View Full Version : ~ Staying motivated
So, you have started your new deck, the ultimate rendition of the perfect deck for you, now - what do you do to remain focussed and motivated to keep working on it and finish the whole thing? Do you get to a stage where your project, that at one point seemed like the most important thing ever, takes a backwards step? How is your tarot deck coming along?
Major Tom
02-09-2002, 04:16
It's funny but I know I will eventually finish my deck.
Slow periods? Well yes, I think it's inevitable to go through slow periods especially when you consider the enormity of the project. 78 original works of art required! I've been going through a slow period - no new cards for several months. I take comfort from the fact that Bea Nettles took 4 years to complete the Mountain Dream Tarot. I've been working on Major Tom's Tarot for just over 2 years and I'm just over half way through. :)
Motivation? Well my dear friend Kayne - I find your question answers itself - Major Tom's Tarot will be the "ultimate rendition of the perfect deck" for me. That by itself is enough to keep me going. The project occupies my thoughts and dreams. I often find myself looking at a scene or situation and thinking 'that's what I need for that card'. Of course - feedback from my friends helps too.
I've currently got the photos I need to produce 3 more cards. As I like to work in groups of 5 or more - I'm still in a photo gathering stage. I can feel some of those on their way to me as I write this - so it shouldn't be too much longer before I can show you some new cards. })
It helps me to read other's are going through this process.
I too am in the photo gathering phase. Which is looking for and cutting pictures out of the national geographic. I find that so relaxing and energizing at the same time.
Just being in the moment....
Then it just hits me what should go where for my meaning of the particular card or cards.
It's alot of fun. Good for the soul and helps me understand the tarot much more also.
Maiden
Need some motivation kayne? Ill give you some if you want ;)
*grumblng about waiting for more 21st century tarot cards including the completed chariot*
LOL hehehe
:THP
Supletion
03-09-2002, 08:08
when i dont work on my deck for long periods, such as now, its because of lack of time for it (vacation is over, a very busy and loaded school year started along with some other time eating activities...). but the tarot project still fascinates me and excites me, and im anxious to finish my deck, so while doing other things i cant help thinking of it and planning the cards in my head. and then, when i get to some time space when i can finally throw myself in front of the computer for a couple of hours and work on my deck, the tension built in this time goes loose, and the enjoyment is alot greater. so thats my motivation :)
blue_fusion
03-09-2002, 09:55
in my masque tarot, i find that as i progress with the creation of the cards, the stlye of the images changes as well. and i end up with cards which are not what i originally planned, but still nonetheless satisfy what i intended for the cards.
i guess its a growing process.
:)
Actually, for me, working on my tarot deck is sort of a motivator in its own right. When I get bogged down in my writing I shut the computer off and pull out my sketchbook and my mock-ups (on index cards) and fiddle with them for a while. Eventually I go, 'sheesh- 78 cards... what was I thinking?' and I'm able to jump back into my writing with no problem.
})
Kidding. I find the best motivator to be the fine folk I've been meeting on Aeclectic, actually. :D:D:D
Hi
One of my tips would be to listen to music.
I just noticed a few weeks ago how much fast I work when I listen to load music + I surprise myself with the work that I do.
I saw a doc on TV not too long ago on Jackson Pollock and he works with load music and you can see this in his work. Even if his work looks the same to most people.
+ take breaks every now and again.
Do you have any tips to keep going??
temperlyne
26-10-2002, 04:10
To me, creating a personal deck is also a way of staying motivated to study. I study veterinary medicin and history and that keeps me very busy, but I need to draw and create to stay healthy. I tried to focus on just one aspect of my interests for a while, but I found myself longing to do something else. So when classes started this year, I decided to choose no longer, but do it all! I keeps me very very busy, but it also keeps me from getting lazy, or tired of just one subject. I make my sketches when classes are boring and when I am tired of studying I paint a little to clear my mind. This way I feel that all my needs are met, and I'm very well balanced.
hey -- is this the same kayne form deviant art? Post your fool card here -- it's the best!!!
billplee a.k.a. patter
My problem is the more I learn about reading the more I want to start my deck all over. Over time I relate to the cards differently. By the time I get done with my deck the styles of the cards aren't even going to match. Yikes!
mrsjvan
Mrsjvan, I understand how you feel. I'm very much learning as I go along but I'm finding that I improve with each card as my understanding grows. And I'm creating the images using a computer so that enables me to go back and refine things if I want/need to, easier than if I was drawing or painting it all, which is a big help :)
Well, I am on 5 years now working on my deck and I am about 2/3 the way done. Sometimes it is very frustrating!
At first I had a very hard time keeping my focus just on tarot, I've always had a lot of scattered interests and even artistically I get these urges to do other things...
I finally realized the only way it was going to work was if I stopped doing other projects. No paid illustrations, no jobs for friends etc. I just do tarot. That has helped immensly and now I think it has settled into a way of life, it is what I do.
Now I am finding a lot of strength and inspiration from the limitations of tarot, from not working on other projects and the restrictions inherant in the cards themselves, it is like taking a light and focussing it down into a narrow laser beam and it is very powerful to me.
I do have slow times when a new card or the perfect image for that card is stalled. During those times I try to seed my mind with a lot of art and nature and I do other related things like work on the writing for the book to go with the cards. Sometimes re-examining cards you've already done will give you insight into the cards you are about to work on.
Right now I am trying to cope with the problem of older cards wanting to be repainted. I am trying to resist, but should I? I think I should, but I'm not sure. I know it is possible, and have talked to many people who have spent a huge part of their lives, decades plus, reworking the same deck and never being satisfied with it. I don't want to go there.
Just some thoughts:)
Marie
Oh good, another illustrator on the boards.
Keeping motivated over a large body of work is hard enough if you're trained, so it must be doubly difficult if you have to go it all alone mixing it in with your work commitments and friend/family commitments.
The only thing that got me through my time at college was to exclude everything else in my life. Even my kids learned where the dishwasher powder lived and how the microwave worked!
To the exclusion of all else.
But you have to decide which path you will follow when creating your deck:
1) The Part Time approach - as and when you can fit it in with your other commitments.
2) The High Art approach - start without a rough idea, give full reign to your imagination and see where it leads.
3) The Assignment approach - brainstorm, plan, execute, finish.
As you can see from choices 1 and 2, these are going to take a long time, and without a strongly planned structure, may well change in style and content from one month/year to the next. This may mean either starting again, or carrying without coherance and unity.
The last choice however may seem 'cold' and sterile. But that is how an illustrator works. An illustrator is the Empress, 8 Wands and King Swords and the Page Cups all rolled into one.
One of my old tutors, an illustrator, did 84 B/W Ink and wash drawings for the Bologna Book Fair overnight. I've planned and drafted two 32 page picture books from thin air over the space of four weeks and done 8 finished pieces of artwork to go with it. And do you know what? Because I had planned it all out and kept to my artistic style, the execution and the finishing off was just a matter of how many paintings I could fit in to one day.
What I'm saying is you have to be focused, to the exclusion of all else if you are going to finish your deck in a relatively short period of time. You have to BRAINSTORM, PLAN, REALISE and FINISH in you're own personal style, which needs to remain consistant throughout.
If this is not possible because of your commitments, then you really need to spend the longest time planning = resolved sketches, and then just spending the spare time that you do have in executing the finished pieces. And always bare in mind what Hannibal from the A Team used to say: I love it when a plan comes together.;) because you will find the deck growing before your very eyes.
Imagine you have your plan and resolved sketches of the entire deck. You know what your artistic style is. So you have a long weekend ahead of you. How many pieces of artwork can you fit into that time? Probably a lot more than if you are working it out one card at a time...
allibee
I have wanted to make my own deck for a long time,but as I started to save,draw,images...etc....I started getting really frustrated.....I would have to say that I do possess some artistic ability....Actually,I DO and WILL brag that my drawings aren't half bad....it's just that I am having a hard time getting used to the computer,and my scanner isn't even hooked up....I've got the ideas,pics,and willingness to draw,but feel totally out of sorts when it involves using the computer....Any ideas for instruction art sites on the web? Hint,Hint...........Or any books or software that might be helpful?Computer illiterate,but my hands can work wonders:D (with charcoal,pencil,etc...:D)
temperlyne
13-12-2002, 04:02
jakyle,
same problem here! So I just ignore my computer as long as I can and make my deck fully handdrawn/painted. When all the images are done, (and this may take years., considering I'm a ful-time vetstudent, part-time history student, part-time worker and social being....) Only then will I try to create borders and titles on the computer. and by then I also hope to have found help for that!
Originally posted by jakyle
I have wanted to make my own deck for a long time,but as I started to save,draw,images...etc....I started getting really frustrated.....I would have to say that I do possess some artistic ability....Actually,I DO and WILL brag that my drawings aren't half bad....it's just that I am having a hard time getting used to the computer,and my scanner isn't even hooked up....I've got the ideas,pics,and willingness to draw,but feel totally out of sorts when it involves using the computer....Any ideas for instruction art sites on the web? Hint,Hint...........Or any books or software that might be helpful?Computer illiterate,but my hands can work wonders:D (with charcoal,pencil,etc...:D)
There is no law that says you HAVE to use a computer at all, what makes you think that?
I was wondering if your problem is that you haven't yet found your artistic style - your voice - yet.
The ultra lucky are born with it, but most of us have to struggle long and hard to give birth to it, and it makes it ultra hard if you know what you want to do, but can't bring it off.
If this is the case with you, then my advice is to put the deck on the back burner for a while and go out and draw everything that you see, your cup of coffee, your towel hanging off the rack in the bathroom, the beer stain on the table in the lounge etc, and then, and only then, think about how you are going to make these pictures 'happen'. What are you going to use.....experiment with everything , 2D and 3D and when you have found your voice, then is the time to work out how you are going to put it all together.
Take your confidence in your style and see what software may be able to help you achieve the polished end product.
Photoshop is a hard medium for the beginner, where as paintshop pro is a bit more like 'photoshop for dummies' if you forgive the expression.
Look in magazines and books and on the net for people's work that you like, and see what they say about how they created it. Most times these days the artist/illustrator has a web page, or if you only see the name of a studio or agent attributed to the work, look that up on the web too.
This all may be superflous to you, as you may already be confident in your style, but, if not, maybe it will point you at a direction to start in.
All the best
allibee
also try these:
http://artoftarot.com/create.htm
http://www.lelandra.com/comptarot/tarotphoto.htm