I’ve been in a slump for a long, long time, art-wise. It’s at the point where I’m lucky if I can eke out a couple things a year, now I don’t even have time to go to the vape trade show that I like so much.
And, frankly, that’s really terrible. Like, TRULY terrible. I tout myself as a painter as part of my personal identity, and yet in recent years I have so little to show for it. (Aside from commissions, which I don’t really count because money is involved, this is about art I do for me.)
Tonight, in trying to jumpstart my inspiration (since holiday season is fast approaching, as well as the day I get my Apple Pencil to complete my iPad Pro), I went diving through my Snowschemes– holiday art for Ragnarok TWILIGHT, a mega-AU for the MMORPG Ragnarok Online. Piles and piles of art JUST for the Christmas subplot. At least 3-4 pieces a year, and those were done solely within the month of December!
The last Snowscheme was 2 years ago. Only one. ONLY ONE. Disgraceful.
I can explain it away all I want: getting older, being distracted by other games/hobbies, depression/anxiety sapping my energy, focus and creativity, being more easily tired because of disability… but those are explanations, not solutions. I need to pry myself out of this pit of despair if I want to continue to identify as a painter. I know that having my iPad Pro+Pencil will better facilitate more art, but that’s really only part of the solution, because I do know that whatever I do there needs to get sent up to Blastoise for final polishing.
And equally as important is consistency. It has to be a regular thing. And I think I have a workable, viable and not-too-tedious solution for that: Twitch recently added their Creative aspect, which essentially reinstates streaming access for artists and such. I already have the software in place to do it (OBS), and as of this writing, Mondays are completely open– no raids or other commitments around the 5pm Pacific timeslot. I can do that, I can stream for a few hours. Even if nobody shows up to watch (though it would be nice if a few did). All I have to do is at least start with a wireframe, else I’ll be spending half the time putzing around on a blank canvas and making an idiot of myself. If I start from a wireframe, odds are it will stick and you can see some actual progression on the stream.
It’s Wednesday night, so I have until next Monday to hype myself up and get a wireframe in place.
Please watch my Twitter/Facebook for details about upcoming streams!