Are you self taught or did you get lessons/a degree?

[TommyJShizuko]

I got a degree in Zoology instead of going to art school I've only had one class that was specifically drawing in high school. I have a lot of drawing books and I'm always working on my comic, so I have plenty of experience. Sometimes I feel like my comic would be better if I had taken some college drawing clourses. When I started writing it I was very much flying by the seat of my pants and I made a lot of big mistakes early on, I try to "logic things out" if that makes any sense.

So I'm curious how did y'all get your mad skills?

[IndigoShirtProd]

I'd say half and half. I learned all of my basic understanding of art from middle school and high school art classes. I had a really good and encouraging teacher in middle school and throughout high school ai just over got better at drawing. Everything having to do with the production of my comic was learned through YouTube tutorials. Writing got better through severe trial and error. And I just consume art content regularly, so there's always something I'm learning.

[harlan]

Writing: I took literature and creative writing classes in college and have bought a couple books on the subject. I have used paid editors before because they not only catch that typo you've read over every time you edit for 100 times, but because they are familiar with industry standards and writing/plotting issues as well as grammar, it can be a bit expensive.

Art: I peaked in 8th grade.

[VibrantFox]

I'd say I'm definitely more self taught than anything. I took art classes for electives throughout middle and high school, a photography class, web design and one 3d animation course but other than that not a whole lot. I guess there's also the graphic design course i took in college since i figured i'd major in that and wound up essentially dropping out after failing. The irony is they added a big animation program right after but I try to look at the silver linings

Still between a lot of practice, personal studies and doing what I can to learn from other artists, books, comics and so on I think I've done an okay job. Plus there's the great treasure trove of online learning resources so I'm forever grateful that exists

[Katzalcoatl]

Both. My background made it easy to move to the writing world. I used to write scientific papers and I took my topics in art.

I didn't study literature as a career or anything similar. I am a full blown engineer with a masters. Basically, being so close to the academic world helped me improve many of the basics.
Once I moved to writing I applied all my knowledge plus I started to self study and I am still self studying.

But without my background I would of had a super hard time. It also helps that most of my career I have dedicated my time to being a Quality Checker.

Having a keen eye to spot small details is huge help. It helped me a lot designing my own covers and characters. Again I could not have done it withput my background and if I had never taken my topics of art back in college I would probably have no idea how to design or become expressive.

[thepenmonster]

I'm self taught 20characters

[GumshoeComix]

pretty much 100% self-taught
i tried taking art as an elective when I was still in school but the classes were full so I took ROTC instead. And I never went to college, even I did I don't think I'd go to art school.

[cherrystark]

I have taken creative writing classes before and I do technically have an art degree in theatre but I consider myself largely self-taught. The theatre taught me a lot of practical skills for several art mediums. I only took one "official" art class and hated it. At my university, the art classes and fashion classes were very gatekeepery. If you weren't a major, you likely couldn't get in. So I learned myself.

[NickRowler]

I did study art but I didn't study comics, illustrations, or creative writing. My focus was more in digital art software and video editing, with hope to get into television...which unfortunately didn't happen.

I did have to take film/tv study classes, so I guess in someways that did help with understanding storytelling. I guess I am in a similar boat where I wish I took a creative writing or script writing class.

Tho, to be honest, you are not going to get better at drawing unless you try to draw more and try different things. Like, you are not going to get better at drawing hands unless you force yourself to practice drawing hands. A class may teach you ways to help understand drawing one, but at the end of the day it's the practice that will help you get better.

[Scarlet_Cryptid]

I definitely land mostly on the 'took lessons/studied/got a degree' side of this. Like a lot of people, I started drawing when I was a little kid, and my parents were supportive enough to let me take all sorts of classes through the parks and rec district, Saturday Academy (once), and other stuff. People bought me art books for Christmas, birthdays, etc. In school, I took art classes whenever I could for electives.

In college, I majored in fine art, fully intending to go into comics. When I graduated, went to my first convention, and got a closer look at the comics industry, I decided against it. I then worked at an art supply store for 6 years instead, which actually taught me a LOT about the materials themselves, much of which none of my classes ever really got into. Over those years, I used/was reasonably familiar with how to use probably 75-80% of what was in that store. (Strongly recommend working at a good art store for a while for any aspiring traditional artists, if possible.)

I still have art books, I still occasionally watch tutorials online, I've even taught art classes, but it's been a long time since I've taken an actual class. Sometimes I kind of want to.

There's an element of my work that IS entirely self-taught, though: the markers. I've never had a class discuss markers. I've never owned an art book that explained how to use them. I've never seen a tutorial online that showed me any techniques I didn't already know. I've considered writing a how-to-markers book before, but it didn't seem like there'd be much demand for one.

(Funny story, for half a semester, I decided I'd do graphic design instead of fine art. So I go to my first graphic design class, which was computer programming or something, the professor says the word 'algorithm', I say 'nope!' because math and I are NOT friends, and I change my major back to fine art ASAP. My painting professor, on having me back in one of his classes, said "Welcome back from the dark side.")

[darthmongoose]

Mixture for me, though with comics and the art style I use for them, it was largely outside traditional education. I did do Art up to Sixth Form in school, but the stuff I learned was of limited use. It was very focused on the process of the world of contemporary Fine Art, and never had as many lessons focused on art techniques as I would have liked (there were some though. We did learn colour theory, anatomical drawing, speed sketching and watercolour at least).

I devour books about art, and went to a lot of workshops and things as a teenager. I learned how to use Photoshop to do image editing stuff at a weekend workshop in my teens, I learned a lot about drawing comics by getting a lot of feedback and advice from people on the UK small press manga scene on the old Sweatdrop Forums. Even now I love collecting resources and tutorials.

So I wouldn't call myself "self-taught" so much as it was self-directed learning with lots of people involved, and a mixture of self-study and seeking out guidance from books or from people with expertise.

[Kelheor]

Self-taught, unfortunately or not ^^

[OneArtsyBeaver]

I'd lean towards self taught myself. I got a few pointers from a close friend, she helped me with color saturation and tried to steer me in the right direction. It's taken years to really practice and make it better. Here's one of my first drawings.

And one of my most recent.

For me the biggest hurdle was finding out where to start, I could tell everything needed work, I just wasn't sure how to fix it. It wasn't until I started to improve by making my comic regularly that I realized where I needed to improve.

Art is something that you never stop learning, I stumble upon videos even today that I learn from. So I suppose I'm not fully self taught. But I don't think that's a bad thing. You should always be open to learn from other.s

[Lensing]

This is an interesting question.

I´m a musician, I draw and I write. It´s interesting for me to compare the
activities with each other and there are a lot of parallels but also differences
in the way you learn the skills.

Reading and writing is taught in school and that is difference number one, creative writing
is also included in most schools.
I always found it odd that drawing and making music is not taught properly.
At least not in the schools I went to and I don´t know anyone who went to a school where
they properly learned to play music or how to draw when they were kids.

So everyone who gets out of school has basic skills to write a story but can´t draw or
play an instrument.

I had singing lessons last year and I did a lot of online courses for drawing, everything
else is self taught, learning by doing and the basic stuff I learned in school.

The learning by doing works best for me when I write, the more I read and the more I write
the better I´m getting. That´s not the case for me when I play music or when I draw, I always
have to get back to the theory and I run into dead ends where I don´t get any better and have
find out why I´m stuck and i.e. still can´t draw hair properly, then I have to go back to the
training and train my vision and muscle memory etc. it´s the same for music.
Writing feels differently, I develop skills while writing without having to read theoretical
concepts or have to listen to some online classes about how to write. Those classes can
maybe be useful for some basic concepts but I don´t have the feeling of needing them

[DasIstWunderblyat]

I am the "No idea, somehow I did it" person. It's a reach for me to call myself "self-taught," I am super dumb that it's useless to teach me. Structured learning often stifles and frustrates me, yet learning everything on my own is unreliable due to how scatterbrained I am.

And no, never had any formal art course or education. Not rich enough to pay on my own, not good enough for a scholarship, and was not supported enough to pursue it.

[BlueDragon]

Whelp, much like most people here, it's a combo of both. I got my BA specializing in ceramics, because I couldn't afford/didn't want to learn painting, and there were no illustration courses at my college besides the basics and life drawing (I mean, specifically tailored for comics and book illustration). I loved the history courses and stuff, though. Most of my comics stuff I think is obviously "self taught" or rather "self studied."

My minor was English, but it more English literature over writing (I took some writing courses, but I LOVE studying and my peers never liked my writing. Which is fine. I know my limits and where I stand, and I write for myself, but share with others I'm happy with that).

Now that I live in a city proper, I was thinking of taking a comics course at one of the community colleges, purely to continue improving my craft. I really agree with Mark Crilley that it is a boon to find some sort of art mentor, and if possible in person. I think I could have benefited from that. C'est la vie.

[SoulSean]

I can totally admit myself was a nuisance and totally self thought from the beginning till current, now.
I even got mocked by certain community for using 3d model as a tracing example and some may say, "You learn nothing from tracing the 3d model. To learn to draw you have to learn anatomy." That kind of controversy I get on my social media page when I said "I don't care, because it was my way of improvement."

Apart from drawing, I am not taking any major or excel in any particular English lesson. Despite of that, self thought and with the help of the community of some author and artist who are willing to stand up front and tells me where did I done wrong and asked me to correct/improve it.

In my point of view, I do not really think that it is really matter either you are self thought or did get a lesson of the mentioned topic. Both way lead you to a success road, and the things that only matters was... Your hardwork is the only things that lead you to a fruitful and desired result.

[tarraxahum]

I think I've just replied to you on CF, but for the sake of keeping the discussion up, why not do it twice?

I'm self-taught to the bone. Moreover, I used to hate drawing for like the whole first decade of my life. That's until I got some favorite characters that I was compelled to draw immediately...and then that just continued on. In a way, fandom was my teacher, and I don't mean it as some corny thing. Fandoms motivated me to draw a lot, drawing a lot improved my skill, and I also made friends with a lot of artists who were far more skilled than me, so I learned from them a bit, too. By example, mostly, 'cause I hate following advice unless I asked for it.

My actual degree is in language studies, that's also where I work at x)

[lomcia]

self taught. drawing now for... 20something years.

[Flios]

Self taught for both writing and drawing, which is exactly why I still don't have a good setup for digital art