Waking up at 5 am every morning is not impossible! I see that now!
Day 5 of waking up at 5 am and dedicating at least 3 hours to working on art. Every day it feels like it’s getting easier. This morning, I had that feeling again of not wanting to stay in bed because I was too excited! I wanted to get up, learn how to improve my art, work on art I’m making for other people, AND forwarding my art practice as a business.
The most exciting thing about being a neophyte in the art business world is the struggle it takes to get there, and joy you feel from the little wins along the way.
Learning Time (30 Minutes)
I’m sick of the Loomis method… so I’m gonna keep doing it! A huge part of learning art is understanding it’s not all going to be fun. I’m also finding that sometimes it’s hard to learn new things partly because it’s easy to think, “that’s just my style.” Having your own style is great, but I personally believe learning what’s worked well traditionally as much as possible can help you create a unique style that you can get excited about.
It’s more fun to break rules if you know what they are.
I watched another video, and then I spent the rest of my time watching a clip from The Witcher, pausing the video, then drawing heads using the Loomis method. I think for the next couple days, I’m just going to do practice. If I run into problems, I’ll rewatch the most helpful videos.
When actively learning, it’s not enough to follow along to a video, you also need to apply it practically.
Commissions (1 hour)
So… I didn’t do a whole lot with the Draenei commission. All I did was get canvas paper and gesso it. Also! I have affiliate links below, so if you could just click on those I would appreciate it a lot.
I’ve been using this gesso for a while now, and I gotta say, I absolutely love it! Painting on it is really
Utrecht Professional Acrylic Gesso – Heavy Bodied, White, Gallon
I’m going to be honest, I haven’t used the oil painting paper yet, but I’ve seen Lena Danya use this paper for a series she did called OilTober (1 small oil painting every day in the month of October and all of her paintings turned out beautiful). So, I’m going to trust that it work… plus it’s a bit spendier than your average every day paper, so it BETTER be worth it!
I’m pretty sure it is though, it really took to the gesso, when I applied it, so I’m already excited thinking about starting the painting tomorrow!
Arches Oil Paper Pads – 12″ x 16″, 12 Sheets
End of commercial
I ended up spending the remaining 30 minutes cleaning up my art studio. Not a bad use of time!
What about the other commission, I hear you ask?
Forgive me, I have to take a moment to publicly praise my mother profusely.
Now, the other commission I’m working on for a family member… the one I haven’t been blogging about… has been very frustrating due to the references I’ve been working from (this has been a valuable lesson in taking commissions when the reference photos- though they might be nice photos- don’t translate well to painting).
Luckily after talking about it to my mom, she IMMEDIATELY found me a reference photo that not only had much better lighting and color, but also the figure was in a somewhat similar pose to the reference photo that was giving me trouble!
Hooray! Thank you Mom!
Business Time (60 Minutes)
More researching on what it takes to set up painting workshops (well, setting up my own drink n’ draw). I contacted a couple local churches I attend as well as looked up references for the painting I want to make. Since I’m planning on hosting these workshops in March, I want to make a pretty landscape with Fethard Castle from Ireland.
It’s really nice to have a chunk of time set up just for the business aspect. Sometimes, when I’m researching business practices, updating my website, Patreon, or other things that are not directly related to art-making, I kind of feel guilty not spending time doing art making, but when I have that time SCHEDULED, I can relax knowing that time is just for business.
Thank you, everyone for sticking with me this long! Let’s see if we can last all 7 days!
Wait… tonight’s New Years Eve.
Tradition dictates that I must stay up until Midnight…
… Which means it’ll screw up my sleep schedule…
… DAMNIT!
Ash Meyer Art 
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