Time Drawn: September 2006
This is a fairly typical piece from my college years, by which I mean odd perspectives, awkward proportions, and absurd amounts of detail. Ok, that last one I actually would like to still have in my work.
These days, though, my work flow is different. I’m doing pretty much only quick digital pieces these days, not long hand-drawn ones. This is because I am no longer attending classes.
You’ve probably seen various people doing something creative in your classes, either drawing or working on embroidery or the like. Or, at the very least, just doodling in the margins of the notebook. If you don’t do such things, you might think it’s from boredom or the like, but if you’re like me, you know it’s nothing of the sort.
Humans come in all sorts of varieties, and that includes variety in which way we learn best. Me, I remember things better if my hands are doing something while I listen to a lecture. I don’t take in information well if it’s just sound-based, so I add a kinesthetic element to it as well. Drawing and taking notes also adds a visual component to help reinforce the memory in another fashion. By “goofing off” while listening to a lecture, doodling away the whole time, I’m actually engaging all sorts of memory tactics to retain the information.
It paid off, too. I always did excellently on tests, frequently getting the top score, and rarely had to do any supplemental studying. Yes, I was THAT student. I’ve had many times where I was both the first to finish and the top scorer, just because I knew the answer as soon as I saw the question and could just write it down without having to think about it. I’ve also retained a large percentage of the information I learned in class past the end of the semester, something the classic cram-the-night-before method is rather poor at doing.
Of course, the other result of this is that I made things in the classes. Some of the classes were more discussion-based than lecture-based, or had a fairly low density of hard facts that needed to be written down for me to memorize them, so I pulled out my full sketchbook rather than just doodling next to notes. I’d just absentmindedly work on whatever piece I was doing, not fully caring about perspective and certainly not having references for getting proportions right. I was concentrating on the subject of the class, after all, not the artwork.
All of which added a lot to the level of detail I was willing to add to a piece. I wasn’t rushing to declare the piece finished and move on to the next one, after all. Adding detailed texturing was actually one of the best ways for me to utilize drawing to facilitate learning. It didn’t require large amounts of decision-making, unlike when I was laying out the main element of the piece. It was just something my hands could be doing.
These days, I’m trying out various ways to recapture that willingness to add detail, but if I’m concentrating primarily on the artwork, it doesn’t come easily. I can only trigger that mental state if the artwork isn’t my focus. So I bring my sketchbook to various talks and conventions and games, where I’m more interested in what’s going on than on what my hands are doing. Alas, this doesn’t mesh well with my hermit lifestyle, so I have produced very little artwork this way since I left college. I should work on that.
As for the subject of this piece, it’s from one of the random stories I have floating in my head. All that’s come from them is some drawings and a few random notes here and there. I haven’t gotten any of them to the point where I feel compelled to do more with them. This one’s from one of my more developed stories, though, so I’m more likely to use it at some point. Which means no spoilers. The character’s name is Brent (at least for now), and the large city below is Celestial City (also, for now). And only Brent is colored because that’s all I colored before I moved on to another piece some six years ago. But it still looks decent enough, so post it I shall!
