A while back, I talked about "The Art of Finishing". The concept of finishing is very important as a creator and "finishing" something can have many different levels and milestones.
I believe one of the most helpful things to get in the habit of deadlines is to enter competitions or challenges.
I recently entered another art challenge, this time, on Artstation. the Challenge was called "The Medieval Back and Forth Challenge". and it was a 2 part challenge. The first part was for concept artists to submit 2D illustrations based on certain categories for a video game. This would include character art, props, environment, and Visual Effects. Part 2 was taking the concept art from part one and modeling the art in 3D and rendering them out in a real time engine program like Unity or Unreal Engine. Prior to this challenge, I have never used Unreal Engine and only dabbled in Unity however, I really wanted to learn Unreal Engine. I also ended learning a few tricks in another program called "Substance Painter" along the way.
Here's a link to my entry with my updates along the way:
Positive and Negative Viewpoints
I'm a firm believer competition is important because it creates motivation to be better and also to learn from those that are better. Sadly, this can have the opposite effect on some people where they may instead get "scared away" from the better artists or may even look at completions as "extra homework they don't need to do". Some may not even want to enter a competition or challenge because they don't feel "good enough". In these particular cases, it's important to ask yourself how seriously you want to take art, and you don't even need to pursue art as a career to take art seriously. If you wan to improve, you need to put extra effort into the art and if you do not, you will stagnate. Instead of viewing it as "extra homework" view it as "an opportunity to draw or create something new". Instead of getting scared from those that are better, instead view it as "I won't have a chance if I don't try" and "What can I learn from them to be better myself?"
Learning From Failing
These where pieces I entered in a Pokemon Trading Card Art Contest and a Digimon Trading Card Art contest. Both my pokemon and Digimon pictures where not chosen, however, I learned alot looking at the Pokemon Winners and Digimon winners of each competition. I learned my art did not have enough dynamic angles, especially in the pokemon category. Looking back I can say the art was way too "centered" and "straight on" compared to some of the other pictures submitted. In Doing the contest, I can say I learned alot about coloring and illustrating in different ways, as well as fusing 3D elements with 2D elements. Some may consider the lighting "not professional enough or even "the style not pushed enough". These are things to not beat yourself over but rather to reevaluate and decide "what can I do differently next time". The Digimon card I did a year later, and here I started playing with different perspectives. I feel in this piece the immediate reference to "Digimon Next Order" may have been too on the nose or even some of the details being too small and getting lost in the background. Sometimes, art is even chosen by opinion, as art is incredibly subjective in nature, and sometimes an idea may stand out more to one judge over another judge and does not mean your own art is not "good art" by any means.
Learning From Winning
This is an Example of a piece I entered and won Best in Show award back in 2006. I was practicing realism at the time, and thus was in particular practicing the concept of adding "noise" to give a more photographic look to an image. This piece is also when I finally hit my epiphany in "being able to copy what I see".
At this point, I had been entering the local art shows for about 3 years in a row and have learned a lot about expectation in details and valuing the ability to reference properly.
When I won Best in Show for this piece, I knew my efforts in practicing observation where successful, and I'll never forget how shocked I was when my piece got chosen. My piece was even featured in the local newspaper, and the advisor at my school's anime club told me about my appearance in the paper.
When you finally succeed at something, it's important to also note that "this is another step" and "This is not the best you'll ever be". Remember, it's important to continue to improve. It's a similar concept to a martial artist reaching black belt and winning a tournament. A martial artist can continue to sharpen their skills and even learn to mix other forms of martial arts into their current repertoire (hence things like 2nd degree black belt, 3rd degree, MMA tournaments. etc. )
This a time to celebrate success and add it to a portfolio or credentials for future jobs, but is not something to be overly arrogant about either. Learning to succeed means you met another milestone, and that first time you succeed allows You to validate growth but to also be aware you can continue to grow.
Competitions don't even need to be big in order to be meaningful. They can be weekly challenges on a website, they can be club challenges, local challenges, or even challenges among friends.
and later on in a future blog, I also want to talk about How it's important to both "copy" and "understand" what you are drawing. I was 16 at the time, and where I nailed realism, I was merely copying what I was looking at and did not understand fully what I was really drawing at the time. I know for a fact in the competition I entered at the time, realism was deemed to be far more impressive than stylized art after observing some past winners as I did not get higher awards until I started studying realism.
Other Art Challenges
In my blog "The Art of Finishing" I also talked about how I finished Inktober for the first time. The Inktober challenge was also a way for me to practice new angles for drawing characters which in this case was "Drat". I did this in response to the "Pokemon Card Art Contest I entered in 2022" and came to the realization my angles where not dynamic enough.
On the topic of Inktober, I can also say there are usually monthly art community challenges that go on instagram, Deviantart Art, Art Station, and Twitter. Some other challenges include:
Swordtember - Draw a sword related picture everyday in September
Mermay - Draw a picture of a mermaid everyday in May
Smaugust - Draw a dragon everyday in August
NodeVember - 3D Shader challenge to make something node based every other day in November.
These monthly challenges are great for defeating "art stagnation" and drawing something different than what you're used to . They are casual challenges, and thus don't have large stakes, but they teach the concept of submitting art on time. The reward being you are more likely to be seen that month online for participating in an art challenge.
Time Management
I mentioned that art challenges are great for deadlines, and part of why this is so crucial is it grooms positive behavior for the business of art. I feel "Business in art" is often overlooked from many spry upcoming artists, as a lot of artists may look at "business" as a boring topic and then realize how crucial these things are later in life. One of the major points that can be gained from entering competitions and challenges is to learn to submit work on time.
When we work on art for ourselves, we don't really have a larger grasp how much time is spent. Technically, time spent for personal art doesn't matter, but it matters a lot when it comes to either working for other people, dealing with commissions, handling mental fatigue and burnout, time management skills, and even delivering art for your own community.
Suddenly, when there's a "deadline" attached, the time already starts ticking, and you have a limited time to work on a piece of art. If a challenge or competition has a fairly long time to work, make milestones every week.
See You Soon!
Thank you everyone for reading this blog. Once again, look forward to upcoming art ideas and topics. Make sure to subscribe to stay up to date! You can also take a look at my social media updates on Instagram , Twitter, and Artstation!!
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