How I Got Into Digital Art
By: Innerman Arts
Tags: Illustration, Animation, Character Development, Digital Art, Comics

So, my current major is Information Technology. However, I felt like I’ve always had the innate desire to create my own characters and bring them to life with their own unique stories. (As a matter of fact, I submitted a video game idea to Sega when I was 10. They replied, but much to my disappointment, my idea was denied :( ). Anyways, I believe that this natural ambition of mine influenced me to begin my journey in the fields of digital illustration and animation.

However, I feel like I was hesitant to nurture this ambition and make my dreams of becoming an illustrator and an animator a reality primarily due to fear, insecurity, judgement from others, and self-doubt. Eventually, in September I had finally mustered up the courage to start my Youtube channel, Innerman Arts, to document my growth as an artist, animator, and storyteller. At that time I had discovered the sailor-mouthed, yet convincing entrepreneur, Gary Vaynerchuck. He mentions documenting one’s progress and just starting regardless of other people’s judgement. Long story short, I fell into the rabbit hole of Gary Vee and I think his content is what pushed me to finally start posting about my journey.

The early days of my channel were quite interesting. I published my first video on September 23, 2019. Not gonna lie, it looked like it was recorded on Sega Genesis. Furthermore, my speech delivery was lack luster. I also didn’t have a sophisticated PC nor did I have a decent microphone. I all had was my 2014 Ipad Air for recording and my refurbished 11-inch Macbook Air for editing. After purchasing a pretty decent camera, a lavalier mic, and a crappy Udemy course about drawing, I began to record footage of me on my college campus, asking fellow students to draw with me on a couple of sketchbooks. Although the early days of the channel were rough and cringe-worthy, it was absolutely necessary for me to make that first and faithful step to grow my presence online.

Eventually, I became unsatisfied with the course I had purchased on Udemy. I spent several weeks learning how to draw skeletons and not much else. After deciding to refund the course, I began to bounce around from resource to resource so I could actually learn something besides skeletons. A few months went by and I came across Art School for Digital Artists by Marc Brunet, an esteemed former senior artist for Blizzard Entertainment. Ever since I purchased the course in May 2020, while it was at a sweet discount price, I have been completely satisfied. Not only did my learning path become monumentally clearer, but I became eligible for weekly critique by Brunet himself, which is just simply amazing.

I had also bought a Huion Kamvas Pro 16 during that same month, however, I still did not have a computer powerful enough to handle both the tablet and Photoshop. My MacBook, which had only 4GB of RAM, made my drawing experience, simply put, horrible. Whenever I made a pen stroke in Photoshop, the mark would show up like 2 seconds later. After weeks of suffering, I decided to use my scholarship money to invest in a decent PC rig and a couple of monitors. So, yeah…major upgrade in that aspect.

I would say my long-term goals when it comes to animation and illustration would be to make some memorable characters, a comic series, an animated series, and eventually a full-length feature film. I personally think that a lot of programs that get aired nowadays have significantly devolved. I grew up on classics like Static Shock, The Spectacular Spiderman, and Jackie Chan Adventures and I would like to bring back entertainment of the same caliber for the enjoyment of millions around the world.

I would like to conclude with some words of advice: try your absolute best to be patient and always remind yourself of why you started your journey to achieve something extraordinary. Everyday I deal with feelings of insecurity, self-doubt, the fear of judgement, and impatience. In order to improve in art, I’ve learned, you must be willing to put in significant practice and sometimes signs of improvement can be virtually non-existent. I find that learning to enjoy the process and constantly reminding yourself of why you are putting in so much work helps to overcome negative thoughts. I implore you, no matter what you want to accomplish in your lifetime, to do the same.

Thank you for taking time out of your day to read this post. I hope it was helpful.

Innerman