On critiques...

Okay, I'm not a professional artist.  I'm a hobbyist.  I started out to become a pro illustrator, made the mistake of going through a graphic design program focused on typography and magazine page layout, worked in graphic design, did little art jobs locally here and there (art for newspaper ads, covers for some tabloid-sized inserts, spot illustrations for a regional magazine, a couple of t-shirt designs for a band, fringe stuff like that) before packing it in and moving to Japan to teach English for a lot more money than I ever made doing any of that stuff.  These days I chase art for my own purposes and to entertain people online.  I'm always trying to improve because I believe education in any subject is a lifelong pursuit.  I'm too shy and self-aware to push myself on working artists, but I have gotten some advice from time to time from some professionals.

Critiques.  As opposed to criticism, which is another discipline.  Criticism is what Roger Ebert used to do to films.  A critique is what artists do to other artists.  Go to art school and you'll receive critiques.  I did.  Some critiques come from the teachers.  Some come from other students.  Either way, they're meant to be a learning experience.  While it's nice to receive a lot of positive comments in a critique-- which is what happens usually if you've done everything correctly-- on occasion, you're going to get negative comments.  Some people will point out your mistakes and tell you how to fix them.  We call this "constructive criticism."  Sometimes constructive criticism comes soft and sweet.

But not always.

Allow me to give you a sampling of some of the comments I've received during critiques.  And keep in mind, these were almost all in front of my peers, as opposed to one-on-one or privately.  Other people watched and listened while teachers told me these things.  Some of these will be word-for-word, but all of them happened years ago, so I'm going to paraphrase the specifics on the ones I can't remember verbatim.  Even so, I'm going to give you a feel for the tone.

"You faked this.  You thought you could get away with it.  Look at these marks on this rug.  These marks are totally meaningless.  You got lazy, violated the rules of the assignment and you're not fooling anyone."

"You know what your favorite color is?  It's gray."

"Look at these two side-by-side.  This one you rushed is a lot better than the one you spent so much time on.  That's why you didn't finish these assignments.  Poor time management and getting all finicky.  And the results aren't worth it."

"This is a mess.  I don't want you turning in things like this."

"You should have just stopped here.  If you had, then you could say, 'I'm finished,' and be done with it."

"Your imagination has outstripped your drawing ability."

(In a very disapproving tone):  "Hmm."

Those are the ones that stuck with me, even if I can't remember every word exactly.  There were plenty of others, too, that have fallen back into a jumbled mass.

The point is, there is no rule that says critiques have to be polite, or positive.  Or even encouraging.  Sometimes the point is to discourage you from doing shitty work.  Especially if you fuck something up.  Read that first one again.  I did fake that assignment.  It was homework for an advanced studio drawing class and our professor was a working fine arts painter who had been a helicopter pilot during the Vietnam War.  Super cool guy.  He had us doing memory drawings, where we were supposed to look at a room for a specified amount of time, then rush to our drawing board and draw gesturally (the teacher was big on gesture drawing and what he called "moves") for another specified amount of time.  I found it tedious and decided to cheat.  The next day we put our assignments on the wall for a group critique and the teacher zeroed right in on mine, no doubt using the same sharp vision he had used while flying under combat conditions during wartime.  He called me out in front of all my classmates and shredded my work.

Shredded my WORK.  Not me.  Although I suppose there was a little of that in there, too, because he was pissed I'd cheated and he knew it and knew I needed some correction.

I could have shriveled from that, but I didn't.  I was left awe-struck.  This guy knew what he was talking about.  It wasn't bullshit.  The light clicked on and from then on, I excelled in his class.  I learned more about drawing from a semester with that guy than I had in the whole of my life up to that point.  The one about gray was right on target, too.  No, gray isn't my favorite color, but I sure used a ton of it in that class for some stupid reason.

Are these critiques, and others like them, the reason I never turned pro?  Not at all.  I may or may not be skilled enough to do professional work, but I made a lot of choices and didn't push myself or sell myself enough because I was too busy expending my energy in epic booze binges.  I was lazy.  I lacked follow-through.  I'm working on my own thing and it's taking forever.  Because I'm some sort of freakish art monk and I do art for the sake of the thing itself and the spiritual benefit of pursuing perfection even though it's an impossible goal.  Japan called and I answered.  There are a lot of reasons and none of them are, "Some teachers tried to help me by pointing out what I was doing wrong and weren't nicey-nice about it."

Shoot, while I prefer everyone love me and gratify me with praise and self-esteem building compliments, and sugar-coat their constructive criticism, I WANT people to kick me in the ass when I need a good ass-kicking.  Sometimes I need harsh words or I won't learn.  Now you can say nice things in a critique, and you can offer constructive criticism and advice in a polite, soft, Nerf-covered way, and that's all well and good.  But as far as there being some set of rules that say you must do it that way?

THERE ARE NONE.

And if you're so insecure you think a critique has to be some re-affirmation of just how awesome you are, then maybe you're too fragile to be doing art for public consumption in the first place.  Maybe you just don't want to learn and grow as an artist.  Or maybe you do and you're just a little thin-skinned.  That's fine.  You're missing out on a lot of learning opportunities, though.

Whatever it is, just don't tell me there are these definite rules for soft-soaping a critique.  A critique can be as easy or as harsh as it needs to be.  And sometimes, like the ones I'm recalling here, a critique has to be a sharp slap in the face to wake you up when you're sleepwalking through art.

Now go read that infamous Alex Toth take-down of no less than Steve Rude and tell me again just how harsh or unfair Janelle Asselin was about that Teen Titans cover.

Having a Tumblr is pretty nice,but you can learn a lot just from hanging out in the right places!

For one thing, there are all kinds of Cassandra Cain-related discussions going on at any given time.  And some amazing art.  My Tumblr feed or page or whatever it's called has attracted a couple of followers, too.  The strange thing-- and also very flattering and gratifying-- is the popularity of my "Batgirl versus the Joker" drawing.  It's strange in that the one shared is the one I put on Deviant Art, rather than the slightly corrected version found on my Tumblr.  Well, whichever one, that someone, anyone, finds something I drew pleasing enough to show others is humbling and leaves me feeling very appreciative.  After all, the whole point of posting stuff is for people to see it and enjoy it.

So far my Tumblr is very Cass-heavy itself.  I tend to doodle or sketch her when I have no inspiration but feel the need to make marks on paper anyway.  Which happens every single day.  That's a lot of Cass!

And now for the other.  One of the coolest things about the Internet beyond the way it gives you a platform for showing off and garnering likes and shares is it gives you the opportunity to interact with working artists or to be a fly on the wall when they discuss their craft.

I've learned (or re-learned) a lot from reading some expert-level discussions on some John Buscema and Jack Kirby fan feeds on Facebook.  Another artist whose work I admire posts structure drawings on his Facebook just about every day and you can learn a lot just from looking at those.  Another educates her followers with some hair-raising personal experiences inside the business.  The other day, a pro whose work I'm a huge fan of (he co-created my favorite non-Cass comic book character) saw something I'm working on and took it upon himself to gift me with some direct-on-target advice.  It's proven to be incredibly helpful.  That certainly recharged my drawing battery, which was running a little low on power after a long weekend of putting down lines!  Last night, using his tips, I started revising the piece and I think it's going to be a stronger work.
 
Remember, these are busy people.  Don't be pushy, demanding, annoying or rude of their time and expertise.  That's what paying for classes is for, and there are dozens, if not hundreds, of perfectly useful "how-to" books available.  You can also find a lot of helpful tutorials all over the place online.  YouTube is a great resource, for example.  I'm way too shy to ever ask for free advice, so I tend to stick to reading and observing and trying to remain unobtrusive.  But if you find yourself in a position to receive some words of advice from a professional or any very experienced artist with teaching ability, or you find yourself reading shop talk where people who do this stuff in earnest every day discuss figure drawing, perspective, page layouts, composition and storytelling, take it to heart and learn as much as you can.

Whether you want to be a professional artist or you just draw for likes on Tumblr, you owe it to yourself to improve.  And if nothing else, learning something new is fun, especially when you can take it and use it to make cool art.  Open your mind to learning experiences wherever you find them--  then go and practice, practice, practice it on your own.

Well, the last thing I want to do is make this blog a simple link aggregator

I really want to give you more content for your money here at Cass-O-Rama!, Japan's leading Cass Cain fan blog, but it's Monday and I'm at work and suffering from severe seasonal allergies.  But there are a few cool Cassandra Cain-related thing happening right now on different places around the web.  Too bad I can't say they're happening in comic books or at DC's official site.  So I'm going to link to them here and hope you go check them out.

Comic Vine has some terrific art on their "Awesome Art Picks" feature.  If you scroll down a ways, you'll find Dustin "Li'l Gotham" Nguyen's sweet drawing of Cass as Black Bat.  Nguyen attempted to slip Stephanie Brown and Cass into the Li'l Gotham comic itself, but we see how that worked out.  This drawing makes me long for Nguyen's art on a straight-up Cass/Steph book, whether it's in-continuity or out-of-continuity.  And not in the stubby-cute Li'l Gotham style.  This.  The man has chops.

Over at Scans Daily, "espanolbot" breaks out a Cass tribute with some artwork from the Batgirl series.  Yeah, it's not really the Joker, but it's still a col sequence of Cass at her ass-whuppin' best.  At some point we'll talk about this issue in depth here.

And finally, someone at the One Sixth Warrior forum for fans/collectors of 1/6th scale figures is asking for help in making a Cass Cain Black Bat figure.  Which is certainly a worthy project and one I've considered doing myself.  I love custom action figures and the 1/6th scale is my favorite because of the wicked detail you can put into the figure and its costume.

It's a rare day indeed when there's this much Cass-based chatter online.  It makes me feel like celebrating!

Cass and Steph surface... in an art commission!

DC can consign their least-favored characters to oblivion, but they can't stop fans from asking for artwork featuring said characters.  Well, actually, DC probably could demand people stop commissioning art of benched characters like Cass, but I'm afraid Pandora's already opened that box and Cass has flown out.  Now she belongs to the ages (until DC's legal department informs me otherwise).  Of course, Steph scores not one but two appearances because she's been both a Robin and a Batgirl.

What am I babbling about with mixed metaphors and meandering digressions?  Cass as Batgirl in some brand new artwork.  Rich Johnston at Bleeding Cool posted this piece by Nate Snareser just the other day, but I've been back at my job (dressed in Cass-appropriate black, I might add) and too busy to comment until now.  And as one of the only Cass blogs still active on the net, it's my job to have an opinion on everything Cass that comes down the line!

I wish I could post the actual artwork here because illustrated posts provide more "pop" and I like them, but you'll just have to follow the link to look at this snazzy artwork yourself.  It's appropriately epic, with just about everyone who's ever been a Batman, Batwoman, Batgirl or Robin coming at you bolder than love and nearly as bad-ass.  I have no idea who a lot of these people are.  I'm not up on all the alternate reality/timeline versions of all these characters and intense continuity is just not my forte.  But I do know a thing or two about art, and this is some solid work.  Well, I'm not going to critique it or anything.  I'm just going to admire the effort and dedication it took for Snareser to produce this amazing piece.

The comments at Bleeding Cool are a fun read, too.  Nate makes an appearance.  He seems like a truly nice guy and I hope he's getting more of these commissions.  True to Internet form, however, the bulk of the comments are taken up by two posters arguing over whether or not a third party should have posted a negative comment about the art.