10 tips for beating creative block

fantasy art illustration
(Image credit: Aleksandra Wojtas)

The exhilaration of seeing your skills grow and work improve is a great feeling, but like all good things, it doesn’t last forever. Hitting a plateau in your abilities is disheartening, but you can take comfort in the fact that it happens to everyone, and there are ways through it.

Even if you've followed all the how to draw tutorials and have the best drawing tablet available, inspiration and motivation can still be elusive. “Artists often plateau because they stay in their comfort zone too long,” says Anna Podedworna, an illustrator and concept artist working in games. “We often find success with one kind of style or genre and stick to it, which can trap us in a positive feedback loop. You draw one thing because you get the most attention for drawing it, which then attracts more people who expect only that one thing from you. Before you know it, you might be stuck.”

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Tanya Combrinck

Tanya is a writer covering art, design, and visual effects. She has 16 years of experience as a magazine journalist and has written for numerous publications including 3D World, 3D Artist, ImagineFX, Computer Arts, net magazine, and Creative Bloq. For Creative Bloq, she mostly writes about web design, including the hottest new tools, as well as 3D artwork and VFX.

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