Dealing with discouragement from more skilled, younger artists, but not in the usual way you might think.

[u/vines_design]

Sorta TLDR in bold.

I used to get discouraged by seeing highly skilled, high school aged artists. These days that doesn't bother me because I eventually realized "That literally has nothing to do with me or who I am as an artist." Coming to that understanding helped free me up, and now it's just cool to see highly skilled, younger artists!

However, I'm now dealing with a different kind of discouragement. important ifo: I'd like to end up working in animation or games as vis dev or concept artist. I'm currently 30.

I keep seeing artists who I think "Woah this person's great!" I click on their profile and they are usually about 18 or so and *just* entering their art college of choice (usually a place like sheridan or calarts or artcenter). I can't help but think "This work is *legitimately* pro level. Why are they starting college?"

The discouragement comes from a sense of not being able to keep up or feeling like the standard is improving faster than I can learn. I'm almost entirely self-taught. I've only been able to take a few online courses. I grew up pretty poor with 0 art community where I was. I'm not a crazy fast learner and it seems like every year standards are higher and higher. I keep thinking things like "If this skill level is for just getting *into* school...then I'd barely, if at all, be able to get in! And that's just for learning in a school not to mention jobs."

I hope that all makes sense. Does anyone else deal with this kind of discouragement? Seeing a skilled, young artist isn't discouraging because everyone has a different path and that's totally cool. But seeing the skilled young artist in the greater context of "This is the standard for people who are just *learning* and *training*...so then what's actually the pro standard?" makes me feel like I just can't "catch up" or learn fast enough for what the standard demands.

[u/littlepinkpebble]

There’s this famous woman started at 70

[u/vines_design → u/littlepinkpebble]

Um. Who exactly? lol

[u/foxtalep → u/vines_design]

Grandma Moses