Year 1: Quarter 3

Goals of the Previous Quarter

[✓] Understand how to use color in an effective and dynamic way.

I now know how to make colors dance without them falling over in a drunken heap. However, there's always room for improvement and that primarily requires developing my "internal sense of color." That is, using my eyes to judge whether something looks good in the moment, as opposed to trying to recall a bunch of rules, images and examples on how color is supposed to work (more on that in next goal). Not to attack anyone that prefers to do that, of course. My mind just doesn't work that way.

[✓] Find a way to systematically create abstract backgrounds and overlays.

Once a upon a time, I took great joy in complaining about how thoughtless creating abstract imagery was. "You just splash some paint on the canvas and you're done; it's stupid!" Not quite. Well, in most cases. I still find postmodern art to be pointless and irritating, but colorful and well-thought out non-representative art is just as challenging to create as highly technical drawings. One would just need to approach it in a slightly different mindset.

Something that changed my mind about abstract artwork was a comment on Reddit (yes, yes, very strange) that went along the lines of "Both abstract and realistic art require ample amounts of skill to master. However, abstract art is able to capture far more than realistic imagery - it's able to convey and evoke stronger emotions than realism."

I've discovered that you're not trying to recall or reference how something looks when it comes to this sort of thing. You're trying to create a fundamental balance between all of the elements you wish to present in the composition. From my experience, it seems like you're using a mixture of intuition, instinct and experimentation. "I have splotchy blue streaks here. How about a very small amount high-saturated turquoise? Interesting. What if I add some here or there? How about high-saturated violet?" And so on. And honestly... it's always a blast trying to see how I can make a bunch of colors and formless shapes work harmoniously together.

[?] Improve understanding of value in order to create texture.

Somewhat of a confused goal, so I can't quite say that I was able to reach it. I planned to get through the rest of the different 'races' and in the third one, I would be able to experiment with texture. Buuut, I got burnt out on drawing people over and over and over. Humans are just so damn boring, well, when it comes to appearance. However, looking at these two different things independently (value and texture), I do believe my understanding of value has improved, but in very minor ways.

When it comes to texture, I can't say I'm too sure how to do it with digital painting. Not intentionally. Perhaps I should start looking for different brushes or look into stock images for texture overlays, but then again, I've seen plenty of works that look just fine without them. I'm going to abandon this one for now and see where my thoughts lie in the future. I'm more than likely going to experiment here and there, but I don't think I'm going to set goals for texture creation any time soon.

[✓✓✓+] Reach 100 Watchers.

Okay. I grossly underestimated how quickly this goal would've been reached. I knew I was going to hit it within three months, but not within less than a month of setting the goal. I gained 320 Watchers in three months and this bodes well for the following ones. Let's keep it rolling.

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I think I'm done setting concrete goals that pertain to my ability to draw. Instead, I'm going to set wide-reaching ones, as well as goals that pertain to what I'm actually doing with my art. Like so!

Goals of the New Quarter

• Experiment!

• Complete the nine different castes.

• Illustrate the world all Astra inhabit.

What? No more number goals?!

Yeah, yeah, all of the numbers are gonna go up. Page views, favorites, watchers, the number of times I forget what I was going to do while walking into another room. I'm not worried about it. Well. Most of those.

I do wish DeviantArt provided some incentive to engage in discussion on artworks... but that's where Reddit can fill that void for me. Oh well. One can dream, can't they?

looking at you, Eclipse - hurry up and get here

Also, I'm planning on posting journals on the lore of the world as I see fit. Adds a little bit of substance in between these tri-monthly updates. I think those are going to be fun.

Until the next one, April 15th!