This is the first turn in my new project. I’m building out a creative practice using the model of an RPG (role playing game). I’m still figuring out the rules and how this is all going to work, but this is the first thing I need to do is to create the card for “Create a New Card”. Then, tomorrow, I’ll play this card for the next step.
I have been playing some games lately and thought that it might be fun to turn my whole creative practice into a game! I did a walk-through of the concept and think it will be fun, so I grabbed a new sketchbook and got started. This is a very small start, and I don’t know exactly how things will work, but there’s no reason to wait, I’ll just start and adjust as I go.
I have been doing a lot of work on my art studies and I feel like I’m getting to a point where I can draw things reasonably well. I’m especially good at copying a lot of the artists that I like, especially in a doodle-comic style. I feel like I have a grasp on the fundamentals.
So now, the question becomes: What do I want to draw and how do I want to draw it? And then, I can start focusing on that.
For example, if I wanted to paint realistic portraits of people (I don’t), I would follow a path doing master studies of other portrait artists in a given medium and really dig into how to use paint to show light and shadow. Or if I wanted to get good at realistic rendering of cars (again, I don’t), I would study from books that get into very technical details of perspective, how to draw wheels in perspective and how to render materials such as painted metal.
Instead, I have been trying to identify what styles and mediums and subjects that I really like. I love a more doodle and comic style of art rather than realistic. I really love ink and watercolor, but I’m also trying to find a similar style in digital art. And for a subject, I really love fantasy art. It’s why I love Minecraft too: there’s adventuring, potions, magic, along with a simple life style of farming, mining and exploring. That’s why I initially had the idea of combining Minecraft and art.
From a practical standpoint, this means that I need to start drilling down into the style I want to pursue for my ‘world’ and how things will be represented in that world. What do plants and flowers look like, how detailed are birds, etc. I can look to the artists that I like and get ideas of how to represent common things like potions bottles, then pull together some practice cards to work on those things. This will help me develop a visual library of objects that I can use in my art.
Andy from Creative Pep Talk podcast has talked about this. Once you decide what things look like in the world of your creative project, then you don’t have to think about every single object. You can make those decisions before you start your project, then it makes it much easier to start drawing.
When I was making Minecraft videos, it was always easy to do something with the videos, or in the game. Minecraft is geared toward always having some fun easy little task to do. But learning art is hard. So when facing a challenging art lesson, or grinding through drawing drills, I would often take the easy way out and do something with Minecraft. Minecraft is easy! 🙂
It’s been 6 months since I stopped making Minecraft videos and used that time to focus on my art instead. And it’s really paying off. My art is improving and getting easier. But it’s still very hard to sit down and work on my art. The improvements are so small over time and it’s frustrating when your taste is higher than your current ability to produce.
What’s changed over the last 6 months? I moved away from the 10k Hours theory of things. The method of using small lessons and drilling on them daily just wasn’t working for me. I enjoy project based learning instead where I have something I want to work on, and find lessons to help me toward that goal. So I stopped tracking my time that way. Also, I often spend several hours on one piece, and then other times just do some quick sketches of things from a class, so my process isn’t working with the ‘one hour per day only’ mindset.
My companion work based on artwork from Lazarus Lore
So what am I doing? What’s working for me now is to have some weekly and monthly goals. I’m not strict about it, it’s more along the lines of having a list available of things I would like to do in a week or month, and then when I have time and I’m ready to work on something, I can grab something from the list.
One thing I’m fairly consistent with is a weekly Master Study and companion work. I take a small watercolor work from an artist I like, and I try to copy it as best as I can. Then I also make a companion work influenced by the master work. This has been really fun and pushed me harder on my skills in composition, color, and techniques.
My companion work based on artwork by Yahya Rushdan
Other than Master studies, I’m trying to keep up with SVS classes and other tutorials that I have purchased. I want to try doing a weekly tutorial in gouache. I’m subscribed to Clo Louise’s Patreon and trying to get to those tutorials, but it’s hard to make time. She’s also much more advanced in gouache, so it’s hard to keep up. Color mixing in gouache is a whole new thing for me. I also want to try doing a small study in Procreate, but again, it’s hard to fit in and quite challenging.
I started a new Minecraft world to have fun with the new changes coming into the game with the Sulfur caves and Dappled Forest. I’m not doing any filming and this will just be a fun play world for me, so I’m having fun playing slow. I do have some projects I’m working on with a crossover art and Minecraft idea. But I’m chipping away at the idea slowly.
I still don’t know if I’ll ever get back to Minecraft videos. I’m going to wait the full year and see where I’m at. If I start again, it won’t be a typical SMP or Let’s Play type of video, it will be more art focused. I’ll see later.
It was a great decision to step away from videos. I have so much more time now and it’s really helping me work on my art. I’m excited for the next 6 months to see how things go before I make a decision on my Minecraft channel.
April and May have been very productive months for me, but with not a lot to show. I continue to do Master Copies with Companion pieces each time, but most of them are so related to the master copy that I don’t feel good about posting them. Even this piece is highly influenced by a Max Wilkins (https://www.instagram.com/max_wilkins_illustration/) piece. He does a lot of tower stacked houses and I did a master study of one. Then for the companion piece I was thinking about how they looked like bird houses, then thought about birds that people could ride as sentries and made this piece of bird stables and rider barracks. (see the little, tiny people?)
I was really scared to add the bird. But I felt like the piece didn’t make sense unless I had an example of the big bird who could fly into the stack and the rider to show the scale of the bird and barracks. So, I had to be brave and add the bird! 🙂 I love how it turned out and it’s a concept I want to explore some more!
I am really enjoying my art practice. It’s work, and it’s so humbling at times. I have much higher desires than what I am able to accomplish with my art at this point, but it’s so much fun!
I have really dropped the concept of the 10k hour project. I’ll need to write up a post and update about it. At this point, I have classes and lessons that I take online, but then I have ongoing projects that I work on. Some days I only do a little bit of art, but other days, I will work on a piece for hours. And I find projects are more motivating to me than daily lessons. So, I’ll update that eventually.
For now, I am enjoying having a list of ongoing projects to work on during the week. I do what I can and if some days are light, that’s ok, because other days I will just sit and work on a painting all day.
I tried a different technique with this piece where I did the sketch and linework, then did shadows in a purple-grey watercolor. Then I added colors on top and was able to just paint color over the white and shadow. For example, the green of the middle house is one green color, just over the white paper and the purple shadow. So I didn’t have to mix a green and a shadow green color. I really liked this technique, it’s something that Yahya Rushdan (https://www.instagram.com/yahyarushdan/) says he uses. I loved how it worked and love how it turned out. But I should have taken photos of the process to really show it. I’ll do that next time.
Minecraft Update
I saved off my old worlds at the beginning of April. I also finished up all work on the Arcadia server. I didn’t play for several weeks while I decided what to do. I need to give myself more time to work on my art so I already committed to not doing any new videos at least until September. I am going to extend that even more and not do videos in 2026. I really want to work on my art skills so I can reintroduce my art and minecraft channel in the new year.
So, after several weeks away from Minecraft, I started a new single player world just to play and have fun. I’m not keeping track of anything, no goals, no ‘rules’, just playing however I want for fun. I’m mostly playing in Peaceful Mode just so I don’t have to battle mobs. I can play though the nights and explore caves with no worries, and I’m really enjoying it. It’s so much fun to play just for the fun of it.
I am making this my go-forward world. If I get back to making videos, they will not be the typical ‘lets play’ videos, they will be more art focused. I have ideas, we’ll see how they turn out. It’s only the end of May, and I am committing to not making videos for 2026! So we’ll see what happens between now and then.
Life Update
I have figured out that I can either have social media and blogs, OR I can read books. I can’t do both. Your mileage may vary. But my little brain will turn to the easiest thing, which is doom-scrolling news and social media. So I have setup ScreenZen on my computer, iPad and phone and blocked news and social media sites. I do allow Instagram since I love looking at other people’s art. But Bluesky, Reddit, and news sites are blocked. And then I read! I have been reading a lot more and really enjoying it. But it’s a hard habit for me if there is something easy like browsing and scrolling.
What’s sad is that I remember the rich and weird internet before the social media days. I remember all these weird wonderful blog rabbit holes you could fall into and spend a delightful hour stumbling into someone’s blog and reading about parrot care or paper making or remodeling old garages. You could dive into all kinds of cool hobbies that people had. It was delightful and wonderful, and I really miss it.
I want to go back to that cozy internet of sharing cool hobbies. No worrying about ads and monetizing, just sharing the fun in our lives. I’m going to try bringing back weekly updates so I can try to bring back some of that feel.
If you know of any cool hobby blogs, let me know! I’ll try to link to them too! 😀
March was a good month, but I lost steam a little bit toward the end. I know motivation ebbs and flows, but it’s so strange to me how it changes over time for no reason. I think part of it might just be that I need to change things up sometimes or that I did a lot and just need a rest.
Art Update
Overall, it was a very good month. I did about 27 hours of art practice, which is great! I also have ongoing projects that I’m keeping up with like the weekly master studies.
Most of my work continues to be copying from others just to get practice. This is a huge help, but means I have less to share.
I got over a mental block of drawing faces. I just had this weird block where I didn’t feel like I could draw a face. I got over it by drawing boxes based on a book from Pypah Santos, Draw Amazing Faces (https://pypahsart.com/draw-amazing-faces). In it, she shows a grid of cubes to help think about how heads change in perspective to the viewer, so you can be looking down or looking up at the person and viewing them from side to side. She had just simple eyes and noses to demonstrate.
But, drawing the grid allowed me to practice drawing faces without getting into how to draw an accurate figure. So it really unlocked something in me and allowed me to practice faces without pressure.
Soon, I was putting faces on any practice boxes I drew! And it became my favorite part of daily sketch practice.
Which, oddly, brings me to:
Minecraft Update
When I started my YouTube channel, I always intended it to be a channel that combined Art and Minecraft. But the Minecraft side kinda took over. I don’t know where things will end up, but I really want to get my art to a place where I can do more world building and story telling with my art and Minecraft.
I intend to make more character based art and I’m developing my character ideas. Getting over my hang-up about faces is a big step forward!
Life Update
I’m still not sewing! One problem is that it’s hard to find time on the weekends with other stuff going on. Another issue is that I don’t have a good easy project to start with. I have a lot of fabric and ideas, but I need to sit down, figure out the next thing and get everything together so I can work on it.
I also re-read Project Hail Mary which is such a fun read. I wanted to re-read it before seeing the movie. I highly recommend the book.
