artistic confidence

[Mad Harlequin]

I'm not a skilled artist either (and by this I mean drawing, etc., not writing, though that's an art too.), and I'll be the first to acknowledge that I need to practice so much more often. But I learned from writing that the best way to improve in anything is to emotionally divorce oneself from the task at hand. A piece of writing, or a piece of art, can't be "your baby," because you'll likely have to make changes along the road to completion. Sometimes it might have to be scrapped entirely.

Accepting this is a necessary step towards improvement. Criticism of a piece of art isn't meant to be a slight against the artist---and that includes self-criticism. So give yourself a break, Warlock.

[Toaster Warlock]

Uh, whoa, got sick for a few days and this got so many more replies >n> sorry for not replying sooner!

anyway, thank you all for responding. i'll take what you guys said under consideration. i still sort of regret making this topic but i learned alot from it, so thank you. not sure what else to say other then i'll just keep trying to draw? i mean i still draw because it makes me feel happy but idk, latley it's just been eating away at me but i suppose that's natural. so thank you all.

[Mad Harlequin]

Keep drawing. If you're struggling with a certain aspect of it, then consult a guide or two and practice what you've learned. Practice, practice, practice!

[Sharm]

I struggle with this myself. I used to be so prolific and for so long now I can't get anything out. It's like I've forgotten how to draw. I realized something though, at some point I let my self worth get all tangled up in my ability to draw, so if I made a bad drawing it meant I was a bad person. If I was going to draw I had to make it worth while to someone else otherwise it meant I was worthless. That is way too much pressure! It's really no surprise that I couldn't draw or enjoy myself. Something that I noticed helped was doing quick little request art. Set up your request thread somewhere where artists are more rare and highly valued, set a time limit for how long you'll take on a piece and don't take any longer, and most importantly don't you dare guilt trip yourself about quality or time it's taking or if you're doing someone's request. Do each piece with the mindset of "this person is going to be so excited when they get this" and then allow yourself to actually take the complements when they tell you how amazing it is. No deflection, no "I should have done better" or "if only they knew how awful it was", no saying "but" even internally. If you don't get a complement, don't worry about it. They're jerks who don't know how lucky they are.

I guess what I'm saying is, this problem sounds less to me like an issue with your art and more like a depression or self esteem issue. It is for me. If you can get your mental health into a better place it will be easier to draw.

[Catalyst Edge Gaming]

I always think my art isn't that great, but the only way to get better is to practice a lot, we all start somewhere. I know some amazing artists who think their art is terrible, and practice all of the time to get better, their art isn't terrible in actuality, but they still get better from practicing.
Honestly I've hit points where I got frustrated with my own art, I felt it would never get better, nothing came out right, I used to get angry, feel not good enough. It took awhile, a lot of practice and a lot of dedication to get better and feel more confident about my art. Find something you like to draw start with that, don't try and be perfect with it, just let it flow, work on the skills rather than perfecting the whole piece, slowly you'll get back into it, skills will develop more and you'll get through it.
Hopefully that helped at least a little.

[Katy133]

I actually wrote an article about this on my Tumblr blog. Hope it helps!

[SundownKid]

I think the main thing to realize is skill = practice + time. Though obviously you have to be making an effort to improve, but very few people are just innately "bad" at something, they just don't have enough practice at it to be good.

[Lesleigh63]

I suffer from this in the initial stages of a painting. When you're blocking your colours in etc - things just look plain ugly. I hate this stage. It's only as you keep refining the painting that it starts to look better.