casey-draws

what do you think was the underlying reason? lack of ideas, perfectionism or fear of failure, etc?

I personally work best in collaboration of some sort.  Either drawing someone else's characters or bouncing ideas off of people.  I get blocked a lot when I try to work completely by myself.

are you a perfectionist or hard on yourself?

Both.  And the effect this tends to have on my work is keeping me from finishing.  I'll quit and restart, or just plain quit.

do your friends/family support your creative endeavors?

Yes, so much as they don't discourage it. But they aren't really good sounding boards either, which is what I need for my creative process.  

were you just starting out or were you in college / working as an artist?

When I first experienced art block?  College, and I think at that point it was more from burn out.  When I stopped pursuing an art degree and it became less work I had an easier time with it (incidentally years later I now have not so much trouble doing art that is 'work' even through block or demotivation, but that came with practice and experience).  I think that a college or university experience is not always a good idea for artists, it depends a lot on the individual and what they expect to get out of it.  For me, at that stage in my life, it was not a good idea.  I took a few courses before graduation to finish it as a minor and got much more out of the classes once I had matured some, and once I wasn't trying to cram so many classes in at once.

The type of block I get now happened after I graduated because I had drifted away from the artist friends I made in High School and no longer had the atmosphere of college.  The isolation has been a little bit like losing a sense.  I don't do well when I don't have someone to drag into my brainstorming.


if you got past it, was there anything that helped it go away or did it happen on its own?

I've had some success with online communities, although I am shy enough that I have trouble putting myself forward.  I also find that doing random gift art helps me too.  (Fan art, for some reason, does not.)  For me, it really is about finding someone who can help me push my ideas further.


I have been told before that something else that can help with creativity is to experience new things.  Whether this means physically going somewhere, reading a random wikipedia article, browsing online galleries; anything that gets you a new experience or a new perspective.  The idea is that to produce creative output, you have to have input, and by putting more things into your brain, you have more things to draw from when it comes time to generate ideas.

I think this is true for me, but I'm not sure if it's a universal thing.  This was another thing that became more difficult after I graduated college.

Thank you

Oh man, as always I really love your character designs *__*  You and starz always make me want to draw stuff lol

I am totally late commenting to this, but I wanted to say thank you again for drawing Satoru, Loish!

It's more like I went through a period where I wasn't drawing much, and then I kept forgetting to post it here XD  I've got stuff queued up for the next few days, so expect to see more. c: