***** Weekly Links are the bi-weekly (don’t look at the dates) article series where I post interesting links I’ve found over the past 2 weeks. Mostly I post art references (mamacitas), art videos that helped me, philosophy stuff occasionally, and lastly some music that I found and love! I also do a little blog post about myself if you’re a weirdo and wanna read about my struggle to become the anime tiddiez master. *****
Here’s another one of those updates that feels like lifetimes have passed since the last one. This year has been a roller coaster for me. I’ve learned and changed/updated my beliefs in the past 7 months more times that ever in my entire life. I feel like I’ve learned so much about how reality works, humans work, and most importantly who I am and what are my limits.
For example, this past month and half I’ve been practicing only drawing what I want to draw and pretty much doing no studying whatsoever. Because of this my art productivity has doubled or maybe even tripled. I realized I just really don’t want to study things I hate in art and only want to study things that capture my attention. It sounds simple and stupid but this simple change has been a big fucking game changer for me in my art journey.
So often, art teachers and professionals hammer it in our head that we have to study, study, study. This is sound advice. The problem with this advice is that in the beginning of your art journey, you’re not the kind of person that CAN just study study study (that was me). There are some people in the world that can force themselves to do things they do not like. If you’re one of those people, then hey, you’re gonna kill it in art. As for me, I’ve been playing video games my whole life so I’m like borderline ADD and I can only do things that engage me, otherwise I lose interest (or wanna smash my head into a big red brick wall).
The real issue with “just study art” is that this is what pro artists/teachers realize is the best way to learn and that’s what they do now to improve. That’s not what they did in the beginning. Most pro artists were drawing/doodling a ton as kids and so developed a hunger to learn art. If you’re just starting to learn art and haven’t drawn for many years, you simply don’t have this same drive that someone who’s been doodling for years has. They’ve spent years developing an interest/hunger for art that you just do not have. This is why artists who have been drawing for years can study “boring” topics for hours on end. They’ve drawn so much that even boring-ass studying is fun for them! They love art, they live and breath it. It’s pleasure for them just to draw anything.
So what’s the solution for those of us who have not drawn for years? You have to get your mileage first. Just like these pro artists got their mileage as kids just doodling or copying a ton, you have to do something similar. In my case I’ve pretty much exclusively only been drawing what I want to draw and nothing else. This means no studying topics you don’t want to study! Pay attention to your interest levels! You know when you’re doing something you don’t want to do! You start tapping your foot, your thoughts are elsewhere, you can’t focus on the task, you start falling asleep, etc. You know the signs when you have no interest in a topic.
Pay attention to your body. It’s trying to tell you: “Hey man, this is pretty fucking boring and not fun. I can’t focus on this bullshit at all so I’m just going to think about things I actually care about or just fall asleep on you okay?”
This is one of the game changing life secrets I’ve learned in the past month:
Pay attention to what you are interested in. Notice the specific things that grip you.
Successful people always say: “If you need motivation to get something done you are not going to make it.” And that is the god damn truth.
The solution to the motivation problem is do the things that interest you. If you do the things that you truly want to do, you don’t need motivation. It doesn’t feel like work to you, it feels like play. So if you wanna draw anime tiddiez, then go draw anime tiddiez. Don’t go study ears or some shit just cause some fuckin guy on youtube says you need to. Study the things you actually want to study. And if you don’t wanna study anything that’s fine! Just go draw whatever it is you really want to draw. Eventually after drawing what you want for months/years, you will become obsessed with art more and more. At that point you will be able to study “boring” topics because now you have your mileage in art and even the boring things are fun for you.
The automatic response to this methodology is: but I like getting my dick sucked all day, like playing video games all day, like getting drunk all day, etc. How is doing what I like to do, going to help me get ahead?
Look here buddy, the context is: I mean do the things that interest you in the subject you are studying. If nothing catches your interest in a subject you are trying to study well that prolly means you don’t like that subject and are not meant to pursue it. If you’re trying to learn welding and all forms of welding you absolutely hate, well hate to break it to ya buddy, you probably shouldn’t be a welder. In the context of art, if you love drawing tits but hate drawing feet for example, then just draw a ton of tits. Stick to your interests, go for the low hanging fruit, take the path of least resistance, you get the picture.
How to learn art: draw the stuff you like drawing for many months/years. Once you turn into an obsessed art maniac you will want to study to get better and the studying will actually be fun for you because you’re a bad motherfucker at art now.
So that’s it folks, that’s what I learned this past month and half. If you’d like to hear these ideas from their original source, go read Mastery and listen to Sycra’s podcast.
Kay, that’s it. Los links time.
Art References
none this month, been getting all my refs from asian girl boards on pinterest
How to fix Cintiq 13HD blue screen of death (Clip Studio Paint)
Just plug the cintiq usb cable into a usb 2.0 slot (the black slots). For some reason wacom products don’t like usb 3.0 slots (the blue slots).
I’ve been suffering with random BSODs (usually after waking my comp from sleep) for months with my Cintiq 13HD and finally tried this. Welp, lets just say I haven’t had a blue screen in 2 months now. It’s pretty fuckin dumb that a horrible problem I had for months was solved with something as simple as changing usb port types, but hey that’s how life is sometimes. Complex problems with simple, dumb solutions. x_x
Artists
Dandon Fuga – Really good pin up artist. He does skin very well and his faces look super good!
lack – Illustrator that does a ton of art for the Fate anime franchise. His colors are so damn beautiful and bright!
Koyorin – Character artist. Draws very appealing faces too!
Neo Art Core – Another great pinup artist. The way he paints light reminds me of Liang Xing, very similar style.
Unsomnus – Pin up artist that draws lots of cute girls. More pleasing faces. ^_^
Nikita Varb – Really damn good Russian pinup artist! His style is like 1/2 realistic, 1/2 anime style. Really pretty stuff.
のらくら – No idea how to pronounce this guy’s name but who cares. He does amazing linework of pretty anime girls! This guy is line art goals, check out his work. x_X
Zdzisław Beksiński – Incredible Polish artist who made lots of breathtaking paintings in the 60’s and 70’s. And by breathtaking I mean mostly fucked up, lovecraftian nightmare fuel. His paintings are very beautiful in a dark way, and some of them straight up make you wanna vomit. Buttttttttt, he has some pictures that are just absolutely fucking gorgeous in a alien world/dream-like way. This guy was something else, check him out.
Shuichi Wada – Professional Illustrator that does a lot of work for mobile games it seems. His art is super dang beautiful! Bright fantasy paintings with gorgeous women, gasp.
Music
Afro Cuban All-Stars Concert – These doods are an amazing Cuban band. This music just makes you wanna dance! It’s totally infectious! There’s some kinda soul or energy in latino music that I haven’t found in any other culture’s music (probably confirmation bias). Probably all those hundreds of years of blood sacrifice, we got those ancient blood gods in our genes and music now. Definitely not study music. 😀
Chris Spheeris – Magaya – This guy makes some bad ass middle eastern/spanish sounding music. Age of Mythology was probably the first game that turned me onto this kinda of music, good stuff to draw to.
Cafe Music BGM channel – Youtube channel that exclusively does beautiful instrumental jazz. They have hours and hours of great jazz and even several live streams going 24/7. Great music for studying or drawing. ^_^
Round Table – Groovin Magic – In-fucking-credible song by Round Table. They’re a Japanese band that makes lots of music for animes, movies, etc. This is the kinda music I absolutely love, this music makes my soul sing. There’s another elevator song of theirs that I listen to on repeat all the time too lol, check it out!
Aqua Corridors – Kaivaan – Amazing song by Kaivaan! I found him from songs he’s done with anime style singers with cutesy voices. This album in particular is pretty dang good, hard to describe. This song is another I’ve been addicted to. He did amazing on that sparkly water sound, sounds like he got it from a final fantasy game or some jrpg.
Akira The Don – Litany Against Fear – Another incredible song by Akira the Don, this time based off of Dune. Not much to say here, if you know about Dune, then you know what’s up with this song. If you don’t know what this is from, go read Dune or watch the sci-fi mini-series, amazing stuff.
-JONRS