Has anyone else noticed how, the better you get, the worse you feel?

Or rather, the better you get, the more you become aware of your own inadequacies and the time and effort required to become GOOD. This, I believe, is the cause of the bizarre phenomenon that the truly talented are, more often than not, far more insecure or modest than the truly useless.

Another example of this is the time I happened to mention to a (non-artist) friend of mine that I was going to be selling my origami window decorations at this arts and crafts thing. She said "Oh, that's nice. Like, for a penny each?". Because she had never attempted origami or anything similar she had no concept of the work involved and hence assumed it must be very easy. (Incidentally, I don't remember exactly how much I did sell them for but I do know I made enough money to buy my self a really good printer. So nnyyyaaaaah.)

My point is that it's very easy to look at something you've never tried and think 'I could do that, no problem'. Not to say that this is inherently bad. In fact, it's probably necessary. I was talking with the other day and we both agreed that, with any decent drawing there has to be a phase during the sketching process were you are convinced that it is THE GREATEST picture that you have EVER DONE. Similarly, if things didn't look easy before you tried them, you may never actually try them. However, I think that it's equally necessary to grow out of this. Like with a drawing, once I have all of my ideas out of my head and on the paper I need to come out of my 'Oh my god, I'm a genius' bubble to start looking at things objectively. Is the anatomy off? How about the perspective? Is the composition balanced? etc. etc.

Of course, art is a phenomenally vague and intuitive medium and this is all much easier to see in the more technical art forms. In my case: comics.

A while ago (god, now that I think about it, it must of been at least a year ago. My, how time flies!), a montage of things combined and resulted in my decision to start making comics. I was incredibly optimistic and thought 'Hey, I can draw and I read allot of comics, this ought to be fun and easy!'. HA! I can honestly say that, since I started on this project, I have developed allot and my comic pages are far better than they were at the start. However, my estimation of my ability as dropped drastically. You know the saying 'One step forward, two steps back'? Well, this is more like, every time I take a step forward my destination takes two steps back! Oh dear, that came out sounding far more depressing than I meant it to... Let me try a more optimistic simile: It's like the difference between being observant enough to see the nature of a problem and come up with solutions and not even being aware that there is a problem. The latter is nice, in an ignorance is bliss kind of way, but it doesn't allow you to develop.

If this all sounds really preachy, I'm very sorry. I'm certainly not presuming that I actually KNOW anything, it's just that all these thoughts have been whooshing around my head for the last couple of days and I felt the need to talk about it. So why post it on DA? Because I find all this kind of thing very interesting and I would love to hear anyone else's opinions.

I haven't been around here much lately. College and work have teamed up to devour my spare time. But it's the half term now so hopefully I can catch up a bit.

I don't actually have much to say, I just thought I should say something as my last journal entry was at least an ice age ago.

Oh, I know what I can say! has successfully turned me into a Trekkie. Haha XD I'm such a nerd. (I already was but now it's official)

Hello!! I am alive! In fact I'm drawing loads at the moment, I just forget to upload stuff on here XD It doesn't help that my scanner is being a moody brat and crashing randomly either. >:0

Anyway, I felt the impulse to make a journal and rant about inconsiquental things...

Firstly, I've taken on some epic art projects resontly. My main new years reaolution is 'DRAW MORE' ( followed closely by 'don't turn into a nocturnal hermit' ) as, looking back, last year I was astoundingly unproductive.

One of said epic projects is the The List Of DOOM which I came across in journal. I am probably utterly deranged to attempt such a thing but never mind.

I'm also embarking upon making some comics. Me and have plans to make some short strips of epic nonsense which will probably be thrillingly hilarious to us and utterly baffling to anyone with a functioning brain. 8D So that should be fun... And I'm working on a story for a longer and (somewhat) more serious comic.

AND doing illustrations for a children's story that my dad is writing.

I shall not bombard you with a meme. 8D

Type the answers to the questions into Google images, and then link to the first one

1. The age you will be on your next birthday: [link]

2. A place you'd like to travel: [link]

3. Your favorite place: [link]

4. Your favorite object: [link]

5. Your favorite food: [link]

6. Your favorite animal: [link]

7. Your favorite colour: [link]

8. The city in which you were born: [link]

9. The city in which you live: [link] Same city as I was born in but I picked a different image for variety

10. The name of a past pet: [link]

12. Your nickname/screen name: [link] Haha looks like it must mean something in another language. XD

I wandered off while I was in the middle of writing this and ended up watching Dr Who reruns. I did have other things to talk about but I've forgotten. So instead I will just say this: David Tennant and John Simm are hot...

I am slightly irritated, reasonably baffled and rather amused by the new mature content rules that mean that I can't view MY OWN mature content pics. O_O lol. I mean, I hunched over with my face an inch from the paper and DREW that nipple and now your telling me it's inappropriate for my to look at? Actually, I don't really care that much and come December it won't apply to me anymore anyway. However, I do think there should be a distinction between sexual/erotic nudity and artistic nudity. If you go into a shop and try to buy porn they're going to check you age but its fine for you to buy a book of life drawing. So it's a bit silly really.

On another note, my Grandma came over very ill today. I wasn't there but it was very upsetting to hear about... I should draw her a card.

OH, I have soooo much to talk about!!! Wheeee....

I just got back from a holiday in Devon. It was so so nice! Particularly being obliged to eat endless puddings for fear of offending the old lady we were staying with if we didn't! Scones with strawberry jam and copious amounts of clotted cream... And constant tea drinking! That is so my kind of holiday!! That is why I could never live in America. Imagine not having clotted cream? I would actually die.

Anyway, on a more interesting note... WE HAVE A PUPPY!!! Omg, really. We have a new dog and she is actually the most gorgeous thing on the planet. She is 17 weeks old and bloody HUGE, lol. She is a Utonagan, which are apparently breeded from an Alaskan Malamute, German Shepherd, and Siberian Husky, so she is wonderfully wolf-like! White and blonde with black streaks down her back... actually, just look at this: [link]

Is she not GORGEOUS????

Also, I was tagged by so...

List ten things about your art, then tag x people to do the same.

1) My best ideas come either when I'm doodling (just kind of happen without me thinking about it, you know?) or evolve in the back of my head over a long space of time.

2) I do most of my 'thinking up ideas' either in the middle of the night, when I'm pacing up and down the kitchen waiting for the kettle to boil or walking in the woods.

3) I work better if I do a sketch in biro before my pencil sketch. It makes me think about the bigger shapes and feel of a picture rather than getting hung up on tiny details or getting the expression just right which I what usually happens if I go strait into pencil.

4) I love my tablet to pieces, even though I do very few digital drawings. However, I DO do allot of photo editing and scan touch-ups for which it is wonderful.

5) My Auntie and my Granddad are both artists, my parents are musicians but my mother also paints and my dad writes, my grandma makes dresses and my brother is a great cartoonist. So.. quite an arty family really.

6) I have been drawing since I could hold a pencil and have only ever wanted to be an artist. That is, unless you count wanting to be a witch and wanting to be a cat.

8) I get inspiration from just about anywhere. I get very inspired by colours or colour combinations which is just as likely to be in the sky or the trees or something someone is wearing as in other pictures.

9) I dropped out of school due to sheer irritation and fury at the system that was making me to things like chemistry for no reason before doing my GCSE's and went to do an art course instead. And I only lasted a year of that before giving up on college for similar reasons. Perhaps one day I will find a course worth taking but for now I am doing things my way and looking for a job.

10) I like it when people compliment my drawings (it makes me feel like I am not completely off on one after all) but I never know what to say or do and it makes me very awkward. Also, it has to be someone whose opinion I respect or it feels kind of meaningless.

Okaaaay, that was long. TAGege:

~