Quantity vs. Quality
Social media has by this point become a huge part of all our lives.
There have been no doubt several benefits and of course there have been disadvantages.
We could go on and on with the debates.
I find that one of the compelling advocates on the benefits on social media being Gary Vaynerchuk.
He’s mobilized the power of “Web 2.0” as he calls it and made it his slogan.
On the other side we have Georgetown university professor Cal Newport, a computer scientist who in his several books speaks about the problems posed by social media use and argues that top performers do not need to have a social media presence that their work speaks for themselves.
Both have real compelling arguments.
And I to some degree agree with them both.
However as an artist you do not create in private.
More often than not, the “genius” in the art comes mostly from the “scenius” as it is mentioned in the book “Show your work!” by Austin Kleon.
I agree that as an artist you need to build an amazing community and for most of us social media permits us to have and maintain such rich networks around the world.
A Cambrian explosion of art and content, we could be living in a golden age.
At the same time, do consider Cal Newport’s argument.
He speaks primarily on the competency and the work-load of the artist or in this case the crafts person.
A crafts person who needs to give focus and attention in order to do deep work into his/her craft.
Newport speaks of “deliberate practice” repeatedly on his books.
In his book “Deep work” he even claims that one needs to quit social media in order to fulfill on becoming better at their craft.
Fair enough.
I take Newport’s arguments as legitimate insofar as he talks about improving ones craft. You improve your craft based on how much you practice it.
As of today, I’ve made one hundred digital art pieces like the one you see above in the title.
I’ve been practicing on this software called Krita everyday in order to become a competent enough artist to put my ideas before my eyes.
I am still a total amateur at this. And I trust the process that I’ll get better with practice.
But then there is always this thing about practice that it is hard.
It is hard to get started, the beginnings are always the tough part.
Knowing might be half the battle sure, but then you got to start somewhere.
To tackle this I chose to follow the Atomic Habits system.
See, The atomic habits part of my life has been so effective to build a daily drawing practice that I intend to put it to use to almost all the other areas in my life.
The unique situation with the pandemic in the world as I write this have given me the opportunity to be in my home and explore these latent talents of mine.
I may or may not be successful at my goal, but I shall keep this system running if possible to the very end of my life.
The goal is simple, it’s an outcome that I intend to fulfill to create a beautiful work of art.
well that’s very vague, we need to define it further. To create a work of art like a comic book run of my own superhero.
This is more specific. Depends on what you consider your goal.
But to me a comic book run of a superhero, compelling enough is beautiful.
Great, so that’s the outcome, what’s the process now?
what I need to do to fulfil this outcome.
For starters comic books have pictures in them so I need to begin drawing.
Unfortunately, I don’t find my drawing skills acceptable but that isn’t going to stop me.
I decided that I shall continue drawing until I reach my goal.
In many ways, it’s like a war of attrition.
You are trying to breakthrough these invisible walls of your own competence and to do that you need to lay siege at this castle/fortress of reality that is keeping your prize locked away.
To lay a siege you need to keep it consistent for a long amount of time.
So my logic was, if I could write everyday for 10 years, 1000 words on medium would I reach a level of competence?
that would mean 365,000 essays each of 1000 words which amounts to 365,000,000 words.
If I can do this, do you think I can become a good enough writer.
I believe that it is possible.
even 1% improvement.
and here I count a 1% improvement as 1 essay per day is tantamount to about 34% improvement a year.
Now that is progress!
I started with drawing One drawing per day, became a keystone habit.
Next I realized that I could do this digital, maybe try doing some digital artworks.
So i started to make one conventional drawing with pencil and paper and one digital drawing with a software on Krita.
Also keep in mind during this time I was also posting all this on Instagram for bragging rights.
That’s my reward, I am a vain person, I need to have people praise me even for the smallest amount of effort and I knew I had friends that would appreciate this with “likes” so I let that influence me for better or worse.
I still think this is a better use of social media, it kept me accountable.
Behaviour change with habits.
I am sure I can do this for fitness too…
So I wondered what if, I began to do double the workload.
What if I made two drawings conventional and digital per day equaling 4 artworks per day.
See I don’t think I can improve quality yet, so I am doubling down on quantity because I am in the position to do so.
And frankly tutorials and techniques bore me…
It might be very impatient of me just to do this much…
But I am not exactly out to push myself just yet…
is that the sign of willpower?
Do i need to exert willpower at this?
I shall keep you posted with the results.
