Hi, Chris! I have to say I think your problem may be as you said, you're "very nuts and bolts like that". It sounds like you're interested in making original artworks but have only been practicing others' works and the basics of shapes. I'd suggest, as uncomfortable as I imagine it might be, that you try to create an original scene or character you have in mind using your preferred paints (don't worry, you can always create it again after learning more, and don't have to show anyone). Once you finish a few paintings look at them critically and ask yourself where you'd like to see improvement without being too hard on yourself (original ideas can be a different skillset than copying and referencing). Then, see how you can work on that. Some key skills for splash art would be things like: faces, figure drawings, character design, composition, colour theory, among other things. Art doesn't follow one process or one "best" material or learning schedule for everyone, it is truly a creative art. I would also say art can be cyclical. Acrylic and digital and pencil and ink can all be used for simultaneous growth. If you practice in pencils you can get a good understanding of shading and value - the same skill that can add to your acrylic paintings. If you learn how to hold your pen/pencil and use good lines this can lead to future accuracy with a paintbrush. This is true of most art forms, they all add to one another in the long run. What you can mentally see/draw/imagine helps you make images in any medium. Painting is essentially just drawing in colour, so there's no harm in practicing inking or shading (and you can do no drawing at all under your painting if you trust yourself to draw in paint, just it's harder to fix mistakes). So focus on what interests you or where you want to improve and it should add up (similar to what another poster said, if you can learn from someone who does something with their art that you like, I find this is the fastest way to grow - absorb and learn that same thing you like to look at in art! Then it's already stylized to your preferences and goals). If you're a complete beginner with acrylics I'd recommend looking for any intro classes, or simply following along with some free tutorials on youtube. You can sometimes pick up the basics by following along and slowing down these videos to get the hang of blending and layering in your chosen medium. Plus, it's very cost effective before you decide on what teachers, courses, or subjects you may want to learn from. Overall, I just wanted to comment and say I think what's holding you back is probably your mindset. It's not the tools or the order you learn things in. Learn lots of different styles (maybe even the anime and inked comic art you hate so much) and especially learn the application of the art styles and medium you're interested in. Let go of right and wrong - because to grow you'll have to step out of your comfort zone and be wrong often to find the next step forwards. Hope this helps in some way. Let's do our best on our art journeys :)

Sounds like you need to take a traditional painting class! The drawing classes you’re currently enrolled in are all great, but none will explain the basics of preliminary painting stages. If you’re looking for a good basics of digital painting course check out Marco Bucci, Ahmed Aldoori, Jon Neimeister to name a few. For traditional painting techniques check out Ceasar Santos, and James Gurney on YouTube, and grab Gurney's books Imaginative Realism and Color and Light. Both are great painting reference books. Your minis are very beautifully done. You clearly learned a great deal of different artistic processes to bring them to the finish you’re capable of! However to draw and paint ideas out of your head, on paper and canvas has a lot more going on. Ultimately the foundation of fantasy painting is drawing so the better you are at drawing your ideas the better you will be able to paint them. There’s a lot to unpack here, but here are some quick answers to your questions-  What pencil should I use for sketching? If you’re painting over it, use what ever pencil you grab first. If you have a choice, start with and HB or #2 pencil Why? HB/#2 pencils are cheap, ubiquitous, don’t smudge, and have a decent value range (light to dark) If you NEED a darker value, use 2B or above, If you NEED less smudging, use 2H or above. If you NEED a pencil… just use whatever you have.  How far should I take the sketch before I start putting down paint? It’s a very personal choice how far to take this stage. No wrong answers. Many begin painting after a simple linear under-drawing, some after blocking in values, some go further. It’s frustrating to hear, but only you can know this. How much do YOU need on the page to comfortably begin and finish a painting? Your minis look amazing, but have you done any fantasy painting, or copied any MTG or Warhammer scenes in acrylic? If so, posting some for critique will help you get a barometer of how much of each preliminary stage you might want to include in your process to improve your work. But some experimentation will also help, pick a favorite MTG card and try to replicate it in pencil, or just try to paint it in acrylic. You’re only going to learn by doing. I’m a huge Karl Kopinski fan and he has shared some of his process here on Proko, so check out his process for some insight.  Line Weight? Line weight is just a tool used to convey an idea. If you’re inking, you might want to include it in your sketching phase. David Finch applies line weight AFTER fully drawing the basic tight line-drawing of his scene, and then uses the line-weight to dictate where he blocks in shadow. David pencils very tightly and fully completes his line weight, rendering and full shadows for everything in pencil on his pages before it’s inked and colored. David also paints in acrylic a lot on his live stream so check out his YouTube channel for some of his process there. Like I said, Line weight is just a tool used to imply light direction, form, movement, distance, among other things. Only you can say how much you need in a sketch if you’re going to paint it, but learning how to use it will help inform your paintings. Ink Unless you’re traditionally inking your work, no need to incorporate it, but it’s a great medium to practice and to learn. If you want to traditionally replicate the second image of the red stylized comic character you posted you could ink your lines using waterproof ink, and paint over it with watercolor, gouache, acrylic, etc…. Again… it’s up to you. Alex Ross uses black gouache as his “ink” in some of his work. Worth checking out.  Figure? Where should I concentrate my efforts Life/reference or construction? Both.  If you want to include figures in your work, there is no wasted time in studying Loomis. Loomis is just a tool to improve your understanding of how to draw the figure. Doesn’t matter what method you use to draw your figures, Reilly, Loomis, Bridgman, Proko, Hampton, Jones, they’re all excellent, and there’s no wasted time in studying how each solves the problem so you're more versatile. Comic artists draw from imagination using construction, and make it believable having drawn from life. Learn construction so you can draw anything from imagination, and learn to draw from life/photo reference so you don’t have to make it all up! Why learn to blend graphite from 2H through 8B for a perfect tonal shift if you're going to paint over it? These two aren't connected. You don't NEED to do that in your under drawing, you can, but as you realize it would be unnecessary. However, being able to blend a graphite gradient subtly from 2H to 8B trains your hand to evenly apply values, and trains your eye to see value shifts. If you can control these value shifts in graphite you will be able to create more relevant sketches/thumbnails/compositions/planning stages of your painting. Painting is all about value, and learning to separate and organize values in graphite will make you a better painter. Bonus: A “Painterly” style is used to describe loose, brushy, impressionistic strokes, over a highly rendered photorealistic style. The blue image you posted is more painterly than the red, but I would consider the blue image more tightly rendered than “painterly.” Hope this helps!

so what i understand from your post is that you want to get good an make amazing splash art or concept art like some of the great artists you admire , but you dont want to waste time on finding out how you get there and on things you might not use.. so you just want to learn whats neccessary to get some great art pieces. The simple answer on your questions like for example with the pencil is try out for your self and get a feeling for what works best for you... In Art there is no 1 way to do smth, everybody learns different and works different.. there are probably more ways to achieve a great splash art then there are people teaching you to do so. For the Construction Question and the Reference thing.... Its no ways of time to learn the lumis method and learn constructing, becouse you will still use reference, most great artists rely on both their ability to construct and to use multiple references to achieve their vision. If you only use refernece it will get very hard for you to paint or draw smth pure from imagination.. u have to learn to understand the construction of basicly everything and how to use multiple refernces without relying on them to be 1 to 1 what you want to draw.. its a trip, a journy dont try to rush art to get to smth, try to find joy in learning different techniques and after working for a few years you start figuring out whats the best way for YOU to make epic splash arts etc.. Try to make courses from people you admire and try to do so as they say you will autimaticly pic the habits you want to do for your work process, you can learn from nearly anything. sry for my bad english not my main language.. hope this helped you a little bit