Peter's Sketchbook

[Peter]

@Peter: Regarding your slump, it's going to happen no matter what you do. It happens to the best, be it artists or professional baseball players. That said, however, you can be engendering the slump by putting unneeded pressure on yourself. You can work hard at your practice without having to put so much pressure on yourself to draw so perfectly or draw like a particular person. I notice in some of your postings you will sometimes compare your drawings to Brian's or Erik's. First, these guys have been working artists for many years; second, you are not them. You will develop your own unique style, incorporating what you have learned from these guys and others, and what you discover on your own.

I definitely suggest a mix of deliberate construction studies and then just some free flowing exercises where you start a portrait from an eye or nose, or the figure from a limb even. All you have learned from your construction practice will help guide you.

I am 100% for building up a drawing or painting using one of the construction methods. i use it all the time. Just don't be so reliant on it that you can't produce without it.

Believe me, I know what you are feeling. I have gone through it many times before with my sculpting. Eventually I stopped comparing myself to others and stopped studying other artists' designs as much as I used to (still referred to other artists' work for inspiration), and started referencing nature and developing my own style.

I think your studies are looking great. The portraits and the figures. Keep working hard. It's paying off.

Got your PM. Thanks. I sent you my email.

Yh I know slumps happen, think I was just extra annoyed that I had a week off work and felt like it was kind of a waste. I'm just too overly critical on myself, always have been. I think it's mainly because like everyone here (well most) I want to get to a professional level and make a living doing what I want to do, I know you get to that level when you get there all you can do is practice, some people get their quicker than others. I just tend to worry about other things such as making enough money in the meantime to live off and how much longer it will take etc, I just need to try and silence those worries.
I'll give what you said ago this week if I can (have alot less time this week) might have to be on the weekend of next week, as you said I'll try a drawing from the eye first of another facial feature etc and see how it goes and if my drawigns are any looser, I'll try and not use the abstraction lines aswell and just go by comparative measurement instead.
I definitely compare my work to other artists way too much only becuase I want to get to the same level but as you said I'm wayyy too hard at times.
Thanks for such a lengthy response aswell. :)