After hurting my right shoulder earlier this year my productivity has dropped a lot, much as I would love to be creating things my arm tells me otherwise, usually by a nice shooting pain up my neck to remind me to get away from the mouse.
So I have taken this as an opportunity to learn as much as I can for when I can get back to being more productive, around the time I hurt my arm I had also just recieved two free months at Skillshare thanks to YouTuber Chloe Rose, I signed up to take her digital art class but while I started making my own project I never finished it as using the tablet was making my arm too painful but I enjoyed the lessons regardless.
Mastering Digital Art: Basics to Final portrait
She also had a watercolour galaxy lesson and that one I did finish, I had recently bought myself a cheap watercolour pack from WHSmith, I hadn’t touched watercolours since school so didn’t want to spend a fortune on art supplies I might not use much.
It’s not the best galaxy painting but I was pretty pleased with it.
Watercolor: Paint a Beautiful, Realistic Galaxy
Looking back at it now I can see how I overworked some patches, at points it was a messy puddle because my water control was dreadful. But I still learnt a lot from doing it.
And more than that I enjoyed myself so much I started looking for more watercolour tutorials on Skillshare, since then I have watched a ton of lessons and even invested in a 48 pan set of Winsor & Newton Cotman watercolours, and a set of Gouache by Royal & Langnickel. Paper has been my biggest issue, I’m loathe to waste it on my inept practice paintings but I solved that worry by getting this pack of practice paper.
A lot of the lessons I just watched but sometimes if my arm felt up to it I had a go, mostly with dodgy results because even while not too painful my control isn’t great, at present my writing looks worse than it did when I was just learning how to write as a child.
One of the lessons where I did paint something was Gouache for Illustrators – Create a cute Animal Portrait by Romica Spiegl-Jones, I chose to do a rabbit for my animal, what a surprise!
No matter how many lessons I watch, be it surface pattern design, illustration or watercolour, every lesson has taught me something I didn’t know because every teacher has their own tips and tricks, so while I have learned a lot I just know there will always be more to discover, and that is why I think that I will never stop learning.
Writing this post finally prompted me to bite the bullet and post my rabbit in the project section as well, one day I may go back and do projects for some of the lessons that I only watched, but at present that’s quite a list of lessons and it’s only growing longer so maybe not.