🎨 My 'I am an Artist!' Phase
I had a phase in 2020, where I was really into sketching! If you are someone who does not follow me on Instagram, let me give you a spoiler - my phase ended halfway through the Inktober challenge.
Now, if you are not familiar with Inktober challenges, Its actually a simple concept - You are given a prompt list with 31 ideas, you have to come up with something artsy daily in 31 days of October (get it? Ink(to draw) + (oct)tober).
Let me tell you the real hard part about this challenge - it is being consistent!
It’s especially hard when you keep having ideas so grand that your skill could not catch up. Also not to mention my constant disappointment after every sketch. Maybe I was just too hard on myself. Maybe I had forgotten I was someone, who had downloaded a sketching app just a month back.
Oh, by the way, forgot to mention -
I used to make digital sketches…
on my phone…
with a small make-shift stylus…
without using any layers!!!
Then, I never even used this as an excuse for my terrible drawing skills. I did want to buy an iPad sometime later. But I knew like all my hobbies, this too would fizzle out soon. So, I delayed my “wanna buy!” instinct. It eventually did happen, one day I simply got bored of it. But since I had already anticipated it, I wasn’t even surprised. I took a deep breath, sighed, and moved on with my life.
Actually, I had started sketching well before October, but I really got into it only when I realized that my skills were gradually improving. I am not even kidding, by my 10th or 12th sketch I already felt like a “Pableonardo Van Michelangelo”! With every increment, I thought, at this rate I might one day draw sketches for a living.
Haha… LOL!
Okay, enough self-loathing, let me walk you through my month-long journey of making sketches. Here we go -
It was one of my friend’s birthday. I usually never keep birthday status, always felt they were lame! But that day for some reason I had an inspiration and tried to casually sketch her. It turned out to be better than I had expected, I got a kick out of it! Or adrenaline rush as people call it!
I felt, My first attempt was a success! So the very next day, I just wanted to try sketching someone else. But if you are to do that you ought to ask his/her permission first, right? So, I randomly asked 5-6 of my friends. And while I waited for their reply, my fingers got itchy and I just decided to sketch myself.
Well, he does slightly resemble me, doesn’t he? It is simple, no doubt, but I had pretty low expectations when I had started. I was happy with the result and that’s all that mattered. Also to this day, this is the only sketch I tried of myself. (Psst! Check the icon of this webpage carefully!)
Before anyone could get back with their best-looking photo for my sketching practice, I drew famous people without consent! I mean, I would have never gotten back any reply anyhow.
I am not sure why I choose the celebrities I choose, It was probably done randomly. By the way, try to guess them, it should be a good starting point to judge my sketches!
Now if you observe carefully (which I am not really sure why anyone would do) you could see lines are a lot darker for the third celebrity sketch. That’s because that is actually my 8th one from the day I had started. And by then, I had learned that there are other brush types available apart from the default one.
You would understand once you see the next 2 sketches,
These were made before celebrity woman in the previous picture, I don’t really remember the brush type I used, it was probably the default pencil that gets selected. I knew the strokes were light, I just kept ignoring it…
Then finally, I decided to draw the most influential woman of my life… My mom! I drew 2 because I was not happy with my first result.
It was around this time, I had just started getting frustrated. I felt like everything I had drawn till now was mediocre, probably because I had gone through them like a dozen times. And every time I had a look, I started discovering mistakes!
I forgot to mention, by the way, I was churning out one portrait daily. I had decided that for the next 21 days, I will draw every friend I have and thus gradually improve my ability.
Now that I think about it, I was naive. The best way forward would have been to pick a single portrait, re-draw him/her and try to perfect it as much as possible. Yet, I haphazardly drew new person every day, without really improving my skill much! In the process, unbeknownst to me, I was just slowly burning out my passion.
The next 2 are my last sketches…
…before I decided to start using colors!
This is again a mistake on my part, I should have focused on improving my line-work before I could fill them in with colors.
Well, what’s done is done. Here is my first sketch with colors!
I am not sure what made me color it, but I felt like colors did bring a certain vibrance to the sketch. I decided to color all my sketches henceforth!
Also, it was around this time… that I did what every person with a newly discovered hobby does! Created a dedicated Instagram account! Also, since Instagram posts have to be squarish, I changed the aspect ratio as well.
I wanted to get creative with colors. As a kid, I had a pretty good drawing teacher who taught me the basics of colors well. I knew which colors went with what and which combination made the most sense.
And based on this, I sketched a few others -
By now, I had set a concept in my mind. It was simple, yet I felt this could be it! Here’s my next couple of sketches… can you see a pattern here?
If you think the common thing among them is they all look cool!
You are damn right 😎!
Also apart from that, I have followed a common pattern here,
- Only draw neck up 🧑.
- Have a colorful background.
- Drop as many details as possible, minimalism FTW!
Finally! I thought I was getting a touch of my own. But it was still problematic, my style was all over the place. All my sketches had a completely different look and feel to them, which is good in some sense. But there is only this much that can be achieved with that!
Here’s 2 more following the same pattern,
Below 2 are my favorites, they took the longest to make but I feel the end results were worth the effort!
It was now that I had started losing focus.
It was the end of September and Inktober was just around the corner, I had the prompt list and a bunch more portraits I could have drawn. I choose to do Inktober challenges, as I hoped it would give me more exposure. I guess that’s where I messed up!
In fact, from some 18 drawings that I did during that duration, there are only 2 sketches that I loved,
Now, that I look back, I could see my phase going from -
I suck at it, but it’s okay -> I still suck at it, now I am a bit frustrated -> Oh Colors! Maybe, I am not that bad -> This looks good, but not as I imagined it to be -> Aaah, let me try something new -> Ok, this isn’t working out -> Guess I am not made for this!
That was a tl;dr of my entire journey!
On that note, let me end this semi-long post of self-loathing! Actually wait, even though it looks like one, it isn’t why I had started writing this. I just wanted to take a look back and see what went wrong and now I know… Also, I learned an important lesson -
IT'S OKAY TO SUCK AT NEW THINGS!
It’s true that I had messed up, but instead of going “…maybe, if I had done that instead of this…”, I should focus on “what next?”.
Will I start sketching again? That I am not sure of…
Will I repeat the same mistake when I explore a new hobby? I will surely try not to!
This post holds proof of what had happened, and hopefully in future, there would be a one to show how I rectified it!
Till then… Have a Good Day!!!