How to not give up

[Tarenken]

I get a lot of suggestions on my critique threads, which is good. I looked through the Loomis books, seem very helpful. I practiced perspective with the help of a couple tutorials, and I tried studying the anatomy of animals.
And none of it has helped.
I'm still the crappy artist I was before. I don't understand the Loomis books because I can't think in 3d, same with the animals. And how the hell am I supposed to apply perspective if I can't draw still life?
I've given up on art before, but come back after a couple days because I've always wanted to have fun with my art. But now my childhood dream of working as an artist has come back and I don't feel I can really not take this seriously anymore. I wish I could get better, I want to, it's not that I don't care, it's that I can't do it.
You people here have probably gone through this... how do you keep going? I like art, it's just that I'm honestly terrible at it. How do you get better when everything seems hopeless?

[Mat Kaminski]

Honestly?

To get to where you want to be, you have to fight from where you are now...

It takes some serious dedication to learn to draw especially if you aren't going to be taking classes.
First things first in my opinion: start gathering up hundreds if not thousands of reference pictures. Art, photos, color palettes, etc. Anything that you enjoy looking at.
Second thing is... studies. Start with the very absolute basics. To learn to get your mindset in the artist eye, you REALLY have to start from nothing. Most people think that drawing cubes are boring as hell. But just effin do it. You might hate it at first... but try doing it for 2hrs a day.
Dont make any excuses about this... draw for at leat 2-3 hrs a day if you can swing it. Anything... even stick figures is a good place to start, because, lets face it... all characters realistically, start from stick figures.
Thats a good place to start I'd say.

www.posemaniacs.com
www.characterdesigns.com
www.conceptart.org
www.deviantart.com
www.hel-looks.com

Resources. There is also a book section here on CA.
Use it all to your advantage. Now start drawing!

[JJacks]

I always look at it like this:

If I keep trying and working hard there is a chance I will become a great artist. If I give up, there is absolutely no chance of me ever becoming a great artist. So I'd rather put in all the hours or study no matter how futile it seems to be at the time.

It takes years of practice and study to be good at art. All the studies that I think aren't helping at the time accumulate together and actually do result in progress. You have to be patient and willing to accept failure even as you become better and better. In the end, I don't think my goal is to ever be a certain level of "good" as much as my goal is to be an artist that is always progressing and enjoying something that is an amazing part of my life.

Part of the struggle is not taking yourself too seriously and to stop thinking you are doomed because you can't do this or that right away or right now. Don't think about things like "I can't draw this way" or "I can't learn how to make things have depth." You can if you try. You may not be great at it now but like I said, if you quit you will never see your full potential.

Calm down and just do your best.

[jigje]

Matte art and JJacks give great advice.

This link to MindCandyMans ConceptArt thread may help. A lesson in never giving up.
MindCandyMan

[Jonas_J]

Lots of valid points so far, just wanted to add something.

I looked through the Loomis books, seem very helpful.

You only Looked through them? Only "looking through them" isn't going to do much. You need to study every image in the book. How do you study you ask? Copy a plate (what Loomis calls his pictures) onto paper. With copy I dont mean tracing it. You should look at the drawing your studying, try to recreate it on paper while trying to understand why loomis placed his lines where he did (read the text for that).

From now on:
- study 3 plates a day
- When the plates are done, draw an object from your desk (could be your cell phone).
- Go to hel-looks (see matte_art's post), pick a picture, draw it.
- Go to posemaniacs, draw one page of poses at 90 secs per pose.

Do this every day. Expand with more exercises as time goes by.


Oh, and there's a-lot of similar threads like this, use the search function.
lastly: open a sketchbook here on CA.

[kingkostas]

I will agree with all the mates here on CA.
Something more.
Can you understand a box/cube in 3d?and put it in perspective?
If you learn how to do that then if you imagine everything else as a construction made of boxes/cubes then i guess you can understand anything in 3d.
Simplifying things is always a way to understand things,then going to details.

In general just keep practicing everyday,but have fun with it,if you training on drawing boxes everytime,play with them in the end,as if you are doing concepts for your futur personal project.
Just keep playing mate.
Make a sketchbook,upload works regularly and let us know that you did a sketchbook so that we can check and maybe help you

See ya and welcome to CA

[Brushcommander]

How to not give up?
Burning bridges helps. This way it becomes a swim or sink situation.
I don't recommend it though.

[Chris Saksida]

I will put it this way:

When I was little, I wanted to be a comic book artist, so when I was like 14 or something I started to take it seriously, I didn`t know shit about loomis or whatever, I just wanted to learn to draw the human body, so I bought some book, people always ask me which one it was, it was a very shitty anatomy book, nowhere near the quality of loomis or something like that... but it was SOMETHING, I valued EVERY word of knowledge that came from that book, and studied it and respected it as my new religion.

I did the exercises carefully, slowly, without rushing... and I became filled with JOY when I saw how my drawing got a LITTLE better, of course I still SUCKED... but I loved the fact that I DIDN`T SUCK SO MUCH ANYMORE!!, I was SO glad that I colud draw THAT... just that... and then I said "now I`m gonna draw something that BEATS that!, I can do it with this book! and did it... my journey through art was filled with happyness because I always was SO THANKFUL of whatever little progress I got.

What do I mean with this?: Never look at what you do negatively, ALWAYS look the positives, never say "damn I suck, I will never be Jim Lee", always say "damn... this one looks a lot better than the last one!" always go for a little more, and be thankful of the progress.

Becoming good at art, like anything, is like walking up a mountain, if you are looking at the top all the time, you`ll get frustrated and give up; if you ENJOY the process, you`ll reach the top and you won`t even notice it, you will look at what you do and say "wow... this looks pretty nice! great"

[J Wilson]

I wish I could get better, I want to, it's not that I don't care, it's that I can't do it.

The first step is to dump that kind of thinking. Any time you find yourself thinking "I can't do it," correct yourself. You can't do it YET. Thinking "I can't do it" suggests it's beyond your abilities. "I can't do it YET" suggests you CAN do it, with the time and effort. With that change in thinking you now have a purpose to the practice and efforts you are putting in.

If it helps, think of your artistic progress as a role playing game. Each drawing and sketch that you do adds a little "xp" to your progress bar. Any drawing at all will give you xp. Practicing from art books and trying to understand what they are talking about gives you much more xp. Asking for crits from other artists gives you xp. It's all progress, even if you have no idea how much xp is needed to finally understand what you are trying to grasp. If you want to reach level 100, you'll have to go through levels 1-99, and each level takes time where you stay at the same skill level for a bit, but hanging in there will ensure you eventually get there.

Good luck.