Why not make a layered cake cake?

Grip it 'n rip it (don't actually)

The culture war really is an all-consuming hellscape.

Feels like 2015-2016 is when it really started to ratchet up into being inescapably bad.

That scary thing AI is able to do to people suspiciously well.

-to break lol. Other people probably figured that out way faster than I did but I eventually got there too and am all the better for it.

Asking "what's the point of this?"/"what function does this thing serve in this idea?" has probably been the most important development of my whole journey.

-on their mind. And while that's freeing, it's also not a good way to develop concise ideas.

Which...is really important to do when communicating with buds or viewers alike.

The urge to just try and squeeze everything I liked into a thing without addressing the why is a habit that took me years-

Unfortunately, yeah. People really should share more about their creative journeys. It may help someone else or even themselves improve.

I'll readily admit that my first few years were embarrassingly undisciplined. I think there's a point in every artist's journey where restraint is the last thing-

-run circles around me from a few years ago, creatively.

A lot of that growth could've been expedited with at least a little bit of solid writing fundies knowledge, though.

Learning through constant iteration and watching movies helps, but fundies could've def eased a lot of the learning pains.

-and even found a whole long course on it prior to getting into my project, but I never finished it because I didn't have the drive of an ambitious end goal to guide me.

Still haven't finished any real courses...but I'm leagues better at writing now than I was back then. Not perfect but I could-

As an example, I've been working on a personal project for the last few years that's been focused on remaking various okay movies I saw potential in.

When I started, I basically knew nothing about writing plots or iterating on ideas or anything. I tried getting into creative writing beforehand-

Because starting from fundamentals is a total drag if you don't have a set end goal in mind. And even when you do, it feels like a slog to get to the good parts.

A good mix of short fundies bursts and guidance towards an ambitious end goal seems like the best method, maybe.

Best of both worlds.

It's really hard to know what you need to improve in your art when you don't know what you're missing.

Being taught to start from fundies (even minimally) at least gives you a foundation to build on when solving problems.

But you're def right about fundamentals not being so strictly needed.

Having a goal to aim for can mitigate the drawbacks of not starting with fundies a little.

You'll pick up on and memorize them pretty good, maybe even better, when you pass a hurdle through learning them in short bursts. A lack of good structure and guidance can make things really slow, though.

Totally agree that problem-solving based learning is probably the best way to learn art.

So often, though, the tutorial books don't give their readers a large and ambitious enough end goal to strive for. Then they compound the issue by not really giving readers the tools (fundies) to problem solve.

-more straightforward to achieve when you know proper anatomy and other fundamentals.

Wish I'd been taught this as a kid instead of taking another decade+ to finally learn it.

Used to own one by Mark Crilley. It was...

Not that great lol. It didn't teach the fundamentals first.

I think *any* manga tutorial book that doesn't spend a large chunk of the pages teaching fundamentals isn't all that helpful, honestly. Manga art styles aren't "easy" to create but they're *way*-

Relatable.

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