If being an artist is a video game, what's your 'build'?

[TheLemmaLlama]

Example (Me):

• Characters (CHR): I'm alright at drawing chararacters, but I ain't no character designer or selling waifu merch anytime soon

• Ideas (IDEA): I always know what I wanna draw and never really struggled with wanting to draw but not having any ideas

• Linework (LINE): I cannot line. It is pain.

• Backgrounds (BG): I think I'm pretty good at backgrounds for the most part, though I still struggle with a few things like what the distance should look like XD

• Discipline (DIS): I am flaky AF. I should really try this 'draw on a consistent basis' thing everyone keeps talking about

• Colours (COL): I think I'm pretty good at colours, less because I have a good sense for what colours go well together and more because I figured out how lighting works XD

(I used this site to generate the radar chart :])

[river121693]

Mine is probably like this if I were to judge how happy I am with where I'm at.
Background is the worst for me. I think part of it is that I haven't found the style/process im comfortable with yet. This affect my "Color" stat too.
My line art is not conventionally pleasing, but I kind of like it.
I think I'm pretty good at drawing characters. Design wise I think they're iconic enough, but I wish I had the time to make them even more detailed, and a few of them still need work.

[AnonymousHouseCat]

This looks fun! For me:

• CHR: Character design for my current project isn't great, because I literally just took doodles from my college notebooks and went with it, but I did try to avoid the same face/same body type issues. I've seen great character designs by other artists with good color schemes, fashion, and hairstyles and wonder "how??" I have put a lot of thought into each character's personality and backstory.

• IDEA: My brain is constantly generating more ideas than I can actually execute (oh no!)

• LINE: I'm no pro, but I think I'm getting pretty good at it! Lines are pretty neat and I know about line weights and styles and whatnot.

• BG: I'm proud of my backgrounds lately since I have been putting more effort into them! They have personality, so that the town doesn't just look like any generic town. But I do get lazy sometimes and just use clip assets or altered versions of google images.

• DIS: On one hand, I can invest hundreds of hours and several years into the same project. But can I stick to a regular update schedule? Can I actually finish any of the several projects I start? No, no I cannot.

• COL: Color is hard! I've studied color theory, I know more than an absolute beginner, but I find good coloring hard to execute (my comic is in black and white )

[BLTX]

Looks fun!

Characters (CHR): I think I've gotten REALLY good at character design. Now-a-days, I'm adding in a lot more depth to them, and just in general designing them a lot more carefully.

Ideas (IDEA): I find that most of the time when I'm writing a script, I can envision exactly what I want the panels to look like, and most of the time, it doesn't really change much from idea, to product.

Linework (LINE): I'm... not really sure how to rate this one, because most of my art is all digital, and can be manipulated easily whenever I screw up, so I'm not really analyzing how my line work is much. In general, though, I'd say I'm... okay at line art, but still have ALOT to learn.

Backgrounds (BG): I'm rating myself harshly when it comes to perspective here. I've always had a lot of trouble with perspective drawing, and it's something that always bugs when I go back, and look at my older work. THAT is the main thing I'm practicing drawing right now. Other than that, though, I think I'm pretty good with 'em.

Discipline (DIS): In a word, horrendous. I often myself doing about 1 or 2 panels, and then walking for hours to release AAALL of the stress those 2 panels took out of me. Also, much of it is copying and pasting limbs, so a panel is almost never drawn from the ground up.

Colors (COL): I went in the middle with this one, because while my coloring achieves the dark, gothic tone I'm looking for, I often make things too dark and hard to see. However, and while I could just be pointing fingers, I've kind of been blaming my low contrast monitor for this lately, since my coloring work on THAT often looks good, but dark, and hard to see on my laptop or phone. Which, is why lately I've been doing my coloring on my laptop, which seems to yield much better results, universally. I went middle, cause I'm not really sure how much is me, and how much is the tools I'm using.

[DualDragons]

I did mine too

Backgrounds: They are generally not my forte but I have been working harder on them especially in more recent pages. Gotta learn to use shapes to my advantage to create relatively simple yet effective objects far away.

Character design: I think I am solid at character designs. Not the best but I think that most of them can be told apart from one another. I plan to reinforce this with different outfits and changes in characters.

Colours: this is the one area I am more confident in. Some people know me for my red shading but lately I have been trying other colours and shading colours to switch things up. Call me arrogant but I might be doing more with colours than quite a few other creators.

Lineart: my lines are okay. It remains a harder part to do.

Discipline: It's pretty shakey because sometimes I have less motivation to work on my stuff. These are "recharge days or evenings", where I need to recharge creativily.

Ideas: I think they are solid but nothing groundbreaking or innovative. I tend not to overthink plot lines.

[DasIstWunderblyat]

IDEA Imagining and coming up with things is rather easy. It's also worthless without execution. Though, I often just bury my ideas down and stick to simpler things that don't cost me much effort.
DISCIPLINE The bane of my existence and the result my art is bad and probably will never get better. I am to lazy to put effort into whether studying art techniques and fundamentals or just simply sit down and finish an art.
LINEWORK My linework is pretty precise and neat at its best. However, see the "DISCIPLINE" part on why my lines getting messier and have less weight lately. Plus, I draw with my finger so no line weight is detected by my art application, that I have to make it look like so.
BACKGROUND I hate this shit and I often just slap on some flat color, free-to-use stock photo, my own photos, or pattern for it. Reason being is in the "DISCIPLINE" part. When there is a call to draw it seriously from scratch, I can do it with enough willpower (results may vary).
COLOR I am the "use colors to hide that I suck at fundamentals" type of person. I do think it's the better part of my art (still need severe improvement). I lately explore way simpler coloring techniques to accommodate my laziness.
FUNDAMENTALS Anatomy? Perspective? Color theory? Composition? Nope. I am lazy and dumb. There's no point in studying.
CHARACTERS They're shitty people, they're unattractive and not hot that I can't sell their porn to make Patreon money, and they don't follow popular aesthetic or design trope. But I kinda like them, so 3.5.

TL;DR: the biggest handicap of my art is that I'm fucking lazy and can't learn shit

[CloudyMagpie]

Characters: I've seen some artists design and share SO MANY characters and they always look great! I have like, six main ones for my comic, and I struggle to design new ones, haha.

Ideas: One of the things that keeps me sane at my day job is coming up with ideas for things to draw or write for my comic, it's great!

Linework: I'm really proud of my linework, I find it the most relaxing and fun part for me!

Backgrounds: went right in the middle again. I like to draw backgrounds and just forgo straight lines no matter what I'm drawing. though they are usually outdoors or in dilapidated old buildings where it doesn't matter. NO BIG CITIES FOR ME HAHA!

Discipline: so many...abandoned WiPs...

Colors: While I prefer my work to be in color, I always struggle to settle on a color palette and I hate flatting.

[PapaDom]

Characters (CHR): When working on a comic, I tend not to make too many details in the design since I have to draw them repeatedly, leading to forgetting stuff. xD But one-time drawings, I put more effort into them.

Ideas (IDEA): Giving myself a solid 10 because I always come up with neat stuff. (And personally speaking, I make banger jokes too. )

Linework (LINE): It's a bit wonky on some parts but still okay.

Backgrounds (BG): Decent at them. Could use some practice but get the general idea of how it is supposed to look.

Discipline (DIS): Depends. xD If I'm not too tired or have too much to do during the day, I can stay focused on my work.

Colors (COL): It's passable. Could need more practice with lightning and such. X P

[DokiDokiTsuna]

Look at this lopsided creature...this is why I work better with partners. >_< There's nothing wrong with being a glass cannon if you have a tank or a healer for support...but if you don't, you have to find some way to make THIS work:

• Characters (CHR): My passion~. No problems there.
• Ideas (IDEA): More than enough; too many, in fact. This is my cross to bear...
• Line (LINE): Never had a problem with line art, as long as I'm not too lazy to do it. I use physical tools for that, though, so maybe that's why. ^^;
• Backgrounds (BG): I'm more capable than I used to be, but I still don't like to draw them. XP
• Discipline (DIS): ...I don't wanna talk about it
• Colors (COL): My favorite thing to do after the initial drawing (and my favorite aspect of character design)! Yay, colors!

[TheLemmaLlama]

Line (LINE): Never had a problem with line art, as long as I'm not too lazy to do it. I use physical tools for that, though, so maybe that's why. ^^;

Oh true, I did do traditional inking once and iirc I actually didn't hate it! XD Still feels daunting though; you can't ctrl_z if you do screw up ...

Discipline: so many...abandoned WiPs...

'Abandoned' is such a strong word ... I prefer to think of them as 'in progress for the foreseeable future' :]

[Scarlet_Cryptid]

Turns out I'm mid-range-to-good in many areas, not great in one, and excellent in another...

Characters (CHR): About a 4. I think my characters are fairly distinct and have individual personalities. They also are streamlined enough that they're easy to draw over and over (and over and over) again while retaining their individual characteristics without regretting my aesthetic choices. I've also rarely had trouble coming up with characters to fit a setting or scenario, especially if I have some idea of what I need, or what I'm getting into. I need to add more ages, body, and face types, though.

Idea (IDEA): Roughly a 1. My kryptonite. The thing I've struggled with for the longest time. The reason it took me fifteen years to start my own comic. I can make characters forever, but I suck at settings/world-building, and I'm even worse at cohesive plots. On top of that, I don't have anything 'deeper' that I want to say. There's nothing terribly personal or important that I 'want/need' to say in my work. Coming up with enough content to make this comic was a process of over a decade, several novels' worth of co-writing with my spouse, a lot of re-thinking, re-working, re-considering, and a lot of second-guessing.

Line (LINE): Roughly a 4. My artwork has always been line-heavy. I think in lines. I'm comfortable with varying line weights, and describing shapes with a carefully sculpted line. I generally have a very steady hand. I wrestle with a bit of rough line quality from my Microns, though, which sometimes makes it difficult to get a fine, clean line where I need it. Having to re-ink my linework after coloring does NOT help this problem.

Background (BG): Also roughly a 4. I'm not afraid of drawing backgrounds. I can comfortably place characters in space, and I enjoy having them interact with their surroundings, or even adding 'easter eggs' for careful observers to find. I'm definitely better at nature scenes than I am at cities, and I have things to learn yet about linear perspective, but all in all, my backgrounds aren't bad.

Discipline (DIS): A solid 6. Yeah, I'm not afraid to say it. I kick ass at Discipline. I drew 30 pages of buffer before I ever started posting, and I still have 25 pages of it. I draw a page a week, and only skipped a week of drawing when there was a death in the family last year. I haven't missed a weekly update since I started posting in April of last year. I'm going to finish drawing chapter one by October, and I'm looking forward to popping a bottle of champagne to celebrate.

Colors (COL): Back to roughly a 4. I'm decent with color. I know color theory, use a ton of reference photos to get my colors right, and I routinely attempt specific lighting effects that sometimes work, sometimes don't. I do wish I could push my colors a lot further and harder, and do wilder things with them, but there are serious limitations to what markers can do, especially without days of pre-planning and possibly some defiance of physics, so I end up being 'pretty-good-to-mostly-okay' instead of the awesome, saturated, unreal colors I aspire to.

[EncryptedWriting]

Character (CHR):I am giving myself a four here as I feel that I can create scenarios/characters very well. My issue with drawing the characters is with outfits as well as knowing the right combinations to make a character pop out.

Ideas (IDEA): Well, as a writer I have to give myself a five here. I don't have to worry about coming up with ideas and good ones at that. This isn't to toot my own horn, it's me being completely honest when I say I think I have some pretty good ideas.

Linework: Ehhhhhhhhhh. I give myself a two as I feel I have improved greatly in my line work, but there is a lot of progress to go.

Discipline (DIS): Another two as while I am good with getting myself to draw, I feel that the amount I draw will vary as well as the idea of getting distracted more times than not.

Colors (COL): If I could give myself a zero, I would. The only reason I give myself a two and not a one is because I am understanding to not use strictly pop colors and am trying to garner the basics of color theory.

[DokiDokiTsuna]

Still feels daunting though; you can't ctrl_z if you do screw up ...

Well, if I ink a line incorrectly, I just redraw it and edit the bad line out after scanning. ^^ Best of both worlds~

[ccmatta]

Characters (CHR): I have so many OCs it hurts, I should draw more of them tho. It's not higher because my MC of my comic are inspired by characters that already exists as it was originaly a fanfic, so it takes points of originality from me hahahaha but their personalities are original, so it counts? doenst it? hehe

Ideas (IDEA): My brain never stops, so yeaaah. I'm always thinking on what to draw or write, new projects to make and stuff like that.

Linework (LINE): I'm very proud of my lineart game, is one thing i know how to do. In my comic i'm very lazy with it tho, I try to do the basics to save time.

Backgrounds (BG): I suck. that's it (but I try)

Discipline (DIS): could be better. I fuction in waves, sometimes I'm disciplinated af, and other times idgaf. But the fact that I'm working in the same project for more the 2 1/2 years and posting every week (save some exceptions) says a lot, I never have done something like that before.

Colours (COL): I like to think I know how to use colours, even tho I never studied colour therory exactly xD I know the basics, but with practice I kinda know what looks good together?

[bulgariansumo]

Characters (CHR): I'm generally pretty proud of my character designs.
Ideas (IDEA): Sometimes I wanna draw, but the idea doesn't come to me right away.
Linework (LINE): I can do some semi-decent linework, but most times, I just opt to clean up sketches.
Backgrounds (BG): I avoid backgrounds as much as I can get away with (especially inside buildings,) but when I do them, they come out better than expected.
Colors (COL): I feel like I've always had a decent handle on colors. There's some trickier lighting that I occasionally experiment with that doesn't always come out how I want, but otherwise, my colors look as intended. I'm proud of them.
Discipline (DS): I draw when I want, and that is not every day. It's most days, but not every day.

[rumpenstiltzkin]

Well, I certainly dont have much of original ideas, I mainly draw characters and I love coloring but not great at colors and kinda like doing lineart but certainly not great at it and lets not even talk about BGs or discipline....

[system]

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