Blocked from creativity

Ever had to write a paper and didn't know exactly where to start?

Ever had to write a story and half way through didn't know where you were going with it?

What about painting a masterpiece and all of a sudden losing that inspiration to continue?

Many creative people, like artists, run into this problem a lot. It's been known by many names, but the most common is artist's block or creative block.

Trying to come up with ideas, loss of inspiration, not liking the outcome of your work, being too critical of your work are various challenges artist's run into constantly.

If you really get down to it, there is no real solution to this problem but many people try coming up with steps to overcome it.

For example, Suzanne Falter-Barnes offers her Coaching Creativity: 7 Lessons for Artists.

The success is within that artist, the creative flow just needs some guidance or inspiration to help bring out the success to it's full potential.

For some artists, it could take hours or days to overcome this problem. Others, it may take months, even years. How to Beat Artist's Block is different for every artist.

Where do I fit in the bigger picture?

I like to think that my blog is unique or original, however that isn't the case.

This blog, like hundreds of others, is tackling a very similar theme. In a whole, they are all artist's blogs. But, there are many different kinds within that category including fashion artists, graffiti artists, painters, photographers, and many others. To check out some of these blogs by various types of artists you can click here.

I guess most artists with blogs are looking for a way to attract potential art buyers to their work by putting it up online. Others maybe trying to attract buyers by providing an insight into their artwork which creates a deeper relationship with the buyer and the artist.

I think it's hilarious that there is even a site that exists that explains why every artist NEEDS a blog to be successful nowadays. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with an artist that starts a blog just to try selling their work by displaying it on the Internet.

Even for myself, I think it would be awesome if I could some recognition from some rich art buyer to give me millions of dollars for my artwork.

But, I would like to think that there are some artists out there that use artistic blogs for there own personal fulfillment, for there own individual accomplishments.

This is where my blog comes in. A blog community that doesn't really feel like they NEED to sell their work, just so long as they can say they set a personal goal and accomplished that goal.

Giving life to the spirit of animation

Everyone loves cartoons, if you don't you should definitely go see a doctor. Well generally, most people have or still do watch cartoons. I know in my case, cartoons are still a big part of what's on my television set.

When I was younger, I constantly told my parents I was going to be an artist when I grew up. It wasn't about until age thirteen that I narrowed it down to....cartooning.

I got a lot of inspiration for cartooning from Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert. I found his cartoon strips both humorous and easy for someone to practice on their own cartoons, someone like me.

Recently, my cartoons are mostly doodles in class or whenever i'm bored. Doodling cartoons is one of my biggest habits. Hopefully I find more time for my cartoons, but for now here's some of those lovely doddles.

Actually human

Even with my recently set goal of drawing daily or weekly, I've still been struggling to find the time to do so.

For the last couple days, I've been carrying around a small sketchbook. I haven't exactly been thrilled with my recent doodling, but I've decided to post one photo from my new sketchbook. I present Tupac Shakur, drawing him while sitting in my car listening to one of his songs and suddenly feeling inspired to draw.
The next two drawings are from the drawing 1 class I took two semesters ago because I still work on those from time to time.

I've choosen these pictures because the most challenging thing for me to draw is real people. For some reason, the human form and facial features is very difficult for me to perfect. These drawings are of a woman and a man who modeled for the class.

Before the final modeling pieces, we had to make various sketches of different angles. However, the drawings only took around two hours to complete. Sounds like a lot time, but to an artist that's just simply not enough.
I still try working on old pieces, but I want to move away from that and start thinking of new ideas.

This last drawing is a self-portrait. You might ask yourself, why is it upside down? I choose to put this drawing upside down because that's the way i drew it and it doesn't exactly look right to me unless it's this way.
Next time, I'll show a different version of the human form and facial features... cartoon style! =)