It's time again to pause and look back at July to September. Here are Quarter 1 and Quarter 2's reviews.
I got quite busy with RL matters and didn't publish a Dispatch last week. So here is another double issue.
After the intense focus of the big bazaar illustration in Dispatch 31, I dialed things back and did two weeks of smaller, faster art pieces. Amongst other things, I finished one drawing challenge, and just in time for a new art challenge: Inktober.
I finished my digital painting of a bazaar stall, the most complicated and involved digital painting I've created to date. Through this I discovered the limits of my current digital painting process, and, for the first time in about a year, faced a loss of nerve and had to figure out how to overcome it. In all, this was a good learning experience!
This week I started delving further into the kind of environmental painting that I've wanted to do for a while. And boy, this is a dive into the deep end of composition and painting, and I'm still floundering around trying to reach the other side. But first, some fun studies to decompress.
Last week (Dispatch 28.5) was an eventful one: I completed up my first ever paid commission work as a freelance illustrator. This week it was back to business as usual (the things I put on hold for commission work), and I wrapped up a number of projects in Drawabox and personal art. Commission work is stimulating and exciting, but once it's done, it sure feels good to go back to working on my own stuff!
This week's Art Dispatch will be a short one. I have spent this whole week working on what is possibly my first paid gig as a freelance illustrator. It's not completed yet, but it has been a wild and exciting ride so far, and I've learned a ton from this experience. I hope to post more about it later!