I have – against all odds, IMHO – reached HOUR TWENTY on this project. One fifth of the way done! Perhaps I have a chance of seeing it through! Or not. 80 hours is still a Very Long Way To Go.
I’ve been working my way through more basic shapes and shading, moving slowly into one-point perspective. Because I’m determined to do it the hard way, or…honestly, it’s more that I’m trying to LEARN things that I’ve only half-assedly learned in the past, but anyway. Point is, I’m kind of going back and forth between the 100 Hours project as laid out by the lady who put it together for her boyfriend, and the Udemy art course I paid for a million years ago but never pursued. I’ve done a bunch of incredibly boring things I won’t subject you to, but here’s a collection of some of the pieces I’ve done over the past few weeks that I’m pleased with.
Quick commentary about them, I guess: I just kind of liked how the objects turned out in the upper left, and the middle top was a very basic one point perspective. The room to its right was probably the most complicated 1PP I’d ever finished, until I did the house on the lower left. The middle blorbos with a lunchbox and things is actually the Hour Twenty project of practicing shading/depth/shapes, and I’m pleased with the lunchbox while also wondering WTF I was thinking, since I’m pretty sure I hadn’t drawn a dinosaur since I was about nine. The lil’ girl with the sword is cute and if I could get to where I could do original characters of my own with that level of confidence I’d be thrilled.
The first 4 of those were from the 100 hours course before I switched to the Udemy course. But before I did that…
…remember what I said about making it harder for myself? So the thing is, I don’t necessarily think drawing along with a tutorial that’s telling and showing you each step to take is indicative of having LEARNED to do it, so I decided the correct thing to do was at least TRY a one point perspective entirely on my own. If I failed miserably, it was obviously something I was going to need to spend more time on, right? So I did this:
THIS. IS THE MOST DIFFICULT THING. I HAVE EVER. DRAWN.
It took two hours and I was EXHAUSTED. No wonder I always gave up on perspective. It’s HARD. Also I got too tired to finish the whole drawing in one go as I’d expected to be able to do, but as the POINT was the perspective, I feel I accomplished the goal pretty successfully. I’m in no way practiced at it, but I can clearly do it, and that was what I needed to find out. So. Mission accomplished!
Also, the reader who provided the photo said “Seeing the work incomplete is fascinating, as the left side shows me how you’re building the layers from the background to the foreground. I know very little about drawing, so this peek into the process is so happy-making!” which made me feel better about leaving it half-finished. I absolutely never thought any drawing I did could be insightful to someone else. :)
I’ll probably do another post at the 25 hour mark, ’cause that’s the quarter mark, too. I think I’m going to go through the rest of the section I’m on for the Udemy course and then possibly do the next two sections, which get up to basic perspective (I think), and then go back to finish more perspective from the 100 Hours project. I’m not entirely sure what’s after that, especially since I see in my very basic breakdown that I left out hours 30-40. They might be more perspective work, but since we are once more reaching for “is she really going to do that much?” territory past hour 25 (I mean, I’m at 20, I’m definitely going to get to the quarter mark out of stubbornness if nothing else at this point), I won’t worry about that too much right now.