#What if they painted in colors only visible in spectrums humans can't see?

[solradguy]

How do i find the motivation to practice art? I have so many shitposts that’ll never come to fruition because my skills plateaued ):

No one else is going to draw my ideas and I'm too broke to pay someone else to do it for me. For better or worse, I seem to approach a lot of things from a "gotta do everything myself around here" angle haha

Honestly—and I won't lie to you—doing art studies is a real pain in the ass, I hate doing them. I never do them unless I've got major art block, and even then I still hate doing them, but it's like taking medicine and I know doing them will make me better. Every art teacher I've ever had's grilled me about this, "solradguy, you need to do 15 studies before the end of the week to get a full grade this quarter." Blah blah blah.

I guess for some people doing studies could be fun, not having to think about pose or composition, whatever, just putting lines down on paper and focus on your reference. One time, when I was still in college, I had to do a certain amount of studies in charcoal so I booted up Red Dead Redemption and drew landscapes or objects from it that I kinda liked. It was enough. I told my professor it was from my grandma's farm hehe

Art memes can be a good way to practice too, especially those ones about drawing in different styles or drawing a character in different outfits. They combine fun with tricking you into drawing things you might not normally draw. Emulating different art styles is the only art study method that doesn't make me want to fall asleep. Don't forget they're just art games though, and especially don't forget:

👉If You Already Feel Burnt Out Don't Feel Compelled To Complete Every Art Meme You Start👈

As you get better at art, you start noticing improvements less and less because they become more subtle. When you're really new to art, figuring out stuff like basic anatomy or shading is REALLY obvious because they're foundational parts of art. Hang on to your really old stuff and look at it every now and then and I guarantee you'll have improved way more than you thought you had.

I get the impression you've probably been at art for a while now, and I don't want to come across as patronizing, but sometimes refreshing the basics can help overcome a plateau too. Drawabox is usually what I recommend to people just getting into art, I really like their approach. Here's a link to their introduction lesson: drawabox.com/lesson/0 And here's one that skips to the actual art stuff: drawabox.com/lesson/1

While it's probably beneficial to actually do the exercises in the lessons, just skimming through reading them can be good too.

Something I've noticed a lot of my artists friends (and artists online) do is try to make every single drawing a finished piece, and I'm like "damn, no wonder art feels like such a chore." My sketchbook is 99% scribbles done in pen:

I use Pentel RSVP fine point ballpoint pens so if I make a mistake I'm forced to deal with it. Doing these rough sketches before starting a bigger piece is something I recommend with my entire heart. Just get a pack of shitty $0.99 pens and doodle like it's high school math class. I like the cheap pens because you can get faint lines drawing lightly and can coax them into darker lines with a bit more pressure (and if you lose/break one it's no big deal).

The best way to get better at art is to keep putting lines on paper. Even if it's just silly pen doodles, you're still improving coordination/pen control, improving construction of basic shapes, exploring concepts, and thinking about art, which will lead to more new ideas and further inspiration.

Sorry this is long and meandering haha Hopefully something here helps at least a tiny bit.

#asks #I get so hopelessly passionate about art. I want to shake everyone by the shoulders and shout #IT'S MAGIC. IT'S ACTUAL MAGIC. NO OTHER ANIMAL ON PLANET EARTH CAN DO THIS LIKE HUMANS CAN!! #It's a shame contact with sapient alien species won't happen in my lifetime. I want to see their art #They probably won't see colors the way humans can. Would we even be able to understand each others' art? #What if they painted in colors only visible in spectrums humans can't see? #But also what if they saw colors the same as humans #Can you imagine sending an alien lightyears away a painting of Earth flowers and receiving one in return of alien flowers #If their sun was different from our Sun... imagine how that would affect the palettes and compositions of their art... #An alien species without vision that makes art through textured sculptures and sounds... #I've been reading a lot of Ray Bradbury lately and spring is around the corner so I'm going a little bananas #long post

[bookwyrminspiration]

Solidarity of the sponges! I... Read a lot less than my mother. Like a lot. As in, it takes a lot for a book to interest me, but once it does I usually can't stop reading it, but that is few and far between. It's been about... A month(?) since I last read a book? I used to be a reading machine, but now I can only read about 8k words in fanfiction 😔

Ooo, 3D models are so fun! I enjoy painting them, even if they get really annoying. I've got two dnd ones and they've got WINGS! I love wings. (You get an A for effort with the storm troopers, I've watched all the og 6 but only because me and my friend went on a movie binge and the star wars movies were on the list)

And thank you!! I must've missed the bird+dragon ask, I remember sending it but not reading it. You don't have to make a new post about monsters if you don't want to! I don't have anything in mind, really, just soemthing monstrous

Oh I love that. I love that you are on a dnd podcast. And thank you!! I hope you are doing well as well!!! I have just finished a term of school and I now have 2 weeks of holidays!! Huzzah!!

-Heathen

Heathen! Hello!! We can be sponges together and just absorb things in tandem. Every person contains a mass of knowledge about random things and sometimes we get it from our parents and sometimes we get it from ourselves

just this morning we had a substitute in physics and he was just like "oh sick I've got so much nerdery about all of this" and started talking about the visible light spectrum and the original color of the universe. and then. he started messing with the teacher's spectrum tube power supply(this thing) because she has elements he doesn't and he wanted to see them. but some of them don't quite fit so he started using wires to do funky science things and there were legit wires sticking out of it like antenna. and he's doing all of this just for fun while we're silently working on our reports and he just goes "this might catch on fire." and then a few minutes later it did. just casually. and the whole time he was like "yeah I'm a nerd about this" i was just thinking "he doesn't know...he doesn't know how much I know about the history of human dissection..." that's off topic but I thought it was fun and wanted to share

also fair with the book thing! I'm like that but with movies and shows, like I just do not watch them unless I really get invested and then I binge it all at once. last time it happened was december when I binged all of Arcane the day before my mom, sister, and I left to drive across the country for two days to visit my grandma. I do read a fair number of books when I have the time, but I think I understand what you mean

I know very little about 3D models, but they've always seemed like fun! but also difficult because everything is so finicky and small. probably something you get better at with practice, but I have never practiced. i do have a small sculpture I painted at a local place a few years ago! it's a fairy sitting on a crescent moon :). I also made a clay frog a few months ago!! i still have him, he just sits on my bookshelf being a frog. he is very small (hell yes I love getting A's. this is success)

also you're welcome! I figured you might not have seen it which is why I linked it, just in case. and I wouldn't mind making more posts about monsters!! it's more like I am requesting just slightly more context/direction so that the things I say will be helpful. monsters are very gender and I love them a lot, so I'd love to help!

yep! I was on that one episode, and still haven't actually listened to it. my dad has, as the podcast person in my family. I find it very hard to listen to podcasts and audiobooks, which sucks. my partner is involved with multiple podcasts and I haven't listened to them because brain doesn't like podcasts. But!! Into the Hollow just released it's first episode so I'm trying to listen to that (I listened to all the interviews before it but not the actual episode yet)

I am doing fairly alright!! a little jealous of your break (/lh), because I don't have one, but also I haven't had a break longer than 3 weeks since I was 13 so I'm used to it. I have finished my college courses for this semester and just need to wrap up 2 high school, but also I have 2 very face paced college courses starting on monday before my high school classes are over.

i hope you are doing alright!! it's very nice to hear from you <3

#me: struggles to listen to podcasts #multiple important people in my life: *makes/is on podcasts* #me: uh oh #/lh #i have multiple unpainted dnd miniatures #just chilling on my bookshelf #you know i have so many things on my bookshelves #do /you/ have drill bits and screw drivers and soap and mini clay frogs and a mini solar powered globe and multiple playbills and #a mini metal dragon and a broken lamp on your shelves? /rh #i'm getting distracted hang on #quil's queries #heathen nonsie