I give up on this one!
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(Note - not feeling negative here, just realistic about what I need to do.) After hours of struggling and trying out the advice of you wonderfully helpful people here on the forum, I decided to give up on this month's prompt. I'm just not skilled enough yet in good use of color. Instead of wasting time and getting discouraged, I'm going to go back to the SVS videos on color, and painting, and then watch again. I also have ordered a book to read and study. I'm hoping to make enough progress to try another prompt in a few months.
So thank you to those who offered some tips, I know it was all good info and I appreciate you're taking the time to comment. I'm going off into a corner to study now, and work on getting past this mental block I'm developing. If anybody had a similar idea to the one I posted, feel free to run with it. Have fun, all!
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@kat best of luck! I still struggle with color too. The painting color and light class really helped me.
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@kat said in I give up on this one!:
not feeling negative here, just realistic about what I need to do
Fair enough, but I'd submit it anyway
Part of the point of the challenges I think is to simply create more things. Though study's important it's also important to increase the volume of art you're creating. Making art that looks bad to you is still better than not creating art at all. Everyone here's learning. No one's work here is perfect. Come to think of it, no one's work is perfect at all.
Or read that book and come back in a couple of months. That works, too
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@kat Wait! Before you give up...I know how you feel, this is my first attempt at one of the prompts and I almost decided to call it quits. I posted two thumbnail compositions last week, and I failed miserably at both. I lack experience with colour, painting styles, and brushes, which makes it very difficult to put together a full composition. Even worse, I have years of experience as a graphic designer so I am fully aware that what I am producing is not successful. I felt very frustrated and defeated.
What I decided to do is stop caring about producing something good, and start experimenting a little. My thought was that if I end up with something to submit that’s great, if not, at least I tried and learned something.
I created a brand new composition (something that I wanted to do and felt more natural), and then I started painting very loose. I was really just thinking about rough shapes and colour, not worrying at all about clean edges or detail. It’s working! I tried a process similar to Marco Bucci (check him out on YouTube). Once I got some colours and rough shapes down, I started to see the illustration more clearly and did not feel overwhelmed. There was also no pressure because I finally did not care if I failed. I’m so happy it’s working and even though I’m not sure how it will turn out, I will have something to submit.
Hang in there and give it one more go if you can!
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@Aleksey , that’s definitely one I’ll be reviewing!
@Braden-Hallett, I’m still finishing my piece, but I just can’t submit it. There are so many really great illustrations in these contests. I know I’m not ready yet. Doesn’t mean I won’t make art, it just means I’m not going to put it up next to the others this time.
@inkandspatter , I was just watching some of his videos tonight! I love his work, so energetic and expressive. I’ll definitely be experimenting with some of his tips. Maybe try to get away from hard outlines and mostly flat colors I seem to always end up with.
I’ll keep working, experimenting, studying, and see where it takes me. But I know at the moment I am just not producing anything I want to put in these contests.
Thank you all!
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I can understand completely as i am struggling with colour and perspective also! (what book have you ordered?)
I'm doing the prompt (to practice), but not to submit. Maybe you could do the same or similar?
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@NizhoniWolf , I ordered Color and Light by James Gurney. Reading the forward in sneek-peak, it talked about bridging the gap between understanding color theory and actually picking colors to paint with. Sounded like my problem! There's nothing about perspective in the book, though (I assume.) There's a great video on SVS about perspective (Mastering Perspective, I think it's called) and if you force yourself to practice what's taught, it can really help you.
Yes, I'm still doing the prompt, just for my own practice and because I've got a goal to finish stuff I start. But I won't submit, for sure!
