The first layer for this painting is dry and I’m adding the second layer of paint. I hope to not need a third layer of paint to get the subtle transitions in the glow of the valley.
I’ve removed the solo artist from the title of my posts because of a conversation with Josh about the Solo Artist Curriculum. We’ve discovered that this monolith of a course is just not sustainable. I’m a super motivated person but it takes super human motivation to stick with this curriculum for the 3 years straight that it will take. I feel the only way that I can get through it is to come back to every now and then and slowly chip away at it. To use it as a guild for continued learning in art as well. If I lose motivation in one area of my art I can always return to the solo artist curriculum for ideas and ways to move forward.
For now I’m moving forward on the tons of painting ideas that I’ve gotten from playing with Ai generated art.
Interesting to hear your thoughts on the Solo Artist Curriculum. I looked into it after learning about it from you and Josh, but decided it wasn’t right for me. I wasn’t so keen on some of the resource suggestions, in part because I already own a lot of art instruction books, and I have different priorities for the various skills I’d like to develop.
I think the best approach for me is to use this type of curriculum as a guide to create my own personalized one. For now, it feels less stressful to just plot one or two steps ahead, and to leave the rest of the journey open to wherever I feel like going next.
Watts Atelier have published some learning paths that I also find helpful.
https://www.wattsatelier.com/online/our-learning-path-students/
I’d still recommend that you consider the Waichulis Curriculum (The Language of Drawing and The Language of Painting), when you’re looking to improve your realistic drawing and painting skills. Anthony’s approach is very focused on deliberate practice of component subskills.
It isn’t so well known on the internet because you currently have to buy it as a set of physical DVDs. The Ani Art Academies use this curriculum, and the students get amazing results.
https://aniartacademies.org/apprentice-collection-i/
Maxwell G. Miller has some videos that show his skill progression.
https://m.youtube.com/channel/UC_HIuO5VZP-4wNUyqflsNhw
I completely agree with you Orlando. These curriculum’s are great to a point but we have to make it our own.
The one thing I really like about the Solo Artist is that it’s a democratized learning strategy. You don’t just get one teach teaching you everything their way. You get all the teachers and each one teaches what they are best at. If we pick a curriculum like Watts we are also picking an illustrators path. I think its best to try Watts, Proko, Drawabox, New masters, SVS, etc… and use them all for what they are great at.
Probably the best thing I’ve gotten out of the solo artist curriculum is exposure to the Society of Visual story telling. By far the best course on learning composition there with Creative composition taught by Will Terri. There is none better.
I’ll look into Waichulis Curriculum thanks for the suggestion.
Look into SVSlearn.com! Awesome!
Thanks for the recommendation!
I like the idea of having many teachers, and choosing experts in each subject.
I found another good resource for designing a personal art curriculum. New Masters Academy have a course guide that groups their courses into modules, and those modules into tracks for different types of art training.
Nice! I’ll take a look at it!
Wow! They did a fantastic job with it. I’ll link it here as well.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/resources.nma.art/NMA-Course-Guide.pdf
Yeah, I was very reassured and impressed when I saw it. I’ll sign up before their Black Friday sale ends.
Right now, I’m planning on having a two-pronged approach to my personal curriculum. NMA on the one hand, and supplemental material on the other (Drawabox, Waichulis, other books and courses). I’ll focus on one resource at a time, and alternate whenever I need a change.
I’ll also do something similar to Drawabox’s 50% rule, making sure to do some personal creative work everyday. I find that just being in study mode leads me to burn out.
That sounds perfect! Do you have any goals for time per day? What other things are pulling you away from you’re art that may disrupt your goal? If this gets too personal for comments here shoot me a personal email. chris@chrisbeaven.com