But I did learn to stop criticizing my art while I'm working on it. That was a huge breakthrough for me. I finally freed up huge amounts of energy which I now use for work and creativity, rather than personal drama and self-bashing.
Now I spend my days patting myself on the back when I sit down and work, and spend the rest of my time trying to find fault with any and all of my completed projects.
So far, this new approach has been bringing good results. Yeah, I'm a bit too complicated and quite an asshole. I know.
Derek Kosol explained to me, and I finally understood, why it's important to keep values close together in a painting - it's to keep the underlying compositional value framework intact. Woot!
I also learned that the most important thing in anatomical drawings is to memorize and understand the points where each muscle inserts into the skeleton. Once that part is handled, a relaxed muscle can be rendered as a surface with minimal curvature (flat), while a flexed muscle can be rendered as a blob (sphere).
Michael Hampton (my analytical figure drawing instructor) is brilliant: his artwork and his teaching method are equally amazing.
So that's my batch of good news for this update :)
Here's some new stuff for my CGMA classes:
