The dark side.I recall brief moments when the "dark side" of me would creep up on me and overwhelm me like a tidal wave of emotions. I was big on fear of rejection, afraid of being criticized, and just too scared to make a move or decision for the fear that I might do something inaccurate or against standards. Not too long ago, I proceeded down a road wherein my thoughts revolved around being so disheartened and pessimistic: "am I good enough to be doing this?" "am I really meant to be doing this? Why isn't it working for me despite me wanting everything to work out?" Later on it became, "why bother trying? Everything I do is failing anyway" and I was pretty close to teetering over the edge of giving up. We've all had those long overhauls of self-doubt. If I had to compare, self-doubt for me is like the worst poison you could ever give yourself. The worst thing is, it's self-administered. It has nothing to do with your current circumstances, wherever and whatever you may be doing. It eats away at our systems, gives us these unseen scars. And at times we don't even see what we are inflicting on ourselves. For me, it was like going down a dark tunnel--having tunnel vision as well--with no directions, no map, no flashlight, the way seemingly never-ending. There were days I cried myself to sleep at another day of discouragement. It manifested a lot in my work as well--I wasn't drawing or creating at all, I was tired as hell and stressed all the time, I was worrying over the smallest things, I stayed up some nights journalling like mad and crying buckets, and I brought my stress with me to work as an interior designer in the firm I used to work in. My work performance dragged down as well--I lost the ability to look at and analyze things with systematic, objective clarity; I was given leadership and management roles, yet I couldn't see myself setting an example. I found myself second-guessing everything around me, even my own choices and decisions. When responsibility rested on my shoulders, I found the burden difficult to bear. I lashed out at people who tried their best to help me out of the rut I dug myself in, only listening to advice without actually following through with them. Or I would overthink, overanalyze, and leave things hanging since I couldn't figure things out. Everyday I was walking on eggshells, afraid of making mistakes (because I was afraid of the costliness), and afraid most of all that people would reject me outright. There were times I thought that I was getting better, only to see myself collapse in self-doubt the next moment. I knew I was becoming erratic and neurotic with despair, but I didn't know how to help myself out of it at all. the "pause button" and everything in between.Finally, I told myself it was finally time to press the pause button in my life. I told myself that I really needed time off to soul-search and contemplate who I am, who I am becoming, who I wanted to be, and what I really wanted to do. It was difficult to cut ties with my work, having been four years into it--I was not at all ready for change. I am the sort of person who loves comfort zones, and it isn't easy for me to walk into something without being familiar with it or knowing what to do. I wanted to be a free spirit, flying uncaged, unhinged by expectations and judgment. The first stepping stone I took after deciding to soul-search was to take it easy. With society and cultural pressure present, it's difficult enough to tell yourself to take the backseat for a little while. I also decided that I was in need of a big change in perspective--one that I had to work on by making the smallest changes in my life. I started with self-affirmation and encouragement. It was probably one of the most uplifting yet initially awkward moments, ever. For one, I didn't like "complimenting" myself because I was always afraid that it would get to my head, leading to complacency. However, it did just the opposite--it gave me that essential confidence boost and dose of positive thinking day after day. For a month or so, I tried out Hal Elrod's Miracle Morning habit which I tracked down using my bullet journal. Everyday I would follow the process while reading up on John Maxwell's "The Complete 101 Collection" which got me into baby steps towards healing. This small change in routine was subtle. I had no way of knowing at first if it was actually working or not. It began changing my attitude towards everything I was going through and it made me slowly come to believe that this was my fighting chance. There were days when I felt like it was just what it was, a routine. And there were better, more uplifting days--days when I would feel encouraged to get out of the funk. It was a very gradual and subtle shift, to be very honest. After being used to negative thinking and the defeatist attitude, I felt myself slowly developing a shift towards positive affirmation. Apparently, telling oneself everyday that you are good enough and that you are powerfully positive in everything you think, do, and say only reinforces and encourages one to be the better version of oneself. I've found that the best way to stay away from self-doubt is to know and to love yourself--and more importantly, to build and forge a good relationship with yourself. It is also about realizing that if you are not happy with your life at present, focus on making different choices. Sometimes we neglect and take for granted the power of our own choices. In this case, I found out how important it was to choose to rise above self-victimization and to make a change by choosing to grow in positivity. Hitting the pause button is all about humility and gratitude: Humility in accepting everything you are and recognizing imperfection; being able to look up to others without being afraid of rejection or basing one's self-worth on others' validation and judgment; realizing that others' stories are not one's own. Gratitude in the understanding and acceptance that everything happens for a reason. Gratitude in the knowledge that getting lost also means starting down the road of finding oneself. re-discovering and igniting passion.The route towards self-love also began with the re-discovery of passion. It's all about letting go of past disappointments, fear, and rejection and seeking courage instead.
In my case, choosing courage also meant letting go of the fear of failure. And I started this by getting back to drawing through means of a 30-day drawing challenge. That's pretty much how it all started, and it became something bigger than I originally expected. I've always loved drawing, then again I used to take the drawing process for granted. I found myself first and foremost enjoying what I was doing. Doing something I loved everyday was my way of re-discovering the passion I lost. I started trusting myself and my own instincts, letting things flow naturally. There were rusty beginnings and rough starts wherein I would find myself disliking where the drawing was going, but I continued. The more I drew, the more I found myself enjoying the process. It was like holding a pencil and translating the vision in my mind's eye on paper. I eventually stumbled on one of my long-standing goals: I started digital painting. I once told my LEAP Coach that I invested in a digital tablet for drawing but never had the guts to actually start using it. After two years of disuse, I finally took the leap of faith despite not knowing if this would lead to any substantial results. The "fluidity" came unexpectedly, and I slowly felt at ease with digital painting. The first experience was a lot of fun! Plus, I did feel pride at finally being able to do what I wanted to do. It felt good, the exalting kind of good. I spent the past few months building on my newfound skills and doing study sketches, drawings, watching tutorials and videos online. The feeling was a lot like dusting my bookshelf and filling it up with more and more books (Yes, I hoard books as I love to read). I became interested in learning more and more about establishing different techniques and practices. Sooner or later I began thinking that maybe re-discovering my love for art had a higher purpose--that of being able to inspire others to pursue their own passions. And I think that is what pretty much led me to sharing a lot of my personal journey through this blog. I still do think that at this point I am learning to love myself more each day, while being able to let go of negative energy. I'm lucky and blessed to have the support of the people around me: family and friends who are both aware and unaware of how much they helped me to continually let go of my experiences on the dark side and encouraged me to live my passion. I'm happy to be a work in progress. I'm happy to note that through this discovery, I am getting to build a solid relationship with myself. And I've got lots of things to look forward to and to work on as I go, one example being to develop commitments to myself. If you've read it up to this point, I'm glad as you are also sharing in my journey. I hope and pray for good vibes and energy to come your way!
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I was on an unplanned week hiatus, and only recently came up with my 30th day drawing challenge (theme: anything steampunk). I was doing some research on steampunk objects and art and initially decided to do something like an interior vignette--(Note 1: I am a lot more comfortable with doing interiors being an ID graduate and licensee) (Note 2: an interior vignette complete with steampunk-style furniture and whatnot) but decided on a totally different track. I wanted to do a steampunk airship. For some reason, I was immediately attracted to the idea because I have a little obsession with balloons and balloon art. It's my first time doing a blimp / airship concept though, so I searched immediately for references. Some references led me searching for anatomies of a ship. Since I wanted to understand the forms and shapes better, I looked through the Google Sketchup 3D Warehouse for pirate ship models. Eventually ended up downloading models based on Pirates of the Carribean ships (Dutchman, etc). As for the blimp/airship concept, the references were a whole lot. It's a popular subject in steampunk digital paintings. Plus it's pretty close to what you'd see on Final Fantasy game art (though FF art is not necessarily steampunk). I also Google-searched industrial blimps (as Steampunk is essentially inspired by 19th century technology) to simulate the design. The following sketches are what I initially came up with as studies prior to the digital painting process: It took me a few days to finally get an idea down using Photoshop. I wanted to emulate the concept I developed from the initial sketches. I wanted a good background, so I started out with sky and clouds in a stormy/rainy setting, experimenting with different brushes such as the Soft Round and Watercolor tips. During this process, I was watching tutorial videos by Matt Kohr and Cubebrush's Marc Brunet as well. It's fun to learn as you paint so that you can definitely apply the concepts they teach as well as pick up some techniques from their process. The second image is the work in progress. I spent a lot of time getting the blimp right with all the shades and textures. It was my first time creating a custom brush from a rust-like photo-realistic texture. I followed some of Marc Brunet's tips for creating brushes from textures and used them on the blimp's hulking metal form. The rusted metal effect was so cool. It's a very subtle effect but the texture does wonders for the painting. I used it with a mix of colors like rust-red and shades of brown. It was a fun process painting the details on the ship as well. The gold metallic-looking texture was initially a challenge, albeit a fun one. I had the most fun detailing the frontmost part of the blimp with an ornamental finial using reference photos. The initial plan was to paint in the mass of the ship underneath, but here I was getting carried away with the fun of detailing. It's not yet my strong suit, but... I'm pretty stoked about it. I think I'm slowly getting the hang of switching between the hard round and soft round brushes, in tandem with the eraser tool (Neat tip from Matt Kohr's video). The final image has a bit of a dramatic flair. There were several changes I made during the process workflow after observing the artwork with "fresher eyes". For one thing, I figured that the blimp looked too flat and untrue to its shape. Since the form is a bit cylindrical, I adjusted the shadows following what I learned recently from Matt Kohr's videos on light and shadow. He explains that the first step in determining your shadow is to imagine a "terminator line" from where the light is hitting an object. I love how he teaches in a really scientific way (but I digress). Used a lot of dodge-and-burn tools as well to increase the overall contrast.
The ship was a lot easier to deal with, having sketched a few studies for familiarization. It was a matter of painting the basic shapes and tone values before anything else. It's a lot less detailed than the ship models I used for studies, but I'm happy with it all the same. The wood texture was simulated by custom brush (I had a lot of fun with this) and the finial/ornamentation for the gold trims were inspired by the finial I used for the blimp. In a nutshell, it took quite a few days to do this but I'm really happy that I trusted the process. The result is far better than I could ever imagine, and the final piece is pretty close to what I had in mind. Thus concludes my 30-day drawing challenge! Looking forward to more paintings and sketches in the near future! |
Nonsensical whimHi, I'm Ashley. This is my blog on journey towards discovering art and documenting my learning experiences. (Particularly Photoshop, Digital Painting, Sketchup/V-ray, Interior Design, fun tutorials I've discovered and the like). wordpress:TUMBLR:Archives
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