So. Being an artist nowadays and drawing with charcoal and paints has somehow become "not enough", "old-fashioned", you need to be a digital artist/designer and you need to know your way around at least one Adobe program. This has become obvious to me while applying for freelance projects (as "illustrator/animator/storyboard artist"). In 99% of the employer's skills wishlist there are programs listed. Almost no one puts down "drawing/watercolor paints" and usually when they do it's because they're searching for something hand-made to give to their wife as an anniversary present and they're ready to spend no more than $20 for it (then the site will take 50% of that). At the beginning I showed a kind of resistance, thinking that since I have a scanner, any drawing I make can become a digital file and what's their problem (the employers') anyway? I thought computer generated images had this too symmetrical, computer-y feel to them that I just couldn't perceive as "artistic".
Well, some time passed and I realized that I was just being silly and stubborn while thinking that what I was drawing by hand was unique and wonderful and all those digital illustrations "out there" had nothing special to them. That if I wanted to get involved in a more serious project and get paid for it, I needed to keep up with the desired medium/format.
But how do you "keep up" when you don't have the basis? Yes, I have a Master's Degree in Animation and most people think that means I'm a pro in 2D and 3D and I know all about After Effects and Maya. Well, the reality of my studies is that I got 2 important professors that were very old and needed help to turn on the computer and 1 very important professor who taught Flash and other basic programs at 10 a.m. when I was usually at work for a TV show, getting paid so I could pay for my tuition. I did the best I could to make myself present at his classes but I was overwhelmed by the information, since most of the students there were Bachelors in animation and had now reached a more complex phase of working with the programs (like actually doing their final films). I went there as a Bachelor in English Philology from a different university and I enjoyed working with the 2 old professors, learning about art history and drawing storyboards but I didn't learn much about Flash or any other animation software. As a result I did my diploma project with paper cut-outs and a scanner, editing it all on Adobe Premiere. This was fine, I believe, since I did two more projects by using the same out-dated technique and got paid for them at the freelance network. However, saying that I hold a Master's Degree in Animation and that I am an illustrator and NOT knowing how to draw in Illustrator or Photoshop is simply silly. I was thinking of attending a paid course in Adobe Illustrator and getting a certificate and all, but I got some shooting gigs (I'm also a freelance script supervisor) and I realized my attendance would be weak.
Then I relaxed and thought for a moment.
To be honest, I got high and thought for a moment;) What is the big pressure and what's the rush? Maybe it comes from the titles of the online tutorials "Learn Illustrator in 3 weeks!", "Become a graphic designer in 30 days!". Sure, that would be nice, I thought, but shouldn't I have FUN while learning the software? I believe that most of my inspiration comes from having fun and not being pressured by the "outside world". And inspiration should come first. Otherwise, what's the point?
In the end, I decided that I will choose one drawing program (I chose Adobe Illustrator) and that I will open it every day on my laptop and do some illustration on it. I won't get a certificate and I'm not sure I'll be getting more freelance projects in 30 days. But is that really so important? Isn't my main purpose to learn how to freely create art in a digital environment? Won't it be nice to make friends with my Bamboo tablet and start working with it?
So I switched my perspective and now I say "I'm experimenting with Illustrator", which sounds more like an adventure and it has been a great adventure so far. I'm not doing an illustration a day but I try to be consistent.
I hope you enjoy my latest "experiment" from yesterday :) I was listening to the Violent Femmes "Color Me Once, Color Me Twice" when I discovered a button in Illustrator that said "pattern" and this is the result:
This was a long explanation! It sounds almost as if I'm justifying myself and I'm not. I'm just sharing my story and I think it's a positive one. My message maybe being something like "try to do what you love more and worry about the world's expectations and rules less";) I'm going to connect my tablet now and do a new illustration. I'll post it later, feel free to take a look at my last posts if you'd like to see previous illustrations I've done. It would be great to receive some feedback from digital artists and from any artist or non-artist :)