Yeah, of course styles can change. It's called art evolution12. (Garfield is an oft-cited example of the phenomenon).
I agree with the round-hole-square-peg idea. Don't feel obligated to change your style just to suit what's popular or try to replicate other artists' styles, but do learn from other artists you like. For example, there's two artists whose art I admire quite a lot, and I'm often looking to their art like "Oh, okay, so this is how she draws butts. I like that. I'm gonna see if I can incorporate that into my style". The result isn't in their style, but rather my style with their features added (certain angles and shapes, etc).
For me there's nothing wrong with having your own style. In fact, it's way better because people can distinguish you among those who in a more generic art style. Let's be honest here, if you draw in an anime style like for example (k-on/chuunibyou style) sure it's cute but there's nothing remarkable that will make people remember that you draw that.
So don't be concerned about fitting in. It's more okay to be unique.
Oh absolutely! Check out some long-running mangas. Bleach is a good example, Tite Kubo's style evolved drastically over the years.
...and not to mention animators. They can change their drawing style based on the project they're working on. Bunch of monsters.
Never compare your work to other artist. You will end up always feeling as if you are not improving, instead compare your current work with something you did a year or two ago.
Actually, it's rather strange to think about, but art mimicry is a skill you need to have with most industry art jobs. Art Directors will love you to bits if you can correctly mimic the style they demand. Think about your favorite game or animation. That's a team of artists all mimicking one style to create a seamless product.
@keac So, don't be embarrassed to try other styles. A lot of artists frown upon it, but really I see it as experimenting. You'll discover how other artists use shortcuts to enhance their art, and these tricks you pick up will help bolster your skills.
Personally, I would always try doing life-studies to work on the fundamentals first. Drawing and style shifting gets easier the more you work on the basic art building blocks like value, perspective, and proportion. : >
Okay, so, a "style" is basically just what an artist tends to default to because it's how they're comfortable drawing things. That includes small things (I tend to draw noses, teeth, eyes a certain way because that's how I'm used to drawing them) and more big, general things (my work tends to have really thick, bold lineart and a lot of detail).
None of those things are locked in. If I sit down and say, "I'm going to draw noses differently" and did so on purpose, I could do it eventually. As soon as I'm not really paying attention, I'll probably default to what I'm used to drawing, but if I keep paying attention and keep trying over and over, then eventually I'll get used to drawing it the new way.
If I decided "I'm going to draw really simple and cartoony" or "I'm going to draw in a lineless style," that would be harder, because I don't have the practice that other people who've been working that way for a long time have. There would be things I wouldn't know how to do, so I'd have to stop and figure it out over and over. I'd have to try and fail a lot. But it's still possible! It's just harder.
Some endeavours value a unique style, and some endeavours value the ability to mimic others; I don't think one is better than the other. But nothing says you can only have one style. You can learn to draw in lots of different ways.
That said, some styles will be easier for you to learn than others --- it's very very common for artists to fall in love with a style that's the exact opposite of what they're good at. That can be really frustrating, because you're having to force your brain to think in a different way, and it's up to you whether it's worth it to throw yourself at that goal until you can do it, or accept that this style of art really isn't the kind you enjoy creating, even though it's nice to look at.
i'm guessing you're still trying to learn art, so you're not used to seeing people who are different from you and probably it makes you feel ashamed of yourself. Hey i've been there too. You learn from years of practice and development that everyone is different and you'll never be like someone else or try to be like them to feel better about your work. You're goal is simply to improve and better yourself and use other artists as inspiration to grow. That's what being an artist is all about.
Being able to imitate styles is definitely a good skill to have under your belt, but if the only reason you're doing it is because you want to fit in with the popular kids, I don't think you're going to be happy in the end. Being happy with your work is all about doing things because it's what you genuinely want for yourself, and not because you think it'll get you anything in the end. Not saying it's not possible for you to succeed that way (because yeah if you practice and practice and do everything you can to change it you'll achieve that style), but art can already be a very miserable struggle, and the more you make it about pleasing other people and not yourself, the less happy you'll be in the long run. And there's also no guarantees you'll even get noticed if you have a "popular" style, so if that has anything to do with your desire to want to change, I really think you should keep that in mind.
However, I do think it says something if you're unhappy with your current way of drawing. Stretching your legs and trying new things really is absolutely essential to becoming a stronger artist because you might find something someone else is doing that you may want to adopt into your own. Take a look at some styles you really like and try out stuff here and there and see what suites you. Practice those new things over and over consciously make an effort to draw those things that way until it becomes natural.
And I do want to say, I don't think adopting someone elses style is a bad thing, if it's what you want for yourself because you genuinely like the style. I just don't think it's going to feel very genuine to you or your readers if the reason you're doing it is to "fit in" (or get popular like them).
Don't worry about style. Just draw.
Don't compare yourselves to other artists. Just draw.
You will get better and your style will evolve as you continue to draw, learn and practice.
Art Directors who don't respect you will certainly love you to bits -- by which I mean hassle you slightly less -- if you can pluck out their thoughts and draw them in a style they think is close to what they're thinking of.
In the real world, different artists have different styles and it's an insult to expect any two artists to draw in the same style. Asking about a unique style as opposed to just aping someone else's style for one's own storytelling and one's own unique, independent project, there's only one answer: cultivate one's own unique style.
If you want to be an animator and draw the same thing a million times and try to imitate the other animators' styles, sure. Go for it. If you want to be part of a machine of any sort, that's your choice, @keac . But that's not what I think you were asking in the first place.
If, however, you want to cultivate a distinctive style that is identifiable as your own and not have people mistake you for someone else, work on your own unique style. As I pointed out myself, do drawing from life to develop your abilities and strengthen the fundamental foundation of your work. But don't imitate others in developing your style. I do agree, try to do things that others do...but do it in your own way and realize it in your own style. Don't just try to make it look like someone else's, because that's really not going to happen in most cases.
I've imitated other artists in learning exercises, stared for hours at other artists' pieces, and that taught me lines to value in my own work and values to imitate in my own work. There is, as @dojo said, nothing wrong with imitating styles if you choose to do so. But feeling like you have to do it to fit in, or even to be well-regarded...is just rubbish and nonsense. Don't do it to fit in, don't do it because you think those styles are "better" -- they're not. They're just different. There is no such thing in art as objective good or bad. There is technical merit and no end of other qualifications, but no absolute "good" or "bad". Art is an expression of personal perspective. When it is a successful expression, that's when it tends to feel like its best.
I've been at this for most of my life and I know what I'm talking about when I say that a unique style will serve you far better than a chameleon ability. Adaptability, flexibility, these are important; however, if you cultivate strong fundamentals and a strong foundation to go with your unique personal style, that will serve you far, far better than the learned ability to ape what other people are going to do better than you no matter what.
@hushicho While I can relate to the soul-sucking machine aspect to the industry, it's really not all bad, and I'm really gratful to the artists that do choose to do it because it gives me a lot of media to enjoy. It isn't for everyone certainly, and I merely wanted to point point out that it is a good skill to have for those jobs.
Additionally, the main role of an Art Director is to make sure all art for the media is on point and consistent. It's not out of disrespect, it's better for the product as a whole. Imagine if one artist at NaughtyDog decided to render really hyper stylized cartoon trees for the Last of Us. It would really throw off the grim message the game depicts, and damage the impact of the story.
Anyway, this is getting off topic. The point is, as artists we have to determine what avenue is best for us, and not devalue what others may choose.
Style is one of those weird things that every artist seems to worry about, even those who have distinct styles. It really is something that you build up after drawing for awhile and not something that was consciously decided.
I think the first thing you should do is draw, a lot! Take life drawing classes, draw from photos, do still lifes, etc. Your style will emerge as you continue to just draw things. A style is merely the way an artist depicts things. I would make a list of things you want to improve upon, drawing hands for example, and just draw them, see how others do it, and after you have drawn 100 hands you will eventually have a "style" of hand drawing.
Seems like you are having trouble with coloring, I would suggest just trying different methods and seeing what you feel comfortable with and what you think looks good. Every time you try something new it adds to your knowledge base and influences your art.
As for styles, I have many different styles depending on my work. My comic style, my cartooning style, my graphic design style, and my medical illustration style. I adapt to a project and ultimately the more work I do, the more each one evolves and feeds off the others.
I can recommend this video3 where Bobby Chiu speaks about "style". He addresses both the sensible way to go about developing one, and what a style really is - namely a reflection of yourself. It was quite an eye-opener to me and I hope it can help you too!
Also, forcing yourself into a corset is not the way to go. I'm thinking that your dissatisfaction with your art (which I tbh haven't seen) might stem from feeling that you lack technical skill, so maybe take a break from stylizing for a while and just focus on the fundamentals like values, color theory, anatomy, all that jazz. It'll help you disconnect and improve at the same time. Or look around for artists whose paintings or drawings you really enjoy, but make it a wide variety of styles. Like not just some internet popular dudes, take the masters, from many different genres to push your boundaries, like Mucha, Rembrandt, Klimt, Hokusai, Hiroshige, Carl Larsson, and do a study of their paintings (which essentially means to try to paint them as accurately as possible). In that process you'll not just improve technically, you'll also get forced to try new things beyond your usual sphere - and you might find what you really enjoy drawing!
You know, I can really feel your pain. So this advice comes from what I'm doing myself in what little free time I have right now. I've been doing one face study per day, and so far it looks horrid and takes several tries to get it to look somewhat sensible, but it's all just proof of me really needing to do this xD No way but to power through!
I would love to draw based from references. But I'm quite hesitant. Is drawing from references uhm... as they say, "cheating"? Or maybe I'm talking about tracing...
That's tracing you're thinking of. Drawing from reference is not cheating. Professionals do it all the time. What it does is help the artist understand the real-life thing they're drawing before they commit it into whatever stylized design they're doing.
Using references is not cheating.
Honestly, as artists we are asked to draw a lot of things that we aren't familiar with, and how do we get familiar with them if we don't go find out what they look like? All the great famous artists used reference, and the more you draw from reference the better your mental library becomes, allowing you to not reference as much.
Here is a good tutorial on the process, and why you use reference:
Think of it like this. 1. How are you supposed to learn to draw something if you can't even look at it? 2. If it were as easy as looking at a photo of a face to draw it accurately... How come not everyone can do that?
Hmm. Hmm indeed.
I feel that this is one of the biggest misconceptions among (mostly) inexperienced artists - that it should somehow be cheating to study the subject of what you're drawing. But following that logic, if just looking at another person would be enough to make photorealistic paintings, how come art history looks the way it does? Why did it take so long for humans to figure out how to accurately draw what's right in front of them? That's because it's HARD, because what we see is strongly colored by our preconceptions (see art history: when babies were painted as tiny adults, because there was no concept of "childhood") and because the world around us is influenced by so many laws of nature that we first need to discover them in order to portray them (see three-point-perspective). And that has taken tens of thousands of years. Just imagine that!
Even fantasy creatures are made based on references. It's just a bit more concealed. A classic western dragon, being an obvious example, might take scales from lizards, wings from bats etc.
What you're doing when you're not using references is going off your memory, which is based on extremely casual observations of the world around you. Because honestly - when did you last measure out the proportions of chairs to the tables they stood next to? Or the height-width-depth ratio of your classroom? Or the way the light bounces off the paper you're writing on and reflects on your hand? Probably never. So what's the harm in strengthening that memory? Good artists who can draw without reference can do so because they have a strong visual library that they have built through life drawing and reference drawing. For example, they know exactly how the planes of the face work, so they don't need to guess and can just jot down a face in a jiffy!
Now don't take this as an attack - I'm just very passionate about this theme! I just want to share the wonders of references with all the struggling artists out there! x)
If you don't like your style then just keep practicing and continue learning. You shouldn't be ashamed that anime or semi-realism isn't your thing, as a matter of fact, you should be proud of it! Who knows maybe you'll create something completely unique and refreshing down the road that many people will admire, and stop comparing yourself so much to other artists because you're you and they're them.
If looking at references were considered cheating then just about every artist would be a cheater. There is nothing wrong with looking at references to help you understand things like anatomy, coming up with poses, perspective, etc. Both copying and tracing however IS cheating just look at what Nick Simmons did for example, straight up plagiarism right there and he did lose his job for it.
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