Recent Changes to my Art Process

💬 the differences ive made to my art approach after being in surival mode for commissions ⚠️ CW:

I remember being really frustrated knowing I was doing this back then, but I couldn't give that much of a fuck at the time because the stakes felt so high for the mindset I was in. I was surviving. I can't fault myself much given what I was working with at the time. It was either get that art done as quick as possible so more slots can be opened, or risk not being able to finish my degree. Alongside this, working incredibly fast without much attention to quality had been the way I approached art for pretty much forever at that point - I thought speed meant I was doing something right - customers love quick art, like people love fast food (something I remember comparing my art to, which makes me sad now!). At that time, I was able to sit at a table for over 12 hours without getting up and just draw non-stop without some sort of joint or muscle in my body imploding on site. It was about just getting it done, the rest I did not think about because well, I got it done and good enough. Nevertheless, I still tried to offset this frustration by experimenting and trying to improve my work while in survival mode.

So, once I graduated and the stakes were no longer high, and well, the dissatisfaction for my degree and everything I'd put time into kicked in, I deflated. So many factors at once hit me and I went into the slumps. Part of this was the status of my health, as I worsened my cubital and carpal tunnel syndrome, and developed SI joint dysfunction from my poor drawing habits. I had no choice but to lay down and stop drawing. I was too depressed to draw anyways knowing that the jobs I'd wanted with my degree were out of my grasp until I do another long ass grind due to me not taking the steps during college to make it more attainable - I'd spent all that time trying to focus on doing what pays for tuition.

Anyways, things have gotten significantly better. Life just hit my ass real quick over the last few months. I'm still recovering, technically. I graduated and it really felt like the world went to absolute shit, funny enough in the same tragically funny way it felt when I started college during the pandemic. But the difference now is that well, I'm done with college, atleast the Bachelor's part. And I've had time to sit, think, and finally work on everything about my art I was incredibly unhappy about without grinding haphazardly.

My art is back in what I'd call a puberty stage. I go through these a lot, and its from when I'm trying to incorporate what I'm studying into my general style - its been feeling very awkward and janky, but this I know comes and goes. I'm experimenting a ton again, which means the crops are flourishing. I'm gonna end up with more pieces I'm upset with than happy with in this stage, but that is good as the pieces I like, I keep those in mind and try to build from them.

A lot of things I've changed about my process are things that I think were common sense to others, but I never really used my brain to realize, wow, I could do this. It is so many things I only recently introduced or re-introduced into my art processes that were absent for like, five years now.

1. Studying other artists works One of the most prominent changes I've made is taking time to study my favorite artists art to try to think abt the decisions they'd made in a piece & their approach for things in art I personally struggle with. I now understand its always been ok to look at other peoples art, as well they likely found solutions to problems I'm having in my own. I lurk in livestreams and watch speedpaints again! This is something I remember noticing I didn't do and was like, "Oh god, no wonder why I'm crashing out I have no fresh inspo'". My initial feelings of being an art viewer was that if I viewed others art, I had to have some sort of consent from every artist's work I viewed to make sure they were ok if I saw their art and felt inspired by it, given I draw dark art they may be uncomfortable with. I wish I was bullshitting when I say this, but this really was my mindset I had until recently (post-graduation). It is part of the rule-follower bullshit I'm overcoming (and I realize stems from a situation that happened when I was 14 on DeviantArt), and thank God I am because now I feel more inspired and less critical of myself. And sometimes, I fight the anxiety that they'll want me to get blown up and I leave a comment on an art piece I like and not delete it immediately xD

2. Zooming in while drawing This is probably the most basic thing that I'd never do until like, this month? I have done so many art pieces and not zoomed in and worked with small brushes to clean up lineart or add details. I don't know how the fuck I've gone so long not doing this, but it is a gamechanger for me now as I've always had beef with noticing my lineart issues but I'd be too intimidated to fix it. I just never...zoomed in and erased the bits I didn't like. This dumfounds me, I just think its funny now knowing a lot of things I wasn't happy with in my art I could have resolved if I realized I could zoom in on pieces.

3. Cleaning up coloring manually Another thing that is absurd to write, but until recently, I only used the paint-bucket to fill in colors and then never filled in little gaps that'd be left behind. Alongside this, If I did color without the paint bucket, I never just took a second to clean up the coloring, which results in a lot of pieces with coloring out of the bold lines I try to go for. Its an easy fix now that I keep this in mind now.

4. Going crazy with brushes and textures! I'm still working on doing this more (and well, its very dependent on piece and what I'm going for), but like as a collective we struggle with getting really locked in on using a certain brush and never deviating from it. Well, now we try to spice it up! Either by mixing brush usage or using the brush in more ways than what may be intended. We finally got into textured brushes and have a lot of shit to throw onto pieces to spice them up. It makes things very fun. The biggest challenge lately is finding balance in excessive textures though lol.

5. Doing multiple sketches This sounds so funny to write down, but I used to not do multiple passes of sketches. I'd sketch something incomprehensible, and just line from there. Like, I stopped doing thumbnails and refining sketches and would just go straight into that bitch and finish it. I look at my older art before I was overloaded and while part of this was the fact my style was more solid and simple which allowed me to feel more confident about my initial sketch, there's a lot of things I feel could have benefited had I gone back in during the sketch phase and gave it a bit more time.

6. Finishing pieces over the course of days Taking more than a day on an art piece used to be like a devilish idea to me. Me, taking longer than 3 hours on a drawing? Blasphemy. Well, I've worked on changing that. Rested eyes really do help you catch what you don't during the first look. I have less anxiety while drawing now since I let some pieces go unfinished and don't have grand plans for them. When I find myself bored and not sure of what to draw, I open up the folder full of sketches to render and pull one out and work on it. Doing this helps for when I have days where I have a TON of ideas but not enough focus to finish them - I make a shit ton of sketches and leave a lot of them be for the time I get energy again and I pull out old sketches that I could work on.

7. No shame for references and tracing anymore References and tracing real life images, whether open-source ones or ones I take myself are livesavers. I went a really long time convinced using them is like, problematic and I'd only be a "real" artist if I knew how to draw any and everything without assists. Well, now I don't give a fuck. I have a ton of references pulled up, and I'll trace interiors if I need to. With time, I'll be able to do it myself. I use tracing as something during studying to help me wrap my head around 3D spaces and objects. I really love meme redraws since many of them are opportunity for me to draw my characters into an established environment and like...rotate them in it. It helps me think about how it works.

Yeah, 7 things I've changed about my art process since graduating and I'm starting to get to a place where things feel smoother and not as overall bleh. There's a lot I'm still figuring out and it feels good! I'm thankful to have the time to do this, even if the situation giving me the time to is far from ideal, it is still good and I'm just happy to have it and I'm making use of it to stumble and fall and figure myself out lol.

I'm trying to unlearn that if I am not productive enough like others and providing fast enough, then I don't deserve shit. I'm trying to allow myself to see these few steps that prolong art processes as productive and not wasting time. I want to try to articulate why these small steps are such game changers for one of my core beliefs, but I won't during this entry. I just wanted to gush about how arts been with me. It feels good. Things I've done for years is dissolving from the idea I must do it out of neccesity. I feel more free again :3