A few days ago, I went to china town in los angeles to get some dim-sum, and I noticed an old run-down art store. I decided to go in, and see if they had any good deals. The place smelled like old must and damp paper, and there was an ancient chinese man sitting behind the counter wearing period clothing of centuries past. He looked at me suspiciously, but told me to look around. In the back of the store, on the highest shelf in the recesses of of a dark shadow, I saw what looked like an old stoneware jar holding a very thick bejeweled paintbrush. I pulled it out and suddenly the old man was standing behind me. "Don't Touch That!", he yelled, "It's a crimson dagger."

That's the last thing I remember before waking up here, in my office, asleep on the floor, the entire room covered with a weird golden dust, and this website up in my browser, a sticky note on my keyboard that said, "If you study, you can be beautiful. I love you."

I don't know what this all means, but I know that I'm mediocre at art and I would like to get better. I've been trying to do studies and practice every day, as much as possible. I would like to get some friends to study with and help motivate me, as well as them. I'm probably older than most of the people here, at 34, but I still want to become excellent at art, and whatever comes of that comes of that.

Just want to say hello!

Good Day to All!

My name is Thomas O'Connor and I was fairly active in the comic book industry for many years. I wore many hats but often the fact that I married early and started a family kept me from taking chances and taking on the bigger jobs. Treading a "safer" path so to speak. But that "Job" wasn't my passion and now that need, needs to be addressed. My strength and weakness was that I was really good at almost every aspect. But I wasn't amazing (at least to me) and could not seem to focus on any one discipline.

I'm looking to get back into doing my artwork again and hopefully earning more than sporadic income. So I am creating all new images, exercising my skills and learning new ones as best I can. But unlike when I was in school I do not have a that ability to bounce my ideas off of other students or artists. So I'm hoping this is one piece of that puzzle.
I hope you folks pardon my ignorance on some things and I will do my best to assist and pass on any knowledge I have gained as I hope t learn from the comments and critiques I pick up here.

Best to all, and I look forward to connect with a few of you, feel free to check out my Facebook presence until I have my website back up again at www.thomasfoconnor.com

https://www.facebook.com/thomas.f.oconnor

https://www.facebook.com/pages/In-Visions-Graphics

Best to all
~TFO

Hello guys!

Name's Rafael Ventura. I'm 30, but I liked drawing since childhood (as I think everybody is), just never stopped drawing. Although I must admit, never took it seriously until I was 23.

Nowadays I work mainly with videogames, with my passion other than painting and drawing: animating. I'm working on some Wayforward games, such as Adventure Time and Regular Show, and the fighting game Skullgirls.

Before that though, I did an art college here in Brazil, but admittedly it did me more harm than good, since games and comics (my main focus) were not seen as art and I was even "invited" to get out of college. Which such endearing philosophy and teachers, I had to try to figure out everything alone on the college's library and close friends who also wanted to learn how to paint, but you can do only this much by yourself.

I haven't had much contact with artists since I had no proper internet until recently, so since I started to look at it as a career (at 23), I've been trying to learn as much as I can and, most importantly, UN-learn what I've got from my college (this being the hardest part, but I think with positive results).

Thankfully, early this year I had the opportunity to go to the Imaginism workshop in Canada and man, what a difference does it make to see true professionals working! I have a much better sense of where I stand now, and how to improve.

I never had the courage to register on forums like this or similar ones because to me it seemed a far cry from where I standed, but I feel more confident now to show how I'm progressing and, hopefully, someday achieve a skill that will make me happy with myself. I do believe critique is the best way to improve, so please do it with my studies and work!

If you want to see my works (both painting and animation), please feel free to visit my site: www.ilustraterra.com

Hello everyone
I am a Danish-Swiss guy living i Copenhagen, Denmark. I am 21 (almost) and I love art (the reason why I'm here ). I've been drawing for fun since i can remember, but it's only been two years since I started to draw seriously. I have a dream to get into intertainement design. To reach that goal I need practice. I am self taught until now, and need to push harder. It can be quite hard to struggle alone and I think it is time to have a community to stick to, though I'm not sure my level is high enough to be here. I really like the concept of finding a partner and I can't wait to begin the journey. My ultimate goal would be to see one day my illustrations on the new Magic the gathering cards or Dungeon and Dragon books. If you want to see what I do you can eventually look by my DA page http://valaraukar6669.deviantart.com/
See you around!

Hello my name's John Bailey. Where to start? I got a BFA in sculpture that never lead me anywhere. I stopped making art for years. I started working in the game industry doing Testing and quality assurance. QA has made me want to be an artist again. I didn't really know where to start again. About a year ago after watching a bunch of Speed paints I stumbled upon Dave's Livestream and got really inspired. I lost my job and got really serious about drawing and painting for a month or two till i found another job. It felt good but its hard to keep it going when your working 60-70 hours a week for someone else. I still have a full time job but I can't use that as an excuse anymore if i'm gonna get anywhere else now's the time, i'm not getting any younger. I'm excited about this community and can't wait for tons more inspiration!

-John Bailey

What's up Crimson Daggers? Now that I'm registered am I also a Crimson Dagger? Or do we start out as a different color, maybe a shade of red that eventually ends up a Crimson? What the hell am I talking about? This is supposed to be an introduction.

My name is Saul Estrada, aka psypher, but my friends call me Psy (pronounced sigh). I've been drawing and stuff for a really long time, but I want to get better. If all goes well I should going back to school at Ai Sacramento and finish up my remaining year to get my B.A. in game art and design. Below is a pic I just finished this morning.

   

Dream job: Working at any video game or film studio in pre-production getting to sketch and paint characters, costumes, props, buildings, environments and pretty much anything that I'm asked to do.

Focus: Right now I'm trying to get better at realistic lighting. I've never done Plein-Air studies and only ever did still life paintings for school. I know that's the key. So yeah. Gonna be doing a ton of that for a while.

well here we are huh?, some how all artist roads are different yet so similar, well what can i say? i have always wanted to learn but school is to expensive, i'm mostly self teaching myself but if i find people who also want to improve that's always a positive my goals are 2 ,to be a concept artist and to make a comic book on the future, I've given myself a realistic goal of 5 to 6 years to reach pro level(not master level) well that's all really i'm not a good talker.....HI lets improve for our dreams ~~ i even got a tablet thingy ,its so hard LOL

Hi everyone! I'm 24y.o. from Russia, still hoping that someday i might make my dream come true and participate in making animation movies. I decided to get started with drawing fundamentals like shape,light,perspective,etc., so i'll be just watching, reading and commenting for some time. See you there ;-)

Yeesh, you'd think after several years being on other forums, introducing myself would get a little less scary.

Anyway, name's Azuli. I'm a hobby artist who, like Stella, recently got her groove back (when it comes to art.) But seeing all my stuff from 2010 and back, I've seen how BAD I really was and wanna get better.

Favorite traditional mediums (that I really need to use more) ink and pencils.

Digital medium: Corel Painter. I should try Photoshop one of these days.

I have a long way to go in terms of doing art, but I know that, with help, I can get better.

Nice meeting you all!