Inktober 2020 - What I learned

 What I learned in Inktober 2020

After 31 days of rushing to the art-board and drawing yet another image, my two characters for a potential comic - I said to myself, why am I doing this? Why? So I started to take some basic notes to answer that very question. I realised, I had to to be conscious enough to see some improvements. What was the measurement for improvement? For me it was not enough to just submit an image only. I had to see an accumulation of my efforts rewarded.

 So, what follows are my observations of what I learned in Inktober, 2020.

1. Define/practice on x2 characters only

I decided from the get-go to illustrate in inktober only x2 characters. By doing this I

1. Eliminated the feeling of being overwhelmed with where to start. Because I knew I had to make the x2 characters work with the daily prompts, half the battle for me was already settled.

2.  Because I was constantly drawing the x2 characters I really started to get a feel for them. And my confidence grew when drawing them. I also found out what I didn't like - where on some days the characters became too cartoony. Overall, by the time Inktober was finished I had amassed a great deal of drawings. These drawings will definitely benefit me when I get around to doing up a small comic of these guys.

2. Using limited inking tools

In past Inktobers that I have done, specifically digital inking - I really tried an array of digital inking brushes. Which was good in some ways. A real chance to try them out. But more than not, because I was trying so many brushes, I wasn't able to pick up on the nuances of a particular brush. Let alone persevere with its limitations also. And as a result of this, I wasn't able to track progress. So, I used only x4 pen's for the whole challenge. They were

1. Zig Mangaka (Kuretake Brush pen)

2. Tom Bow ABT N15 (Brush pen) 

3.  Zig Art & Graphic pen (Kuretake Brush pen)

4. Artline 200 0.4mm (fine tipped pen with dead line weight) 

The go-to pens for me were numbers 1-2. The Zig Mangaka (1), which I only found days before the competition, is awesome. I found that you could keep a steady line, almost bring the pen to a stop, and then push it around and get a lovely smooth transition. It also gave nice fat-to-thin tapering effect. Number (3), Zig Art & Graphic pen was almost running out. But I found out you could get some nice textures as a result. So lesson learned - don't throw pens out until they are well and truly gone.

3. Where to place areas of black

It was rather by accident, but my wife had left a compass out on our drawing desk. And I thought to myself, drawing a circle might help along the composition for this image. Which yes, it certainly did. And so there a now quite a few images which have a circle (filled black) for my images.

So, the circle shape is a very pleasing element. It also helps to guide your audience to a particular section of your image - and create a hierarchy or focus. 

4. Not to be perfect

Perfectionism is such a beast. It can silently come upon you and then devour and destroy all your creativity, within minutes.

For me, doing Inktober is as much about getting better at inking as it is about pushing through to complete an image - no matter how (eek), ugly or imperfect one image maybe. And I certainly created my fair share of eek pictures. But what I came to appreciate was I could see why something wasn't working. And I still had to go through with it, say its done. And then upload it. Pat myself on the back, and do another drawing for the next day. And it was the next day where I found you had to overcome the beast of perfectionism. Because now you had a failure in your mind only a day earlier.

Lesson learned - fight the beast. The more ugly you do, the more resilient you will become and bounce back to hit those good/great and amazing images.

DON'T GIVE UP!!!!

5. Composition and the use of extra elements

This is something I am always struggling with. I think some days I've got it, then, damn it, it gets away on me.

Composition is challenging for me as I often go straight into the pose of the character/s without often thinking also about how other elements will work in a pleasing way, within the piece. And so often what will happen is, I will be stuck trying to add elements (like fire, wind, smoke, etc) with the characters.

These above poor babies (my imperfect offerings) - sad face, are for me, compositions which, with the added extra elements just weren't doing it for me. The one at very far right I laboured over. I used the black mountain (which is hard to read I think) to help frame the x3 creatures. However I feel that this then competes with the dark area at bottom left (which I initially thought might help frame for the bottom x2 characters). I just feel that overall the image doesn't read well - it's a little jarring and confusing. So to make myself feel better, here are some images of which I feel have good composition. And also good use of elements.

That's it. Survived another Inkober challenge. Wahooo!!! Until next year, 2021. Bye for now.

If you, yes you, dear visitor. Have read all the way to here. Thank you. Really - thank you.

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I hope you have learnt something, or enjoyed this read. Have a great day/night.