Well life happened. I took a break (not entirely by choice but oh well is what it is). I've spent the last few weeks contemplating a lot of things, haven't really found any answers yet but found a lot of paths to try and make some changes so that's good. During the break, I did re-evaluated where I am with my art.

I know I'm not entirely happy with where I am with all of my fundamentals, however, I feel like there are areas where I am ready for more. I spent a lot of time thinking on this and I've decided that I am moving onto Term 2. I can always take a step back and revisit Term 1, but I feel like I need a bit of a mix of learning new things and practicing the old stuff to really keep me balanced and happy on this journey.

I don't know, I might be making a mistake but I feel like a change is necessary so I am trying it and seeing where it goes. Again, If nothing else, I can just take a step away and go back to practicing fundamentals (I'm not sure we ever really stop practicing these as it is).

With that being said, I have watched through the photoshop lecture and I did make a version of the box art deal, but I am not happy with it so I am reworking it. I also did line art for the self portrait (I know that I was supposed to use a mirror, but I don't have one that isn't screwed into a wall and I can't really move my set up to the bathroom for a day so...). I have the line art mostly completed but the shading is difficult for me.

It is definitely a good challenge though, and hopefully by the end of term 2, I'll be finding all of this a lot easier.

Anyways, here is some of the things I've been able to do. It isn't much by any means, especially since its almost been a month since my last post but it's what I have at this moment.

This is the current photoshop assignment, I made the characters with the pen tool but wanted to practice some shading so I did and it really didn't turn out how I wanted it too. It was a good practice attempt I guess, but I was really disappointed with it.

The idea was to give kind of a portfolio cover to my Term 1 journey with the little skeleton representing anatomy and the box representing perspective, and then the cubes representing the elements of art but I don't quite have the skill to pull it off yet nor do I really know how I truly want it to look.

I will revisit this idea at a later date, but for now, I'd like to just find something that isn't relating to me and have a bit more fun with it than I did with this one.

After watching through some of the term 2 stuff, I'm going to try and do some quick form studies during my warm ups, where I'm not trying to be perfect but just trying to build up muscle memory of these forms to get better at quickly recalling them as I work on things. We'll see if it helps or not but I figure it is worth a shot, considering how vital they are.

This was tough, this is my first portrait that I've attempted in probably about 5 years now. I did do better than I thought I would but its still pretty rough.

@mitsuki-youko Thank you! Yea that is what I was thinking too and I've been having some fun with this already so I think it was time to make the switch and move forward.

@snakker Thank you! I've been working really hard practicing the basic forms and rotating them in space, it seems like those have been helping and finally paying off a bit haha.

@patrycja.lerch Thank you! I'm happy you think so. I'm still not sold on it but it's something that I can come back too and try my luck at it again. Hopefully I'll have a better grasp of what I want it to look like by that time haha.

I don't have much for today. I'm not quite done yet but I've got a busy evening ahead of me so wanted to get something posted before all that hits. So here's the whole two things that I have at the moment.

Spent some time reworking the self portrait and the overall contour/line work of it. Noticed some things looked pretty funky and wanted to get at least those fixed. Then spent the rest of the time getting the shading done.

Was really challenging, I still don't really know how to work hair so did the best I could. First time using a hair brush and even working with hair digitally so that was kind of neat. A lot of areas to improve but I am pretty excited to get into more of Term 2's exercises and start working to improve on these new areas.

Anyways, thanks for looking! Hope you are all well!

Well first day back in town, got more into Term 2. Watched most of the Anatomy 1 video, and jeez is it packed with all sorts of information. It's great, but I did get a bit overwhelmed with all the information. I'll finish the last part on another day.

That being said, it's really exciting and I filled a couple pages in the sketchbook with notes and just head studies. Gonna take a lot of work but I feel far more prepared for it than I thought I would be so that's a good sign.

Anyways, here's what I've got for the day.

Still struggling with the straight on view, but it'll come with time. I will probably rewatch this part of the video again and check that I am doing all the parts correctly, especially now having a proper session of practice doing it now.

I overloaded myself a bit today and gestures just felt rough to me. Oh well, I will get back on track throughout this process.

Did another session this evening, I was feeling good and wanted to take another stab at the exercise before I called it and It felt a bit better to me so that was good.

Anyways, thanks for looking as always!

Fell behind and was trying to knock all of my studies out today, but lost steam. Going to do more realism based faces for the next set of studies.

Thanks for looking as always.

Got a bit more done today. Finished up my character head studies, I had fun with them. Also had some fun creating some brushes this evening while I was just messing around.

Was going to do all realistic faces for this section, but they took a lot out of me and I didn't want to put it off another day so I did throw Midna in to have one simpler one to end off on. I had a good time doing them though, looking forward to getting more practice as I move through these exercises.

Thanks for looking as always!