01-24-2014, 11:38 PM
JonHop said it all, pretty much. I just want to add a little to the subject...
From my personal experience and also from experience I had from watching others, the biggest danger in being self taught is the fact that you need to find a way to check your facts:) And joining this forum is a big step towards making sure you don't acquire wrong approaches and wander for years without progress even if you are practicing hard. I've seen that happen to MANY people.
Some important aspects of art aren't intuitive and people that are self taught (or went to a bad school or atelier) often develop wrong thinking and looking processes and don't know that. And then, even when they watch, for example, gnomon videos or Feng Zhu's videos or whatever, they are able to perceive something, but it's still some skewed version, adapted to their wrong approach. And they don't progress. I know tons of these people from college for example.
But, assuming you are not at the absolute beginning, you might already know this and have the fundamental knowledge with which you can filter information and create practice that works. But, in case you are not completely sure in that aspect, I would advise to do a lot of communication, get feedback, post practices, sketches, processes, ask EVERYTHING, use only tried methods and well known authors, ask about those etc.
But yeah, a self taught artist can be just as skilled as any other. There are pros (creating your own program and focusing accordingly, not being stressed by exams etc) and there are cons (the biggest one being the lack of a direct tutoring, like trying to learn kung fu from the instructional video instead of training with some master). And, of course, you would have to be your own slave driver, which is hard for some people and they turn to complacency quite quickly - I was one of them for YEARS.
And yes, I also thing that one year is simply not enough. Depends on your current level, of course, but generally speaking it's not.
So, these would be my 2c:)
From my personal experience and also from experience I had from watching others, the biggest danger in being self taught is the fact that you need to find a way to check your facts:) And joining this forum is a big step towards making sure you don't acquire wrong approaches and wander for years without progress even if you are practicing hard. I've seen that happen to MANY people.
Some important aspects of art aren't intuitive and people that are self taught (or went to a bad school or atelier) often develop wrong thinking and looking processes and don't know that. And then, even when they watch, for example, gnomon videos or Feng Zhu's videos or whatever, they are able to perceive something, but it's still some skewed version, adapted to their wrong approach. And they don't progress. I know tons of these people from college for example.
But, assuming you are not at the absolute beginning, you might already know this and have the fundamental knowledge with which you can filter information and create practice that works. But, in case you are not completely sure in that aspect, I would advise to do a lot of communication, get feedback, post practices, sketches, processes, ask EVERYTHING, use only tried methods and well known authors, ask about those etc.
But yeah, a self taught artist can be just as skilled as any other. There are pros (creating your own program and focusing accordingly, not being stressed by exams etc) and there are cons (the biggest one being the lack of a direct tutoring, like trying to learn kung fu from the instructional video instead of training with some master). And, of course, you would have to be your own slave driver, which is hard for some people and they turn to complacency quite quickly - I was one of them for YEARS.
And yes, I also thing that one year is simply not enough. Depends on your current level, of course, but generally speaking it's not.
So, these would be my 2c:)