Final Reflection

My time in Advanced Art has allowed me to develop art skills that I had never really nurtured before in my life. Last semester, I couldn't draw more than a stick figure or maybe a rudimentary, disproportional body at best; currently I feel much more confident in my ability to draw, and having the freedom to draw whatever I can think of (to a degree) feels very liberating. Over the course of the semester I experimented with many different mediums and have done a wide array of projects with many subjects. I've used Blender, Adobe Illustrator, and traditional methods like paper, 2B pencils, 0.5mm pens, and brush-tip pens. Overall, the medium I enjoy using the most would definitely be traditional with pencil and 0.5mm; likely because I don't have a Bamboo Pad to draw on my computer with, and I found Blender to be very confusing and perplexing. Traditional is much more enjoyable because I have minute control of my drawing tool, so my errors are minimized.

Of all of the projects I have done, my favorite one would have to have been the Vladimir Lenin bust that I did at the beginning of the year. Even though I have not used Blender at all since then, I found the time that I sunk into the project to be well-worth it for the results I had. The rendering process made the bust look hyper-realistic, and while I have improved vastly in my innate ability to illustrate things from a 2-D medium, the bust has always been a source of pride for me because of how original the idea was, and how surprisingly well I believed I executed it, especially with the knowledge of Blender I had at the start of the project. As far as other techniques and mediums that I have improved on, I am especially happy with how my ability to visualize in three-dimensional space on paper has gotten. Before this class, I quite literally could not draw a cube from a three-point angle, but now I feel good with my ability to draw bodies in certain poses.

I have many outlets and sources for inspiration when it comes to creating art, but I would have to say that by far without a doubt the largest source of influence for creating artwork for me would be from video games, followed only by historical events & battles. When I see all of the tremendous amount of work that went into a game, especially from a small group or from a dedicated group of people, I find it to be tremendously inspiring (Undertale was created by a single person over the course of four years, for example, and is widely accepted as a cult hit in the gaming marketplace). There is a clear difference between when someone makes a game for money, and when someone makes a game to tell a story or express their use of creative liberty; I have a huge amount of respect for people that take such massive risks by revealing the inner machinations of their mind to the outside world. In addition to this, significant historical events are always interesting because they serve as the turning point for individuals, principalities, nations, kingdoms, and even entire continents and the cultures within.

Concept art for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. It looks a lot like an impressionist painting from the 1800's, yet it's just a piece of concept art among 10,000s of pieces for just a single game. An impressive amount of work is put into the Witcher IP, especially when it comes to artwork.

There are many things that I have not been able to do in terms of projects, and admittedly it's because of my restrictions in my level of skill. Unfortunately I have never had a structured course for art in my life, and the most advice I had ever been given one-on-one on how to draw a human head was to draw an egg-shape in 2nd grade. I really wanted to be able to enjoy and take advantage of an intense period of time where I could develop my skills, and that is why I opted to sign up for the 'Into to Art' course down at the Des Moines Art Center. I felt that this was a good class because they cover the basics of shading and composition, which I have absolutely no experience in, or very little. If I feel good about taking that course, then I will definitely move onto the class they have down there for anatomy and posing for the human body.

Andrew Loomis, along with many, many different YouTubers, have been my largest source of knowledge and learning for these past few months. Shortly after completing the Vladimir Lenin bust I started studying Loomis' books, as well as the mehodology of various youtubers like Sycra, Jazza, and FZD. The thing that really drew me to the YouTubers that I watch is their ability to create confident linework and speak about IPs and wide aspects of art with a knowledgeable and well-versed base to go off of. Their passion for teaching makes it much easier for me to learn the content because I am more engaged and look forward to the insights they have to provide. Below are some videos from some YouTubers that I watch frequently:

A self-portrait of Andrew Loomis

Sycra on Head Proportions

Jazza on basic body proportions

In addition to those who make art tutorials, I really enjoy the effort put into animation, as well as a lot of the styles of the animators I watch. They find really neat ways to express their thoughts and share stories from their lives. Here are some links to various animators that I'm subscribed to:

Domics

The Odd 1's Out

Piemations

Sr. Pelo

I really enjoyed Advanced Art and I hope to peruse some type of activity in drawing in the future; This year was certainly my largest year for art growth and I don't intend to stop!