Sweet! With all that character concept and background design experience, you're sure to be able to compress months of work into a mere three weeks and successfully ensure a winning pitch!!*
*Dramatization! May not have happened!
i've asked about half my class if they want to help me with this. lol.
bad idea.
you should be doing it yourself if you're the one getting paid for it unless you're willing to split the cost with your class.
so far there is only one girl helping me. which is cool because she's cool and really determined to get out and do some work.
there is no money to speak of. only the chance to do work experience and have our names attached to this TV show if it get's up off the ground.
No Monetary compensation in any form? My dear freind you are being ass fucked with the "exposure" lie. But Im not going to tell you not to do it. There is a small, very small chance it will lead to actual paid work for you. More likely your name will be passed along as some one willing to work for very cheap or free "exposure". If they mentioned this might lead to paid work down the road. It wont.
... i just got asked to do character concepts and background designs for a company that's pitching a tv show in 3 weeks... fuck.
Sweet! With all that character concept and background design experience, you're sure to be able to compress months of work into a mere three weeks and successfully ensure a winning pitch!!*
*Dramatization! May not have happened!
i've asked about half my class if they want to help me with this. lol.
bad idea.
you should be doing it yourself if you're the one getting paid for it unless you're willing to split the cost with your class.
so far there is only one girl helping me. which is cool because she's cool and really determined to get out and do some work.
there is no money to speak of. only the chance to do work experience and have our names attached to this TV show if it get's up off the ground.
No Monetary compensation in any form? My dear freind you are being ass fucked with the "exposure" lie. But Im not going to tell you not to do it. There is a small, very small chance it will lead to actual paid work for you. More likely your name will be passed along as some one willing to work for very cheap or free "exposure". If they mentioned this might lead to paid work down the road. It wont.
hahahhahaha. they bought lunch for me...
it won't be the first piece of free stuff i've done... fuck.
i doubt my names gonna be passed on by this chick. just work to do i guess. somethign to put in a portfolio?
i'm still at uni. and i'm pretty sure i have to get work experience hours anyway.
Also go read The Book of Five Rings if you need some motivation. Or, if you need some semi-vague philosophical advice regarding how to kill samurai with some swords.
This is Miyamoto Musashi's book, right? The one he wrote after giving up samurai sword fightin' and became all monkish?
Also go read The Book of Five Rings if you need some motivation. Or, if you need some semi-vague philosophical advice regarding how to kill samurai with some swords.
This is Miyamoto Musashi's book, right? The one he wrote after giving up samurai sword fightin' and became all monkish?
I have a serious problem with perfectionism getting in the way of me getting any better at art.
(Thomas Edison)
Thanks for the thought Bacon. I've never actually thought about that "failure is just a lesson" thing seriously. I don't know, when I can't draw something I don't feel like I learn much other than "I can't draw that yet." or "I need to take my time with this." I think I don't really feel like I have conscious strategies for art; a lot of things, unless they're pretty clear "steps," I just don't think about, and so when I can't draw a three-dimensional form well, I don't learn much from it, probably because I'm not even approaching it the right way anyways. Again, I basically need to get my ass into a basic drawing class, because my biggest problem is getting over my obsession with precise linework and understanding three-dimensions.
A lot of the time, I honestly don't feel like I've learned anything about art on purpose. I just start doodling, and then my hands do something that works, so I try to repeat that later. There are times I've realized I could draw something I couldn't before months after having drawn at all. I'd say, though, that I probably don't learn from failure consciously at all, so perhaps I should try to think about it more.
Besides all that, the perfectionism still bothers me. I guess perhaps with time I'll become skilled enough so that things things don't take so many hours to do. As it is now, I spend so much time on lines, erasing, and redrawing everything crisply, because I can't lay it down right the first five times usually. I want to get back to my awesome PC back in NYC so I can just start drawing with the tablet and be forced to just use color and think about form. Though it's doubtful I'll be motivated to do this stuff once the school year starts, as is usually the case.
srsizzy on
BRO LET ME GET REAL WITH YOU AND SAY THAT MY FINGERS ARE PREPPED AND HOT LIKE THE SURFACE OF THE SUN TO BRING RADICAL BEATS SO SMOOTH THE SHIT WILL BE MEDICINAL-GRADE TRIPNASTY MAKING ALL BRAINWAVES ROLL ON THE SURFACE OF A BALLS-FEISTY NEURAL RAINBOW CRACKA-LACKIN' YOUR PERCEPTION OF THE HERE-NOW SPACE-TIME SITUATION THAT ALL OF LIFE BE JAMMED UP IN THROUGH THE UNIVERSAL FLOW BEATS
Well, what is your action upon seeing, "oh, I can't draw this yet"? Is it to throw your art up for critique and say, "hey guys, I don't know what's going wrong here, can anyone help me out"? Is it to go back to books and tutorials to solidify your technical knowledge, so it will be at the ready when you go to draw again (If you don't know what books, ASK! If you can't afford them, go to a library or eBay or get a job!)? Do you look at artists that do what you are trying to do well, and try to figure out how they did it by doing a master study? Do you set your piece to the side and try to figure out what is going wrong with it on a separate sheet of paper, coming up with different alternative solutions to the problem? Or do you just throw the drawing in the bin and bitch about it on the internet?
If you're not working in a way that's purposefully engaged with the subject, just doodling now and again and not really making a conscious effort to apply new information or working specifically to apply and improve certain aspects of your work in your drawings, of course you're not going to make much progress. There's a reason when one looks at half-finished master drawings in art history books, the caption title calls them "studies" and not "doodles".
Again, "oh bloo bloo bloo I need a drawing class then everything will be fine" is a poor fucking excuse. Yes, a drawing class will help, but it's no excuse for not standing up and getting the information to address your problems now, through critique, tutorials, or books. There is no reason to wait for any "perfect X condition" (a condition that, most likely, does not and never will exist) to start learning, so do it now if you actually want to improve. A class can only ever be a piece in a huge, complicated puzzle- it is not a silver bullet. Acting like it is only a poor excuse for not taking action now.
And "oh I need my computer to..." NO! Get a pencil and a piece of paper and draw! NOW! Do it now! Stop making excuses for yourself! Everyone has personal gripes and bitching and shit about this stuff- bad people stay on bitching, good people do something about it instead. If you sit there and wait for a solution to come to you, I will have absolutely no sympathy for you when you inevitably fail because of it.
So... my work gave me a Cintiq. And now I can't bring myself to go back to my Wacom when I need something portable (Cintiq has a bazillion support cables). It's like trying to draw on a tablet for the first time all over again.
So... my work gave me a Cintiq. And now I can't bring myself to go back to my Wacom when I need something portable (Cintiq has a bazillion support cables). It's like trying to draw on a tablet for the first time all over again.
So... my work gave me a Cintiq. And now I can't bring myself to go back to my Wacom when I need something portable (Cintiq has a bazillion support cables). It's like trying to draw on a tablet for the first time all over again.
I'm really jealous, gibs. I'm dying to get My hands on one of those things. DYING. I manage alright with my intous though. I Dont really have the desk real estate for a Cintiq, though.
Posts
Funny, I was just reading an interview with Will Wright today about how he puts together his teams, and it seems relevant:
Failures are inevitable. But the only failure that matters is the one that you allow yourself to be defeated by.
The people that are considered successes are also, inevitably, the people with the largest number of failures under their belt- this means they have had the greatest number of lessons from which they've learned. The only way to equal their successes, is to have to stomach to also equal their failures. The only way to do so is to work, and keep working- to focus on the learning to be had more than the results. If you do a absolute shit drawing but you learn something, that is a success.
It's hard to lose sight of that when you're all angry and pissed off at a drawing, but it is the truth.
I doubt any of this is coming as much insight, as most motivational phrases generally boil down to the same shit, ie: "JUST FUCKING DO IT.". And don't accept the idea of "oh I can't get into my school's classes" and let it slow you down and become another example of a failure either- whether that means taking a class at another school, or finding a tutor, or starting a sketchgroup or having your mom thwack you with a ruler if you don't pull out 2 pages a night, or any number of other things you can do- take an action to take you past that one setback. And if that action doesn't work, try another. Again, you only lose by giving up and doing nothing.*
*I wish I could say these things without feeling fairly hypocritical, considering I've let myself get frustrated and knocked back by failures over and over again- but I am trying at least to keep in mind the ideas of people that are much smarter than myself so I don't continue to repeat those mistakes.
Also go read The Book of Five Rings if you need some motivation. Or, if you need some semi-vague philosophical advice regarding how to kill samurai with some swords.
Twitter
I got an email from the job I was applying for! They loved my portfolio and asked me when was I planning on moving to Japan! Followed by "Please let me know as soon as possible"
AHHHH!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEES!!!! God, I hope I get that job!!!!
Congrats and good luck duder!
Twitter
I have, and let me just say it's a good thing you'll be earning Dentist money.
bad idea.
you should be doing it yourself if you're the one getting paid for it unless you're willing to split the cost with your class.
Not having to sleep would be so rocking, sleeping is the biggest time pirate.
Please still be our Internet friend!
there is no money to speak of. only the chance to do work experience and have our names attached to this TV show if it get's up off the ground.
No Monetary compensation in any form? My dear freind you are being ass fucked with the "exposure" lie. But Im not going to tell you not to do it. There is a small, very small chance it will lead to actual paid work for you. More likely your name will be passed along as some one willing to work for very cheap or free "exposure". If they mentioned this might lead to paid work down the road. It wont.
it won't be the first piece of free stuff i've done... fuck.
i doubt my names gonna be passed on by this chick. just work to do i guess. somethign to put in a portfolio?
i'm still at uni. and i'm pretty sure i have to get work experience hours anyway.
I haven't been able to stop playing for the last four days.
The day you (not specifically you, just... anyone) stops doing work for free and realised what they're worth = a huge step forward.
This is Miyamoto Musashi's book, right? The one he wrote after giving up samurai sword fightin' and became all monkish?
Indeed it is.
My Portfolio Site
A lot of the time, I honestly don't feel like I've learned anything about art on purpose. I just start doodling, and then my hands do something that works, so I try to repeat that later. There are times I've realized I could draw something I couldn't before months after having drawn at all. I'd say, though, that I probably don't learn from failure consciously at all, so perhaps I should try to think about it more.
Besides all that, the perfectionism still bothers me. I guess perhaps with time I'll become skilled enough so that things things don't take so many hours to do. As it is now, I spend so much time on lines, erasing, and redrawing everything crisply, because I can't lay it down right the first five times usually. I want to get back to my awesome PC back in NYC so I can just start drawing with the tablet and be forced to just use color and think about form. Though it's doubtful I'll be motivated to do this stuff once the school year starts, as is usually the case.
I wish I could go without eating or sleeping and not affect me physically or mentally. Such a waste of time and money.
Well, what is your action upon seeing, "oh, I can't draw this yet"? Is it to throw your art up for critique and say, "hey guys, I don't know what's going wrong here, can anyone help me out"? Is it to go back to books and tutorials to solidify your technical knowledge, so it will be at the ready when you go to draw again (If you don't know what books, ASK! If you can't afford them, go to a library or eBay or get a job!)? Do you look at artists that do what you are trying to do well, and try to figure out how they did it by doing a master study? Do you set your piece to the side and try to figure out what is going wrong with it on a separate sheet of paper, coming up with different alternative solutions to the problem? Or do you just throw the drawing in the bin and bitch about it on the internet?
If you're not working in a way that's purposefully engaged with the subject, just doodling now and again and not really making a conscious effort to apply new information or working specifically to apply and improve certain aspects of your work in your drawings, of course you're not going to make much progress. There's a reason when one looks at half-finished master drawings in art history books, the caption title calls them "studies" and not "doodles".
Again, "oh bloo bloo bloo I need a drawing class then everything will be fine" is a poor fucking excuse. Yes, a drawing class will help, but it's no excuse for not standing up and getting the information to address your problems now, through critique, tutorials, or books. There is no reason to wait for any "perfect X condition" (a condition that, most likely, does not and never will exist) to start learning, so do it now if you actually want to improve. A class can only ever be a piece in a huge, complicated puzzle- it is not a silver bullet. Acting like it is only a poor excuse for not taking action now.
And "oh I need my computer to..." NO! Get a pencil and a piece of paper and draw! NOW! Do it now! Stop making excuses for yourself! Everyone has personal gripes and bitching and shit about this stuff- bad people stay on bitching, good people do something about it instead. If you sit there and wait for a solution to come to you, I will have absolutely no sympathy for you when you inevitably fail because of it.
TL;DR: DRAW NOW. LEARN NOW.
No.
Twitter
/endddddddddd sarcasmmmm
just saying
PS. Cintiq's rock. Its like magic paper.
Where do you work?
i m gel us
i thought cintiq was a type of wacom
whooooooooops