rant /rænt/
verb: to speak or declaim extravagantly or violently; talk in a wild or vehement way; rave: The demagogue ranted for hours.
Credit to Dictionary.com for the word's meaning.
[You can skip this if you want]
If I recall correctly, my last rant was not a comical one. I Love doing comical rants more than any other type. Although I really don't consider myself a joker of any sort, I can make a few laugh, and if it destroys somebody dark mood for the day, it's worth tripping over my tongue or trying to figure out what to type. However, as much as I want this one to be, this really isn't a comical rant. Me + School = Unfunny.
[Now we can officially start]
[oh, and fair warning, it's long]
Not many on this forum knows this, but I'm what I guess others would call a artist, particularly in the Comic/Manga business. I can't call myself a great artist, hell, half-assed would be a far fetched term, but I've developed, and made some good artwork and signatures over the years.
However, I don't feel like I'm developing as fast as I feel I can. It's a bit frustrating. I do have a uncontrollable tendency of being pessimistic and... Well... Lazy. But when I start drawing something, I sometimes... get a little intense. But through the years I've been drawing, I started learning a few things that not only an artist never wants to hear, but just proves how big of a lie elementary school was.
Anybody remember when you were little, in like, 3'rd-4'th grade? The teacher forced you to draw stuff? Remember when he or she said "there are no mistakes in art"? For somebody who stuck with drawing like I did, that load of BS will hit you like a sack of rotting roadkill carcasses stuffed in a moldy burlap sack. If you get into one, SEMI-serious art class, they will most likely chew you out, I've been there on a couple occasions, also got ripped a new one for drawing manga instead of "realism" though we were never really instructed as to WHAT we were supposed to draw. The point is, that little saying, is pretty much a "give them a quick sense of confidence, and let's pray none of these little snot noses grow up to be artist."
But still, I cling onto that old saying, I'm not a person of perfectionism, I develop more in my own sense than how others want me to. And it causes trouble... Pleeeeenty of trouble... The forum site I go to most is Gaia, sounds childish I know, but there are mature people there if you look. I originally joined for the Role Playing, which I regret, and the art post sections, which... I regret a helluva lot more. Flat out describing the average comment, a**l retentive to such a degree, yet for the most part NO HELP. The people I normally ran into all said the same thing, the one thing if, ANYBODY says, I will instantly, instinctively, punch them, in the face. That, was not a joke, the incident almost happened twice, but then again, my friends are asses.
"Work on Anatomy"
That is what they say... That is what pisses me off on such a level, I literally want to pull my hair out, and I have fro hair, and I keep it short, so it hurts like hell when I'm clawing at my skull! To a person just glancing at the line, it may not be much, it may be flawless, but it's as flawed as it gets. It's vague, really vague.
"Work on Anatomy"
Ok... But where? Are the arms too long? is the head too far on the left shoulder, is the person's right leg too long or large in comparison to the left? WHAT? You can't just up and say "work on anatomy," and think you're being helpful! Point something out, give them something to start with. If out of all those years I had somebody point out certain things I could work on, or something different I could try, instead of tossing out a one liner a 1980s pro wrestler wouldn't use, who knows how much I, or other artist who had to deal with it, could have developed. I actually been in quite a few arguments over this subject, never won, people still use, people still never learn from it, why the vicious cycle hasn't stopped is beyond me. I rarely post in the art section anymore, thankfully.
More recently I've been going to college. My first two semesters were disasterous, though I am not shocked, San Francisco, classes I never heard of, being dragged way out of my element, the classes were going to be hard cross shots. The semester I just completed however... It... Was just brutal for one class...
Perspective.
I'll flat out say it right now, me drawing characters, not all that great, me drawing animals, not all that great, me drawing scenery, in perspective no less, if you ever see me doing so, call professional psychiatric help, PLEASE. That class was nothing short of chaos. Five hours, each Monday, with the most a**l retentive teacher I've ever known. This is honestly his expected critiques of the student's drawings. (shown in this crudely made comic... it was a rush job.)
That was 80-90% of what he said! Which isn't much help if you're naturally bad at drawing a cartoonish building. This goes back to the "give more ideas to set them up" point. Now, he did occasionally came by to look at our stuff and give suggestions, which for the most part, WERE THE SAME DAMN THING, but the guy was literally a rush job. A normal day was Critique homework, give us some time to fix some changes (nowhere near enough) lecture, example practice with nothing but blocks, lecture, lunch, lecture lecture lecture, some time to work on homework in class, we leave. We did have something called a workshop, where we could go in, and get help with our work, but it was on a Thursday, and the teacher there, was a co-writer of the book that our teacher used like a bible... That's like stepping out of a pit of Garden Snakes into a pit of Black Mambas. Last Monday was the last day, and was the most annoying, I really should have skipped it, I knew I was going to fail anyways. The week before, he told us to bring all our notes so we can make a notebook... Never told us this in the beginning... I don't have the notes, I tossed them, making notes never been of any use to me, they did more harm than good (don't know how, nobody knows why this is...) so I'm pretty much scrounging for whatever I may have kept, not enough, F, fail. "Well you can always take what you learned here and pass next semester"
Yeah, that's assuming I learned anything from you. I actually had to go onto youtube to get a better understanding of the class lesson. It was that bad. And here's the ironic thing. Friday was my last figure drawing class (I'll talk about that class in a bit,) after class was over, and said goodbye to the teacher, we sat and waited for our shuttles. I'm looking at some buildings... And... I see one, that looks like I building I drawn for one of my homeworks... It was a L shaped sky scraper in the distance, and it looked pretty plain. It was far, but not far enough not to see details. This guy was whining about how I didn't make my stuff look realistic, that I would never see it in real life... IT'S RIGHT IN FRONT OF ONE OF THE CLASS BUILDINGS! I've been had!
I guess there are some lightings in the dark, the same semester I had the airhead perspective teacher, I had a really cool teacher in figure drawing. We just called him by his first name, Adam. Adam so happened to be a guy who was working on a big project with my first college teacher, so we've met at least a year before. This guy was cool, knew multiple forms of martial arts, played guitar, the flute, was an amazing artist, and unlike many teachers, adjusted to each student. The most drawing thing about the teachers was he required us to draw in our sketchbooks, five drawings a week. Periodically he would check them, and instead of just scanning them, would actually give us suggestions as to what we could do to get better. He would take time to look at our in class work, and sometimes sit and draw on our drawings, just to show us how to do certain things to check if things looked right. He didn't keep the class silent either, he'd sometimes break it up by playing on his guitar, or playing one of those cheesy martial arts movie themes just to get us to laugh. It's a bit shocking to say so, but I kinda miss being in that class.
Now that I got a few months off from classes, I guess it's time I can actually relax my nerves... But, since Monday's class, I've been pretty sour. Just all these issues, simply drawing, has just been coming to a boiling point. So I guess I really needed to up and rant about it and relieve some of this pressure.
So. Like I always try to say when I end a rant, if you read all the way through the written portion of the chaos I call my mind, I give thanks.
- Hybird
