I suck. Now what?

The first step of improvement is to admit that you suck.

I suck. 

At 15, I taught myself how to use photoshop. I mostly dealt with concept at, webcomics, and original character illustrations. 

Tarpaulin or lay-out design? 

What was that? 

People tend to assume that if you can use photoshop, you can do anything it's capable of. 

That's not true, by the way.

My pride and refusal to learn and adapt cost me the chance to improve. I have lost opportunities of pride. My pride has lead me to one of my weaknesses. 

Lay-out Design.

I view the craft of making tarpauling design as a complicated matter. 

Experimenting to search for the perfect blend of color harmony, font, images and lay-out stress my neurons.

I became lazy, and decided not to learn anything about tarpaulin design.

I mean... I knew how to use photoshop. I'd get through it. 

Wrong move, girl. 

I suck. 

But you know... I won't suck forever. 

To create good art, I have to accept I'll be creating lots of bad art. 

Bad art is okay. It's part of the learning process. 

The growth killer called Ego

As a teenager, I thought I knew everything about art. That I was better than my ex-bestfriend in creating art.

I forgot that people change, and boy did we change!

Ex-bestfriend is an incredibly talented artist.

And me?

My ego stopped me from growing.

Lesson number 1: Do not let your ego think you're the best. You aren't.

Phony

What have I done?

It's already August 11 and I am going to speak about "how to draw" on August 14.

Oh my God.

It's frightening me.

How could I have said "Yes" to my former Editor in Chief?

I absolutely feel like a phony.

I no longer draw.

I chose to write.

And I'm giving a talk about how to draw?

Just what... Just what could I possible share now?

How an Intern made me Walk my Talk

Ola!

I was supposed to create a 5 expression sprite of Akane Tendo from Ranma 1/2. (but I do have a different output)

I wanted to see if I still I could still.... you know, draw anime/manga inspired stuff.

I do have plans of establishing a sideline of drawing character portraits for Visual Novels and Indie JRPGs. But from the looks of it, I think I still can. Though I have to admit my skills have regressed a lot.

I won't excuse myself. It looks horrible. (others might say it's decent). But yes, it looks cute and horrible. It only shows how stagnant I've become.

There's still room for improvement. It's not too late for me though.

Another reason why I decided to blog about this is because of an Intern whom I had a friendly chat with. The DSWD has this summer job for out of school youths and working students. They are assigned to the different units and projects in the department. There are about 5 Interns assigned in our floor. Since she had finished her job, she sat beside me and talked to me.

This intern is 2 years younger than I am and she's from a neighboring school way back in college. The lady's a 4th year Irregular BS IT student.  So we where chatting and chatting and chatting...when she mentioned to me how her classmates (who graduated on time) now have stable jobs.

Deciding to motivate her, I advised her to start a project. Any project. And post it online. Keep making and post them a lot. Who knows? Someone might find you and seek your services.

After I distilled that advise, I was thinking inside my head.

Shit!

Here I am, giving to a 22 year old, and I'm just sitting and talking about my golden days!

I HAVE GOT TO WALK MY TALK.

Seth Godin told me to SUSDA______

In his blog, Seth Godin writes about showing up, sitting down and (SUSDA) working or painting or *insert whatever activity".

In his book, "show your work!", Austin Kleon writes how its improtant to have a daily dispatch.

For Godin, the act of doing something is more important than the output.

For 2 days, I've drawn 22 single-panelled comics. It's the largest amount I've done since 2012. While I know it's very simple (bordering to ugly for some people), it's the very same reason why I keep the doing it.

It's too easy to make that it seems foolish not to do it.

Showing up everyday and sitting down on my chair to write and draw... it's a commitment, you know.

My endgame is to find my personal groove to create. And this commitment works for me! (Writing 10 ideas is a testament) i'm seeing results to meet my endgame.

My only challenge is whether I can make it sustainable... and the answer lies in the followimg days.

Tomorrow's another day. Another batch of comics and ideas about to be born.

Show up!

***

1. My fiction's getting some nice reviews. To be honest, I was really concerned about receiving those. I read somewhere in the net that when you take your focus off the reviews and focus on creating the product, the reviews will come to you.

2. Chapters 8, 9, 10 and 12 are already drafted! I have 11 and the epilogue waiting to be done! Whew!

3. Wrote 60 ideas on 6 different topics today. I had 2 great ideas to implement! Unfortunately, due to my limited attention span, I choose to focus on 2-3 projects at a time. My hands are full.

4. Cut and froze some bananas. I have plans to make a banana-based ice cream. Yummy!

5. Discovered an excellent webcomic in webtoons! (Siren's Lament). I never thought you could mix music comics together at the same time. The effect is devastating that it took my breathe away!

6. Made a voodoo doll and sealed it with Mod Podge. It looks great! Looks like I still have the skills. Took me 20-25 minutes to make one :D

7. Devoured/browsed through different art of local artists here in Davao. I'm blown away at their output. It's simply amazing. Nothing beats the feeling when you see amazing art!

8. Discovered a potential not-so time consuming past time thanks to number 7. While I do want to act on it now, I prefer to unload/finish a project before I embark on another one.

9. Projects projects projects. Side-projects? Life is fun when you're creating something.

10. Had a good home-workout! Committed to do 8 reps of negative pull-ups. I'm looking forward for the day i'll be able to pull myself over the bar!