How much has your art improved this year?

[Jewe11s]

Thanks a lot! I feel like your characters have had a similar evolution. Their personalities shine through with each pose and in the dramatic movement of your lines. Really cool.

I have to say: I love those crazy-long legs.

[laneord]

I'm not sure if my drawing is changing for the better or not. It just seems different than last time.. haha
The old drawing is from my old sketches. The new one is taken from my comic Abbie

[phen]

That's so exciting to hear, thank you! Those long legs, oh man, I have no idea how that even started. Maybe it's a vision impairment of mine, everyone has super long legs in my eyes, hahaha^^

@laneord Aa, I love how you've simplified your look! It's a subtle change but just enough to make a difference in how you see her (both hairstyles are really cute, too, her side-swept bangs... !).

[Jewe11s]

The 2015 picture seems to have more personality for sure. I like that you're adding in a bit of shading as well But there's something about the 2011 picture's line work that seems more dynamic and interesting though.

[laneord]

I know right. Somehow the more you draw a character they just change slightly over time not sure if it's "better", for me it's just different. And it's still changing, I guess that's just how you grow as an artst.

[dsandoval3]

i learned how clean my shit up! i didnt know how to use gimp for nutin but during this year i think i improved ma colorin skillz

[AnnaLandin]

I feel like my progress this year has been more about page-composition and confidence and colour schemes than it has been about making huge strides forward. I haven't been super focused on improving other technical aspects, so those have been very much a slow-and-steady sort of thing. I also can't show much from Grassblades as comparison, because the stuff that's being posted now is actually stuff I drew 6 months ago, on account of my buffer being so big. >.> I can say, though, that I've gotten better at drawing my main characters since last year!

But I did do a bunch of end-of-year art memes the other day, so I'll go dig those out and you can judge for yourselves!

2015 Summary of Art, covering everything from random bits of fanart to Inktober projects. Not shown here - my Goblin week entries.

And then - my improvement over the last 5 years:

[laneord]

Awesome work.. gotta love em colors..

[MarineHaddock]

This would work a lot better if I consistently drew the same characters. I don't really know how much my art has improved, it's something I find really difficult to notice in my art. I'm considering taking an art class next year depending on how well the rest of my course goes, so if I do that should help a lot.

Earliest drawing I have posted (2011):

Start of 2015:

December 2015:

[Jewe11s]

Gotta love those giant buffers! Do you ever feel like, when it comes time to upload a new page, that you start nit picking (and editing) the work you did 6ish months ago before posting?

I've totally been following your tea witch posts on twitter by the way. Love em.

[AnnaLandin]

Gotta love those giant buffers! Do you ever feel like, when it comes time to upload a new page, that you start nit picking (and editing) the work you did 6ish months ago before posting?

Before I start posting a new chapter, I go through the whole thing and edit dialogue and fix up mistakes and stuff, yeah! I take a week off between each chapter, to allow me to, you know, draw the cover illustration and all. XD But yes, I do nitpick and edit. I rarely redraw anything from scratch, though. I've only done that once, for one panel in chapter 3 - I try not to get stuck reworking old stuff, so I only allow myself to fix up some crooked lines here and there, and edit the dialogue.

There's one panel in chapter 4 that's going to get poked at a bit, maybe adding a detail in the background, but yeah. That's about it.

I've totally been following your tea witch posts on twitter by the way. Love em.

<3 So happy you like them! They're a bunch of fun to draw! Only two more to go now before I'm done! :3

[Jewe11s]

Art classes can be really helpful for sure. Plus, you get to gain new artist friends! (Which is like having your own personal circle of tutors. )
I can tell your knowledge of anatomy has strengthened over the years! You're much better at drawing mature characters than I am. (Those chibi-style characters are super cute btw. That chicken! <3 )

[shazzbaa]

I'm in the same boat, haha -- I've been working on my comic while on hiatus this year, and I'll be coming off of hiatus in two weeks, so none of my comic work over the past year can be shown online just yet! Other than that I mostly sketched a lot, but here's some finished stuff I can show! Improvements have been small, and kinda hit or miss:

Like, I'm super proud of that recent cover image on the bottom, but I also feel like the earlier RGB (the march piece) and the zombie pony are kinda better overall than the more recent July RW piece -- even though I was starting to experiment with stuff in that July piece that led to me being able to do the November piece the way I did. So, it's up and down!

Since I read this tumblr post from Faith Erin Hicks I've definitely come to agree with it -- improvement memes are awesome and inspiring, but acknowledging that it's okay for your work to go up and down over smaller time frames and that that's a normal and good part of learning are important too!

I don’t believe art skill develops in a straight line. Like, you don’t start out at 0 and work your way directly to 100. Some years I felt like my skills were going backwards, and other years I feel like they shot forward, and I wasn’t sure why. [...] some years you get lucky like that. But most years you don’t, and it’s just about challenging yourself in tiny increments, trying desperately to learn.

[Jewe11s]

You know I love your comic and that My Little Zombie is both awesome (still want one) and hilarious

You bring up a really great point. I can relate to the ups and downs of skill development. I have a sketchbook full of drawings from 2008 where my style looks like was going in a completely different, much more unique, and energetic direction of style than what it eventually evolved into. I still wonder where that style went...

Yes, it is important to acknowledge that we real people don't develop skills like video game characters. It's an ongoing process and not an experience points bank.

[carloswebcomic]

A year ago I used to draw like this:

But now, I draw like this!!

All thanks to the power of BELIEVING IN MYSELF!!!

[Silerna]

Could say that in comic art my art has been approved, I draw their thumbs now xD. But can say that in overal I have improved

[YamamotoRyuunosuke]

I started drawing Nana-Hon no Ken back in December 2013 (just 2 years ago). This is a comparison between the first cover and the seventh cover(latest one).

Of course, I haven't only improved in cover art but also everything else.

[Marvin]

Well that's drastic ! Good job !

[DeadAccount]

It's honestly hard to say. This year was my first year drawing Proper Comics, and there are definitely things I've learned doing it. However, i think technically there hasn't been a massive change. I feel like you kind of reach plateaus with art, and the furtther you get, the harder it is to change. The difference in my art at the age of 16 and 17 was massive, and now it's like...meh :/

I do feel like I'm getting a hang of drawing my characters a bit more on-model, though, so at least my consistency is improving.

[Zannen00]

All thanks to the power of BELIEVING IN MYSELF!!!

Naruto would be proud.

I started my first comic IMAGICA=verse early this year, round April, this is what my progress looks like:

.... still sucky.