Week 44 Drove back to my grandma, set up quickly and started catching up on the schoolism course that I had paused during my Berlin trip. It was quite a few photobashs, paintovers and speed paintings, which are fun to do but also remind me of how much more focused, deliberate practice I need to do before I can intuitively pump out good stuff. I got one homework left for this week and will go the extra mile and really push myself to do the best possible illustration. My goal is that the result is good enough to enter the current Atomhawk art challenge. I won’t have a chance of winning, the competition will be super tough, but I want to submit something that I can feel good about, knowing it will at least for a second or two be looked at by their artists. With very few savings left and tough times ahead, I am going to activate my backup plan, part time coding. I’ve found this awesome community that is actively working on a game for over a year. They are a very positive community driven by good values. They also have big ambitions in terms of building communities that are actually good for their users. It’s a really big chance to be part of something awesome and a learning opportunity that can fast track my coding skills. So this week I will try out the part time coder, part time learning art lifestyle. I kick off every day with a bit of figure drawing to warm up, watch a coding tutorial and then do 4 hours of highly focused coding Monday to Friday. The rest of the time is art and coding my own projects. As always I think what it comes down to is the ability to focus and put in good work, not wasting time on social media etc. PS: The robot leg is basically photobashed, which is why I only post it here for educational purposes.

I was about to stumble and once again fall victim to the attention sucking monsters like instagram, email, news etc. But the whole epicness of my Berlin journey and art progress showed me what is on the line here: Am I going to just grind away a low end job making ends meet, telling people in bars that being a professional artist isn’t really all that great? Or will this be a spectacular life lived to it’s fullest, taking me on wild rides I can’t even imagine? I really think it is that important. When I started to tumble, I noticed that I had a hard time to focus for even 10 minutes during a tutorial. I just had to look something up, got distracted, wasted half an hour and basically told my brain to override the 10 minutes tutorial. So I went cold turkey, blocked all social media and news and limited it to 10 minutes after 8pm. I also signed up for headspace premium and started meditating twice a day. Now when the urge comes I just sit with the feeling for a moment, examine it and let it pass. And after a drawing session I don’t browse the news or check my worthless stocks, I get up and let my mind wander a bit, do some exercises, wash a few dishes, cuddle my dog. Tomorrow is my last day in Berlin, I’m going to do one more figure drawing (with burlesque costumes, which are my favorites), and then drive home to take care of my grandma for a month. My plan was to get back to coding, but I just can’t do it after having made more progress with art than ever before, more than I even thought was possible. I’ll just do something like 20% of the time coding to put my mind at ease, making it nothing more than a backup plan. The stack on the photo is mostly just one sided paper, but still a nice feeling to see this pretty thick stack and an almost full sketchbook after 2 weeks of busting my ass off. The figure drawing one is from life, which is why I’m quite proud of it. It’s crazy what a difference it made to draw from photos vs. drawing from life. Reminded me of slowly practicing techniques in martial arts vs all out sparring where you forget everything you ever knew and just try to survive. The portrait one is just a relaxed evening drawing, which is why I am also quite proud of the result ;-)

Week 42 I’ve never spent as much time drawing as I did this week. At home I worked through tutorials while taking notes as if I were writing a book and taking as much time as needed to really ingrain the lessons (portrait, figure drawing, animal drawing). Once a day I took the train, drawing the whole ride, to go to a place to draw from life. I did another round at the natural history museum, some urban sketching and the portrait drawing meetup. The latter one served as a good measurement on how much I had improved, I could barely believe it. My favorite museum (Barberini in Potsdam) had an exposition with some of the biggest names in abstract art (several rothko and polack paintings), so I gave it a shot. I was receptive and open minded and even a bit scared, having had a strong experience with Rothko a few years ago. But I felt nothing and at least I know now this isn’t something I should explore further. Luckily they also had an exposition of impressionism. It’s where I and most of the people ended up. They had over a dozen Monet paintings, including 2 from his famous hay stack series. Absolute fucking magic. I and many others just stood there staring at it, taking a trip through time and space. He made me feel like I was in a little village in France some 150 years ago. I also learned that he worked quite scientifically, like he used to do many paintings at the same time and kept switching based on the time of day and weather, sometimes only painting a few minutes before moving to the next canvas. Drawing wise I’m trying to push myself to think more constructively, like Peter Han and his dynamic sketching. For that I came up with a cool exercise: I draw the Asaro head from the super useful tool on Artstation, then I put the drawing and reference away and try to draw it from memory. Then I bring back the reference and copy it one more time next to my attempt from memory and see where I was off and pay special attention to that. It already led to a break through sketch on the train today. I was trying to draw this woman who was talking to a bunch of dudes, so I failed badly trying to copy lines and angles. I switched to drawing in 3D and then slapping her features on to that. Another one of those moments where I couldn’t believe I just did that. This blog got mentioned in the Proko newsletter, which made my day! It reminds me of my epic run in online poker another lifetime ago. I used to blog in a forum and when I started putting in more and more effort, I got featured and interviewed and voted member of the month. Half a year later I had moved from small stakes to high stakes (and some shots at nosebleed stakes, went horribly wrong lol). Anyhow, I think I’m on track to repeat this epic run with art. Only difference is that I am in a way better mental and physical position :-) I got one more week left in Berlin and will give it all I’ve got!

Does it have to be based on a reference or can it be from imagination? I'm asking because it says that it will be judged based on likeness, which sounds like we have to submit the reference? Thanks!

Week 41 I drove to Berlin and jumped head first into the art scene. I went to urban sketching meet ups, figure drawing, group portrait drawing, went to the natural history museum twice and even organized sketching at the zoo, to which 8 people showed up. I'm enjoying socializing and talking to artists so much that I can't believe how I managed to stay isolated in a little town all these years. This week marks one of my biggest triumph over my social anxiety. It has stopped me from so many good things happening in my life, but now that it wanted to stop my from getting good at art, I took out a baseball bat, broke it’s legs and bashed it’s head in. It’s still alive and always will be, but I’ll be ready, swinging my bat. So while the discomfort and anxiety is as high as ever, I’m simply pushing through. Like the first session at the museum was freaking nerve wrecking, having a crowd behind me and people constantly watching and commenting. I was sweating and blushing and all that stuff. It was also quite tough to pose for the portrait session. I used to get nervous when someone might be looking at me… what a nightmare then to have a room full of people go silent and intensely stare at me. The upside of doing uncomfortable things though is that I’m getting comfortable at it :-) I’m also making an effort to approach people and be friendly and positive, instead of being the shy dude in the corner judging everyone. In just one week I’ve had so many awesome conversations with interesting people from all over the world, and hopefully laid the ground work for future friendships. To my anxieties dismay, I’ve had nothing but positive experiences. Like earlier today I was sketching people at the train station while sitting next to others. It was too close to hide my sketchbook and I knew sketching moving people was going to look like crap. I did it anyway and this couple next to me started talking about ‘this dude is doing some awesome drawings, like he just draws the people over there’, apologized for watching, but then we chatted and they said how much they liked it (wasn’t that good though, lol). I’ve also been asked 3 times now if I’m a professional artist, which I take as a nice compliment. On a side note I’ve applied for a game dev job, there was this thing called money that I could really need. I haven't heard back so I guess it won't happen. Maybe for the best as I feel art is calling me louder every day. Damn sirens... Pics are subway sketches. Always a pleasure when someone falls asleep in front of me :-)

Allright, 51x 50 minute units of work done! I learned photobashing in the schoolism course. I’m not sure yet if is super useful or useless for me, so I went through it quickly. Could be a very good way to start cool illustrations, but not sure in the value of getting it to look like one big photo. Next week I’m heading to Berlin again, have to help someone out. I’ll try to make up for the lost time of packing and driving by unleashing my secret weapon: Going to bed really early. I’ll try to be in bed by 10pm.

I took the prompt to do an exercise I had thought of recently: I set up a still life outside and kept taking pictures at different times of the day/weather. That alone was a worthwhile exercise to get a better understanding of light and color. The center of the light action was this little golden brass bottle in the middle. Lots of reflected light and the sunlight overpowering the bounce light, so I got a yellow center, green outline around it turning red on one side. And of course it all shifts with the time of day. I tried to push myself going as loose as I can with the brushwork. Quite challenging though because often times I just end up with a confusing mess and need to clean it up again. I can highly recommend this exercise! (though it may have cemented my status as a lunatic among my neighbors, holding candle light vigils for juice bottles)

Week 39 Great week, put in 46 x 50mins of focused blocks. I also reduced distractions, which clears up a lot of time. I did a challenging but helpful exercise for the schoolism class, painting a scene in different lighting scenarios. For the homework I used a photo, but kinda regret that I hadn’t gone the extra mile. Luckily, there is the new Proko Challenge with one of my favorite artists, Marco Bucci! So a few days ago I set up a still life outside and have been photographing it at different lighting scenarios. Now I’m painting them one by one, trying to get a feel for the change in lights. Also did a few plein airs, but not worth making a photo of it. I also worked quite a bit on a new game, again... Anyhow, this will be a real test if I have changed or not. I think I quit at least my last 10 games, if not many more, and every time I was convinced I’d ship it. I was looking into Unity’s new UI system and under a recent videos people commented how bad it is, the poor documentation and lack of features. I thought for a moment to listen to that and not learn it, but then I thought what if I’m just better than them? Turns out I am. It’s not for beginners, but there are plenty of resources out there to learn and unleash great stuff with it. All in all I’m really happy with the effort I’ve been putting in this week. At first I thought it’s the pressure of having to get a boring job soon when my money runs out, but it’s more and more a feeling that things could get epic. So for now I just have to keep it up. Putting in a lot of time, little distractions, going the extra mile.

Week 37+38 Another turn in direction. My mom’s dog got badly ill and cost her quite some money and time, so I decided to give her some of my savings. That means I have to aim at earning some money soon, so I started to divide my time 50/50 into art and coding. I’ll just make small games I can use as portfolio pieces while working on my art skills. Speaking of which, I am still working my way through Foolproof concept paintings. And if Karma is real, there might be some good things coming towards me :-) Despite things looking a bit bleak, I’m greateful that I even had money I could give away, that I still don’t have to go back working in the kitchen, and that I’m in a good position to get good at art in the near future. A position I had to work years on to even be in.

I started Airi Pan’s course ‘Foolproof concept painting’ on Schoolism. Starting yet another project while listening to the 3 point perspective podcast about shipping, aka finishing a project, got me thinking and a bit worried. I have way too many unfinished projects, like working through a tutorial series, doing an animation or a game. So I’m going to pick some of my many halfdone projects and finish them before starting anything new. And I’m only going to do 2 at the same time, each split into theory and practice.