Seriously, I cant figure this out.
I always hear that drawing is supposed to be all therapeutic and whatnot, but usually I just get progressively more irritated as I go along.
There is a certain type of thing that I do know how to do... sorta. Example:
What is that, you may ask? I have no idea. I never have any idea! I only know how to mash shapes together at random to make things like... whatever that is supposed to be.
Well, that and brush lettering, but brush lettering is not "drawing" to me and I consider it an entirely separate skillset. I can also do what I call "mimicry" and take some drawing (if it's simple enough) that already exists and just replicate it. Very... very... very... very... slowly. What might take one person an hour to make normally takes like 5 hours to replicate and it's gonna be just a tad wobbly. Ask me to draw the same character or whatever in any other pose or whatever, and you'll get a blank stare.
Seriously, I cant figure out how to do anything else. Part of what makes this so obnoxious is that tutorials are usually like "Okay here's how to draw an owl. Draw a couple of circles and an oval like this... see how simple this is? Now step two, draw the rest of the bloody owl. PLeaSe LiKE aNd sUBscRiBe!!!11"
I have yet to find any tutorials that dont assume that the viewer has at least SOME knowledge of this stuff. I'm going into this with none whatsoever.
And the OTHER frustrating things with a lot of tutorials is that they assume the viewer is using digital art tools (which also means that 90% of the tutorial will be about the program itself). I do not... I have a Wacom tablet, but quickly declared it stupid and jammed it into a drawer somewhere (seriously, I dont like digital art programs outside of my fractal stuff, I find them absolutely infuriating).
And yeah, I know, with any type of art everyone always says "well ya gotta practice" but see, to do that you have to have something to actually practice AT. There's nothing to practice, because the starting point doesnt exist at all. And yeah, I've tried doing it even despite that fact. The result is blobs.
Now, I've been handed the idea of "well why not try an art class?" but see there's two problems with that: First of all, none exist. The most exciting thing around my area is the local Walmart. Ya want ANYTHING else? Better be ready to drive at least an hour... to an area that still wont have it. This region doesnt have things like that. I've looked. Just farms and grass. And even if I found one, I couldnt do it. Classes are structured and require scheduling. My rotating sleep schedule (non-24 sleep wake disorder) is absolutely incompatible with any sort of repeating schedule. Yeah, maybe I could do a 5 PM class one week, and that'll be "afternoon" for me. But the next week, I'll be going to bed at noon. This presents exactly the sort of problem that it sounds like.
So yeah... I'm not sure what to do. I've got all these neat art tools, but I rarely use them because any time I think of something to draw, the idea is thrown out because I cant even start the process, because I dont know what "start" means in that context. If it aint smashed together shapes, it aint getting made.
So, for you artists out there... any advice at all? How did you learn to draw/paint/whatever?
I always hear that drawing is supposed to be all therapeutic and whatnot, but usually I just get progressively more irritated as I go along.
There is a certain type of thing that I do know how to do... sorta. Example:
What is that, you may ask? I have no idea. I never have any idea! I only know how to mash shapes together at random to make things like... whatever that is supposed to be.
Well, that and brush lettering, but brush lettering is not "drawing" to me and I consider it an entirely separate skillset. I can also do what I call "mimicry" and take some drawing (if it's simple enough) that already exists and just replicate it. Very... very... very... very... slowly. What might take one person an hour to make normally takes like 5 hours to replicate and it's gonna be just a tad wobbly. Ask me to draw the same character or whatever in any other pose or whatever, and you'll get a blank stare.
Seriously, I cant figure out how to do anything else. Part of what makes this so obnoxious is that tutorials are usually like "Okay here's how to draw an owl. Draw a couple of circles and an oval like this... see how simple this is? Now step two, draw the rest of the bloody owl. PLeaSe LiKE aNd sUBscRiBe!!!11"
I have yet to find any tutorials that dont assume that the viewer has at least SOME knowledge of this stuff. I'm going into this with none whatsoever.
And the OTHER frustrating things with a lot of tutorials is that they assume the viewer is using digital art tools (which also means that 90% of the tutorial will be about the program itself). I do not... I have a Wacom tablet, but quickly declared it stupid and jammed it into a drawer somewhere (seriously, I dont like digital art programs outside of my fractal stuff, I find them absolutely infuriating).
And yeah, I know, with any type of art everyone always says "well ya gotta practice" but see, to do that you have to have something to actually practice AT. There's nothing to practice, because the starting point doesnt exist at all. And yeah, I've tried doing it even despite that fact. The result is blobs.
Now, I've been handed the idea of "well why not try an art class?" but see there's two problems with that: First of all, none exist. The most exciting thing around my area is the local Walmart. Ya want ANYTHING else? Better be ready to drive at least an hour... to an area that still wont have it. This region doesnt have things like that. I've looked. Just farms and grass. And even if I found one, I couldnt do it. Classes are structured and require scheduling. My rotating sleep schedule (non-24 sleep wake disorder) is absolutely incompatible with any sort of repeating schedule. Yeah, maybe I could do a 5 PM class one week, and that'll be "afternoon" for me. But the next week, I'll be going to bed at noon. This presents exactly the sort of problem that it sounds like.
So yeah... I'm not sure what to do. I've got all these neat art tools, but I rarely use them because any time I think of something to draw, the idea is thrown out because I cant even start the process, because I dont know what "start" means in that context. If it aint smashed together shapes, it aint getting made.
So, for you artists out there... any advice at all? How did you learn to draw/paint/whatever?