This year marks my second attempt… and success! at Inktober! (See last year’s Inktober review). While I had committed just as much time, if not more, as last year, it’s always worth it. And just like last year, I’d like to give myself some time to reflect on everything I experienced throughout this challenge.
I decided to stray away from the standard prompt this year, compared to last year when I tried to incorporate both that prompt with the Xenoblade 2 theme which felt a bit too restrictive (when a prompt is supposed to give you ideas on where to start, not be restrictive). Following the same idea of drawing video games, I decided to dedicate this past month to NieR: Automata, just having finished the game a bit over two months ago and loving every moment of it. I had such high expectations for the game, given I loved everything I saw about it from the artistic design to the characters to the music, and even then the game exceeded those expectations.
Twitter thread of Inktober drawings below!
Some of my favorite pieces:
Time Commitment
Compared to last year’s Inktober of 50 hours, this year I had spent a total of about 75 hours. My goodness. I had never felt so inspired to improve, let alone to draw for the sake of drawing, and for the most part, those hours flew! I’d spend on average 2-3 hours per drawing, with a few taking only one hour but others taking as much as over 5 hours.
I knew that there would be some days where I just wouldn’t be able to do anything, so I decided to give Inktober a head start, starting about ten days before the month started. This was such a great idea. I never felt the stress of deadlines (e.g. finishing the 13th piece by October 13) and the possibility of overdue drawings piling up, because I was always (until near the end haha) several days ahead. I started falling a bit behind (just by a day) at the last week, mostly because I had put in more time per piece on average than the beginning, so even then I wasn’t worried about being late. I was still putting in consistent practice, which is the main idea of Inktober, so I’m more than content on that! The lack of stress gave me much more confidence and enjoyment in the challenge compared to last year, so I’m so glad I gave myself that head start.
The alternative suggestion I gave myself was to perhaps do a drawing every other day, but nahhhhh, I wanted to feel that improvement.
The Power of Ink Wash
Last year, I mentioned how I really wished I had used ink wash for shading, so this year I gave it a shot! It was so worth the attempt. Painting felt very… therapeutic, after spending an hour or two focusing on perfect line art. I was never too comfortable with the brush, even after having taken a class of it in college, but I seemed to have picked it back up pretty well. I felt so much more flexibility in shading with it, and it felt more enjoyable than cross-hatching with a pen for thousands of lines. I’ll be sure to try it again next year! perhaps going back and forth with using just a pen for shading.
Skill++
Places where I feel like I drastically improved:
- Confidence in the brush / ink wash
- Understanding of light: where to add shadowing (not so much highlights)
- General line art confidence (notably in improved speed)
- Quicker sketches (and understanding that they’re just sketches, i.e. rough forms)
- Better / faster understanding of form, before attempting line art
- Better understanding of proportions
- Lots of machine anatomy lol
Some things I realized I want to improve on in future pieces, whether it be general artwork or the next Inktober:
- Creating my own compositions, instead of just tackling studies
- More dynamic angles
- Hands and feet
- Understanding highlights
- Backgrounds
Art Community
Over the past month, I had gotten more into watching art streams on Twitch and following everyone’s journeys in their Inktober challenge. Whether they be professional artists or complete newbies, whether they’re following the prompt or doing their own thing, literally every individual has shown so much love and support, more than I have ever seen! Admittedly the Smash community isn’t like that, more often than not. Even if it were an artist’s first time drawing ever, everyone always had something nice to say about their work, with absolutely zero judgments. It was… almost a bit too wholesome, haha, but I’m all for it. It’s definitely encouraging to keep on improving in art, especially not on my own.
Smash Break
To give myself time to draw that much, I decided to take the month off of playing Smash, and honestly? It felt refreshing. I had ended up only playing at the weekly tournament just three miles away from me, more so for the social aspect rather than searching for improvement. Only playing on average three hours a week was a nice change of pace. Oddly enough though, despite the lack of practice, I had beaten a power ranked player in San Diego whom I had never beaten before in Ultimate! Overall I had played consistently well, only losing to arguably the top 20 players in the entirety of San Diego.
I had also competed in the regional tournament, 2GG: Nightmare on Smashville, but similarly it was more to see people rather than to actually compete. I didn’t do as well as I’d like, but with how much tougher the competition was and with the lack of practice, I didn’t mind it at all. It was still a fun day, especially since I got to hang out with friends with boba and Korean BBQ, haha.
Post-Inktober
Now that Inktober is over though, I’ve been going back and forth between drawing and Smash, and it’s been a fantastic balance. Between attending tournaments, studying VOD analyses, drawing, and chatting in art streams, it’s a lifestyle I could see myself sticking with for a long time. We’ll see how the future goes! Thanks for reading : )
Kevin Who 