Went on a small spree a year or two ago where I just did studies for a bit.

Studies and sketches are the background of visual art, but it always feels so hard. Again with this constant theme in my life, but I do sometimes wonder if I’m putting too much into studies, because I always feel so drained and stressed after doing them.

Actually, now that I’ve written that- it seems obvious. Yes. I really really do stress myself out too much about studies.

Recently, I saw some artists talking about their processes for studies on Twitter, and it kinda blew my mind to realise that they only focused on one thing when doing studies. They didn’t feel like they had to fully understand shadow and tone and composition with every study they did. Just maybe on simplifying one aspect of tonal value, or just linework, or something.

I haven’t really tried just being really casual with my studies, so I’m curious to see what kind of results that would give, if I made 300 studies this year, without feeling like I needed every study to turn out perfectly like the reference picture.

this one was definitely a long study. Like 3 to 4 hours iirc? i kinda just never wanted to do it again for a long while after i was done with this, although i’m pretty happy with the result.

Another study with the same brush. I like this brush but I wonder if it doesn’t feel too hard to keep building up the layers, for me anyway.

i do wonder if making 300 studies this year would force me to work quicker and lighter. i feel like i really need to make this process more light-hearted on myself if i want to make this my career.