Who do you think you're fooling now?

It's such an ordeal to update this blog/sketchbook, but you know what? Someday, when I'm really good, some kid who's just starting to draw will want to scroll back all the way to now to see how I got to where I will be.

This thing calibrates my Monitaur, but it does a terrible job so I've been putting off making a still life out of it. Unfortunately, I'm running out of interesting objects to draw so there.

And then I did some fan art for Riot Games. It's their latest champion. That company is going far, because they're actually innovating within the DotA genre, and their business model is very clever. That is, until Valve gets on the scene with DotA 2. Then all those companies (all two of them) are getting hit by a freight train, unless Riot makes some really bold moves.

Some things I learned:

You compose with gradations, not flat colour. Always know where your gradations are going, and how intensely.

The most efficient way to make something better is to erase it. So do that as often as you can manage. Ideally, if you have the time and are willing to 'scrap' hours of work, you should do your illustration 3 times before the deadline. Good product is made by having smarter than average people iterate on an idea more than the competition.

Sometimes seeking shortcuts for processes actually takes longer than doing it the "stupid" way.

Next time you listen to a pop song, in your head replace all the "baby" lyrics with "hitler." It's the way it was meant to be heard.

I'm beginning to understand that more and more things in life depend on what you believe rather than logical analysis. There are many things you couldn't possibly figure out the reason for, so you have to rationalize it with your own belief. Fill in the gap in knowledge, in a way. So what you put in that gap is entirely up to you and sometimes it's very important to your attitude and work output. Please, always believe the most positive thing. If a big shot artist doesn't respond to your e-mail, don't blame the fact that your art isn't good, or that you came on too strong. Analyze what you can, then rationalize it with "he would have loved to answer if he wasn't so busy."

That said, in any past circumstance, there is always a more positive outcome that you could have achieved. You have to question how you could have gotten there, without regretting that you didn't.

I heard that the final boss of Diablo 3 is, in fact, Lady Gaga, and not the lord of terror.

Edges are gestalt psychology at work. When you draw from life, you find out how your brain makes sense of your scene, by analyzing which edges in it seem hard and which seem soft. The fast your eyes skim over the edge as you're looking at the scene, the softer that edge will be in your painting.

When doing something artistic, you gotta genuinely love what you do, so that you get some creativity help from your subconscious. When doing other tasks, like programming, you just have to have a passion for problem solving.

There are really 3 types of edges in digital painting. Hard, soft and textured. You can use a texture brush to softer things, instead of the boring old airbrush.

I also heard that in the Diablo movie the monk will be played by Vin Diesel.