Moving Forwards With Fear

Creating art isn't for sissies or put another way, it’s not for the faint of heart. Sure, it’s got its charms, but at the same time, it’s fraught with some pretty powerful lows, lows powerful enough to compel some people to stop or not even start at all. Lows strong enough to give even the most accomplished artist a run for their money despite all their success. This is because the act of birthing something that never existed before brings with it certain cautions that can blindside or even overwhelm us if we aren't prepared. Indeed, when we bring something forth from our insides, something that's inherently deeply personal, we poke a sleeping tiger within us, one with a pesky, nagging voice that tries to hold us back. This slumbering beast is fear and we all have it, even the most skilled, famous artist ever. We’re human after all. So the trick isn’t about extinguishing that fear, it’s more about living with it, working around it, moving through it, and creating within it that’s the ace up our sleeve. How do we do this though? Well, brass tacks, it takes the antithesis to fear: love. Love for our muse, love for our efforts, love for the pieces we create, love for the sharing of our works, love for all of it, including ourselves. Elizabeth Gilbert would probably refer to it as "coming home." And from that love emerges courage. A whole lotta courage! Chin up, deep breath, eyes forwards, step forwards and all that. Steeled, resolved, blind courage. But how do we find that within ourselves when it can be so hard to muster? Well, we draw from our moxie, that’s how, the cousin to courage, that “darn the torpedoes” attitude that imbues us with cheek and a bit of recklessness. Because, truly, if there’s one thing fear cannot stop, it’s recklessness! Also birthed by love is another powerful ally in our pushback, good ol' curiosity, that inquisitive streak that draws us forwards in our investigations and creative explorations. Stoke those fires of interest then and you'll find that your fears will quickly take a back seat and pipe down. So find those partners within yourself and cultivate them so they grow wild and free because the more love, courage, moxie, and curiosity you have, the less sway fear has over you. But how do we do that?

Well, perhaps with insight into the nature of that beast, we can begin to see its weaknesses and falsehoods and once we finally do, it looses a lot of its bite force. Oh, it’ll still bite, don’t discount that, but its chomp will simply be a meager pinch and not the tearing trauma it once was. Every human soul wrestles with itself on some level, that's just the way of it, but we can manage it a little bit better with some insight. In this spirit then, let’s explore three big components of creative fear: Imposter syndrome, insecurity, and anxiety. With just a little bit of understanding here we can glean some big pay offs in our ongoing battle against fear.

We work so hard for our successes, don’t we? Long hours, study, earnest work, patience, diligence, concentration, sacrifice, angst…it just goes on and on. So when we finally strike it big and reach the top, it’s like a trumpeting of angels, it’s a tickertape parade, it’s the profound satisfaction of job well done, of having “arrived.” Right? Wrong. More times than not, what actually happens deep down is a lingering sense of being a fraud, a charlatan, an inadequate who doesn’t really deserve the kudos. It’s also a sense that you’ve fooled most people this time but soon that bubble will burst and the big reveal of what a huge joke of a phony you actually are will be obvious to the entire world and it’ll be humiliating, horrifying, and a complete disaster. This is imposter syndrome and to some degree, every successful artist has it. Why? Because it’s a very human response to the absurdity of success. It can be incredibly preposterous and unbelievable to win this proverbial lottery. Yes, we may have invested everything into our success — but plenty of other artists do who never get anywhere, right? So what’s so special about us? It can truly feel like a bubble about to pop because it seems to rely on intangible things that can blow apart at any moment. This is why being told, “Well, you worked so hard, you deserve your success!,” just doesn’t seem to satisfy so much, does it? If anything, it can make things worse. Honestly, so many other artists work even harder, are even more skilled, but who just never seem to win that elusive brass ring. So we don’t feel as deserving in comparison, do we? And that feeling busts past our proper sense of worth and accomplishment with such blithe ease, we can be left completely deflated and worried instead of proud and elated. If we aren’t careful then, some artists find imposter syndrome so debilitating, it can compel them to withdraw, to even stop creating all together! Now this is the disaster! Again, love, courage, moxie, and curiosity will be our saviors here: The love that compels us to create, the courage to continue despite the lingering sense of deceit, the moxie to embrace our success even when we feel we don’t deserve it, and the curiosity to see if we can continue the streak by topping ourselves. Instead then, allow imposter syndrome to morph into humility, a humbleness that instills a sense of gratitude and wonder at the bizarre circumstance of it all. Give yourself permission to enjoy the limelight with grace and generosity — so many others never get that privilege.

Most people are insecure. Heck, probably everyone is on some level about something. Being human has its built-in burdens. When it comes to arting though, a lack of confidence can be a particularly destructive thing. See, the thing is, inspiration is actually an extraordinarily fragile wisp, something supremely vulnerable to fear. So many people are struck by inspiration at some point in their lives but fail to follow through not for a lack of talent or access to materials, but because of a deep-seated insecurity about making it real in the first place. “I’m not good enough,” “I don’t have the talent,” “I just can’t do it,” "I'm not an artist," and a litany of other self-perceived deficiencies plague too many folks. So much art never gets born this way! But it doesn’t end there. Know it or not, even established artists can struggle with a lack of confidence on a daily basis. Many wildly famous performers struggle with crippling stage fright, for instance. The truth is though: This is normal. It’s normal and natural to question your abilities when faced with big goals and lofty ambitions. And the bigger the dream, the harder the questions. So again, the workaround isn’t to deny it, but to embrace it — take hold of your insecurities and start to pick them apart, start to see what generates them. Here, curiosity will be particularly helpful to you. Could it have been a callous comment directed to you as a child about your art? Could someone you admired have made a careless comment about what you created? Are you comparing yourself to others and thinking you come up short? Are you afraid of shame and ridicule? What’s getting in between your inspiration and your follow through? Here, too, courage and moxie can be assets because at some point, you'll just have to throw caution into the wind and jump in. Don’t let inspirations wither away! Chase after them, make them real out of sheer gumption and in spite of your fear. And here love can jump in to deliver a one-two punch because here's the thing: That inspiration came to you — and only you — out of all of history. Listen to it, follow where it leads, give it your whole heart and, absolutely, you’re going to surprise yourself in ways you never imagined! Do that enough times and you learn to hold confidence more firmly. Because that’s the thing — confidence isn’t only something someone just has. Confidence can also be learned, and learned by doing something over and over again so you become proficient at it. Learning and confidence are sisters. And in all actuality, confidence is overrated. All we really need is the willingness to keep going despite our insecurities. Stubbornness and resolve can be great fakes for confidence! So have the courage to keep going just one more step and find that moxie within yourself to fling yourself into the fray even when you’re questioning everything you’re doing. And always hold tightly onto the love you have swirling inside you for what you're doing because it can bust through any roadblock. Mix all that together and you've got a potent concoction because, above all, you’ve got to be willing to give yourself the chance to surprise yourself!

This brings us to our latent anxieties about arting, or more to the point, the fear of making mistakes, of not being perfect. The fact is that when we art though, we're going to fail. That’s inevitable. We're going to fail and fail a lot. We’re going to lose count of all our faceplants. But that’s not the gist of the matter, is it? Because what many people mistakenly assume is that a mistake is the end. Stop, it’s over! You screwed up! Game over! But, no! See, what they haven’t figured out yet is that a mistake isn’t the end — it’s the beginning. A mistake is the start of improvement, the prerequisite to success, the pathway to enlightenment! Absolutely, mistakes are learning itself. No artist ever created without making mistakes! No artist simply cranks out high caliber work without first earning it through a slew of missteps! We have to be pretty bad at something before we get pretty good at it! In fact, it’s the artists who make a ton of mistakes and learn from them who advance the fastest with the deepest understanding. And remember this: Whatever you make, you can unmake, and make again! You are the creator and destroyer here. Making corrections is perfectly fine as you go, too, there's nothing wrong with using your eraser! You never have to commit to the first attempts. Most art ever created goes through a series of revisions and refinements as it evolves, nothing unusual about that. Mistakes are simply part of the process of creation. So bring on the mistakes! Big ones, little ones, stupid ones, surprising ones, confusing ones…bring them all on! May they be glorious and grand! Every mistake we ever make will unlock our potential more and more. And know this: Every artist has a Bad Art Day and every artist creates bad art at some point. That’s all part of the learning process and the journey of discovery. In this light, bad art isn't a failure, it's a stepping stone. If anyone has a problem with that, well, that’s on them, not you. You got this! Because here, again, courage and moxie will serve you well — the courage to try again, always again, and the moxie to remember that all you’ve learned is just one more powerhouse in your arsenal! Curiosity lends a big helping hand, too, because you'll need that for troubleshooting, study, critique, and investigation. And, of course, love leads us by the gentle hand, always guiding us forwards. Just remember that you’re in control here so don’t let the fear of mistakes take it from you. Embrace your mistakes, rejoice in them, and soon that nagging fear will transform into even more curiosity. “How will I mess this up?” can really mean, “What amazing thing will I learn today?,” can’t it? Frame it that way and you’re well on your way! What's more, Brené Brown has a lot of sound advice for you when it comes to criticism, whether from other people or self-inflicted.

Art isn’t to be trifled with. It asks us to be monumentally vulnerable, and that's by no means an easy feat for anyone. So sure we can engage art on a whim, which is great and necessary from time to time, but if we're diving in deeper, it becomes a path, a Way. See, if we’re doing it conscientiously, we’re also learning, even about ourselves, at the same time we bring something new into reality. We create ourselves, too. Framing creativity in this way, as a framework for discovery, isn’t just a mere indulgence, it can be a necessity to root out those very things that hold us back. It’s what also stokes the fires of love, courage, moxie, and curiosity. Every inspiration may be the match, but unless that fire has fuel, it’s doomed to snuff out. So do yourself a favor — cut yourself some slack and allow yourself to be in love, be courageous, be cheeky, and be curious if just to create some art. Often what’s bad for fear is good for you. So give yourself a chance to surprise yourself! You have more to offer than you know, you’re more capable than you believe, and even if no one ever sees what you created, you’ll have the satisfaction of your own journey. Make arting less about creating for approval and more about creating for your own personal satisfaction and you’ll have found that fuel for your inspirational spark you can fan into a rampant blaze of empowerment. When faced with that wall of fire, your fears will back off, making room for the true gift of creativity — joy! And once you've tapped into your joy, it's over for fear. We may always bear our fears to some degree, of course, but joy is a stronger compulsion, one that also happens to feed love, courage, moxie, and curiosity in a positive feedback loop that drives us forwards in the best ways. So while fear may be the swirling storm around you, all that good stuff inside is the rocket fuel that propels you right through with a sonic boom. So it's not about stamping out our fears, it's about engineering a creative attitude that can create joyfully and purposefully in spite of them. Do that and you'll surge forwards with an unstoppable creative empowerment that'll carry you through every challenge! Don't you owe it to yourself to embrace what can bring you such enrichment? Don't let fear rob that from you because — yes — you are deserving of all the treasures arting has in store for you! Tap into your love, courage, moxie, and curiosity, and make those fears take a backseat because you have wonderful things to conjure up! So dial it up to eleven and pop that knob off with joyful abandon! You can be your own art hero!

The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek.

— Joseph Campbell

Moving Forwards With Fear

Artistic Awareness: The Third Eye Of Creativity

 

As dedicated artists, we endeavor to create our very best work each time we dive in, don’t we? We try so hard and invest so much of our heart and soul into each piece we create. But what if one of the biggest impediments to our work wasn’t our perceived lack of skill or talent, but an issue with something a little trickier? Like our artistic awareness? What is artistic awareness? It’s that learned ability to bring unconscious habits progressively into our conscious creative efforts. What does that mean? In practice, it’s about actively trying to root out our blindspots and plateaus by regularly taking stock in our philosophies, habits, Seeing, and skills then revising as necessary. It’s an active challenge to those notions we lean on, especially the unconscious ones, a regular questioning of what we’re doing and why. When we do this, we can make progressively more effective creative decisions that increases not just the realism and detail in our work, but potentially our enjoyment in what we’re doing by making things more of a curious adventure. 

Because here’s the thing, it’s incredibly easy to get stuck in a force of habit, a formula, a way of doing things that’s familiar and easy to us when it comes to something as difficult as equine realism. This is such a tough art form, it’s surely tempting to find a crutch wherever we can get it. The problem though is that these crutches are linked to our blindspots which lead to plateaus which ultimately stall our progress. Indeed, if we have goals that we’re regularly not reaching, it’s probably because of this problem, not a lack of talent or skill or discipline. This is because it’s our blindspots and plateaus that have more power in our work than our strengths. That may seem like a bit of a Catch-22…and it kinda is…but this realization does put us on a sure path because if we remain cognizant of our creative choices by regularly taking stock in our philosophies and skills, we can fuel-inject our progress. That’s to say, when we understand that blindspots operate right under our noses all the time, to introduce biases, errors, and a grip on obsolete ideas, we have a better shot at rooting them out to make some real progress. There’s a big difference between an unconscious skew and a deliberate decision so making more of our job about the latter, we gain the power to take our work in any direction we want. In this sense then, artistic awareness lets us "self–educate" ourselves in a continued, open–minded, and unafraid way to better See and target those aspects that need attention with greater precision. To brass tacks it then, it’s really this ability that’s the hallmark of an advanced artist. It’s not necessarily the quality of work that's the giveaway, but the ability to consciously create and troubleshoot that demonstrates their prowess. It’s more about expert insight gifted by more deliberate decisions rather than running ramshot in the dark. In a nutshell then, artistic awareness is all about empowerment, the power to gain real and substantial control over our creative decisions. 

Your chances of creating deeply hinge on the quality of your awareness state.

— Eric Maisel

But even more than that, artistic awareness is also about understanding that we’re fallible human beings who’ll make mistakes — and that’s okay. When we can reconcile this, we open the door to not only a lot more objectivity, but also much more inflected kindness, something deeply important in this relentless taskmaster of an art form.

Perhaps then the biggest favor we can do ourselves is learning how to remain a "damp sponge” rather than a dry one or wet one. Why? Well, because a damp one absorbs more than a dry one, right? But a damp one absorbs more than a wet one, too, one already saturated with “enough” ideas. So if we stay learners, we have a better shot at flushing out our blindspots and breaking through our plateaus. Yet we also come to free ourselves from the baggage of criticism, public opinion, misinformation, and even our own doubts and insecurities as we gain more confidence in our own abilities to guide ourselves. Over time, this can lead to less grasping of conventional ideas, habits, and formulas as we morph into something more explorative. Ultimately through artistic awareness then, we gain creative autonomy, a better ability to make our own decisions based on real information that we ourselves have excavated from our work.

Why Is That Important?

When we experience the changes inherent in this kind of journey, we're changed, too. When we open ourselves up to other potentialities, we also find ourselves rethinking what motivates us and that’s actually pretty important. Why?

Well, for one, working in equine realism means we're portraying an animal embedded in a buzzing cloud of ethical questions, value judgments, and differing opinions, all of which we must wade through to come to our own conclusions. Even so, it can get confusing with all the mixed messages out there when we have to make decisions true to our values and goals. Really, most artists make a questionable decision not because they're inhumane, but because they're misinformed. Realism obligates us to a kind of accountability not found in many other art forms so staying grounded and self-educated is key. In this, our convictions may change as we gain more insights and that's a good thing. Forward evolution is always a very good thing. But all this means that if we’re engaging this over-arching journey of Seeing unaltered, chances are we aren't venturing far enough into our internal explorations.

Second, realism has such a high standard, one weighable against the living example—and that's a hard act to follow! And despite all our work, none of us are going to attain 100% objective reality in our clay or pigment or prints…and maybe that's a good thing. But how we handle this Don Quixote dilemma then is a measure of ourselves and that's meaningful to appreciate. Because the truth of the matter is there are many different ways to express equine realism accurately, there isn’t One Right Way. There are many paths to the goal! And in this we have room for interpretive style and aesthetic touches that makes each artist unique and each piece truly a miracle.

Third, the difficulty of our quest has many traps lurking in wait for us. The trap of frustration, the trap of envy, the trap of resentment, the trap of rivalry, just to name a few. But when we've truly learned the lesson that artistic awareness gifts us, we cease to compete against each other to instead turn our attention onto ourselves and our own goals, working to establish our own standards and ambitions, and setting out to reach them on our own terms. Because giving 100% to any piece is all we can ask of ourselves, right? So if we stretch, reconsider, scrutinize, and practice to the very edge of our abilities — and that includes challenging our blindspots and plateaus — that will show in our work and keep it vibrant, evolving, and engaging. In doing so, we become less inclined to compare our work and successes with those of others, better preserving our joy and enthusiasm in what we’re doing. Absolutely, there are few things that can kill off our motivation more efficiently than comparing ourselves to others. Stay on target with own your work without apology. Your magic is wholly unique in all the Universe! The magic of other artists isn’t yours — and you don’t need it! Embrace and revel in your own!

Comparison is the death of joy.

— Mark Twain

And fourth, the path to progress is going to be littered with our own internal baggage, burdens that hold us back that are often of a deeply personal nature. For instance, I was invited to critique a lady’s paintjob but in a roundabout way, it ended up not really being about the paintjob. Through some rather pointed guided introspection, she discovered that she was blocking herself not with her choices, but with the awful voice put into her head by her Aunt who once told her as a child that what she drew was wrong — and that voice was still telling her that what she was painting was wrong when it really wasn’t. But it’s often unacknowledged internal battles such as these that can be a chronic roadblock for us which means that how much we’re willing to dig, confront, and reconcile can sometimes make or break our progress. Daunting prospect, isn't it? But often necessary.

And, fifth, this brings us to perfectionism. Now I wrote The Perfectionist Paradox about this issue back in 2021 and it’s worth a read. But suffice to say, this art form does ask for a lot of perfection yet this very thing can become our worst monster so easily! Learning to find balance when confronted with this lofty expectation then is a continual effort on our part, but a worthwhile one to mull over from time to time. Indeed, there’s a huge difference between striving for perfection and a fear of failure just as there’s a massive difference between setting high expectations and nothing ever being up to snuff. We have to accept mistakes and see them for what they really are: Learning. So what is driving our perfectionism? Fear? Ambition? Curiosity? Maybe a bit of all three? Really root around and get to the heart of the matter. Truly, discovering its engine can do a lot not just for our improvement, but a lot more for our creative happiness in the long run.

Sixth, given the nature of realism, we're going to get stuck on a plateau at some point and will have to somehow scramble our way off. Indeed, if we're approaching our work in a proactive way, each piece will be underscored with a drive to understand more than before, if even just a little bit. Our same ol' modus operandi just isn’t going to help us move forward, will it? How could it? We need new aspects that would boot us out of our self–made status quo. This quote by Albert Einstein comes to mind, “Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” This art form asks us to evolve forwards so periodically kicking our own status quo to the curb to stretch, explore, challenge, and confront our own conventions is an important part of following through. It can be intimidating and even frustrating, but it’s the only way to pop blindspots and jump off plateaus. It’s so darned easy to lean too much on familiar formulas and comfortable ways of interpretation, isn’t it? All that familiarity is great for sure, but the problem is that it comes with our habitual blindpots, the same ol’ missteps over and over again. We gotta rattle our own cage from time to time to see what falls out!

Seventh, know that our perception is a one–way circuit: Change happens first in our perception to then flow into our work, not the other way 'round. So if we want to fix anything in what we See, we have to target our perception first. Change our Sight and we change our work. Even more though, this also means that our magic wand lies within us! And we each have one — one unique just to us. So if we can accept that we always have a lot more to learn — a lot more opportunities to See differently — we gain a lot more responsiveness and traction in our growth. Hard talk here: It doesn't matter if we believe our methods have worked for us in the past with great success. That may be so. But a plateau is always waiting for those who get too comfortable. The real measure of success is our ability to continue evolving no matter how long we’ve been at this, in whatever direction our own magic takes us.

Human beings, by change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden.

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

To accept fallibility and to therefore stay open to possibility helps us to continually challenge our own conventional thinking, feeding a drive for discovery so critical for growth. Keep our mind open then, especially about our own potential, and our work will always remain fresh and innovative. Stay curious and always question, especially when we become comfortable in our work.

But know that you aren’t alone. We’ve all been there. It’s all just a natural byproduct of learning to then unlearn to relearn again and again. And we all have to start somewhere right? And from there on in, we all have to restart somewhere, too. And the platform we jump from is our habitual way of doing things, our momentary plateaus. So if we can finagle it so they stay temporary, they become springboards that launch us to the next stage rather than mesas we get stuck on, frustrated and confused. Never underestimate the power of rethinking, reimagining, reevaluating, or the moxie to introduce the unfamiliar, maybe even the radical into our work. Be bold! Be brave! Believe in your gumption! If our blindspots and plateaus live inside us, aren’t we then our greatest obstacle? But then we’re also our greatest hero, right? If the tricky bit lies within us, we can fix it with a bit of self-directed moxie — we got this.

Personal Metamorphosis

And this is the real reason why realism can be so darned hard to master—it's not just a matter of media, technique, concepts, references, interpretations, or our subject. More than anything it's a matter of ourselves. How so? Well, we cannot dig through what we See without first discovering why our skews and blindspots exist in the first place because these are things knitted right into our perception — and that’s rooted in who we are. Rummaging through one dissects the other if we’re digging deep enough. For example, why do we sculpt the eyes so  buggy? Or why do we paint the appy spots so skewed? Why did we paint our ticking so out of scale? What are we Seeing wrong? Why are we Seeing it wrong? What are we not admitting to ourselves? What are we trying to deny or avoid? Why? How can I fix these blindspots? Am I hesitant? Procrastinating? Resistant? Why? How did I end up here? What was I neglecting? Why? Did my ego get in the way? Did I have a skewed sense of quality? Did I become too comfortable in how I do things? Why?

Do you see how this rabbit hole just gets deeper and deeper if we’re really digging? But that’s exactly what’s also needed to proactively root out blindspots and plateaus — we have to address our inner landscape. See, a blindspot or plateau tends to happen for a reason, and one that has less to do with arts technique or media and more to do with personal reasons. Yet it's precisely this introspective feature that's not usually addressed when we consider these things. Make targeted introspection a habit then and we'll find that our inner landscape has far more influence on our media than we ever suspected; what we cannot See in our work is a manifestation of what we cannot See within ourselves and so we may continue to self–sabotage our efforts. Yet this is a very personal matter to unravel and no one can do it for us. We have to be willing to do it at regular intervals, too, because as our skills advance so do our blindspots and plateaus. This exploration isn't always comfortable but we have so much to gain such as artistic and personal growth, and much more connectedness with this lovely creature.

So it's not always inaccessible instruction, inadequate technique, deficient talent, or problematic media that roadblock our way. We can also induce our problems from the inside to skew our Sight. But—hey—that's good news! It means we have the exclusive power to come to our own rescue, doesn’t it? We don't have to depend on anyone or anything—we're in control, and we can do so in our own way, in our own time. It's okay then to question ourselves, our perceptions, our skills, our motivations, our ambitions, our values, and our goals. Indeed, it's a healthy exercise. Nevermind if everything we've ever done has brought us success. A willingness to stay hungry will serve us well.

Art that serves an artist best is an experiment in expanding awareness.

~Peter London

Because consider this: Questioning ourselves doesn't mean we're insecure, paranoid, self–doubting, or overly sensitive. It means we're confident, centered, and devoted enough to give careful thought to what we're doing rather than just blindly doing it. Cogitating our inner experience aligns our consciousness with the creative moment, bringing our locks and keys closer together to release our true talents. Make this a habit and we might be surprised by what we learn about our talents, our subject, and ourselves!

It is a profound human waste for people to go through life half–hearing, half–seeing, and only dimly aware of the range of their own perceptions and capabilities. 

~J. Ken Clark

Think about that for a moment. To me this is a fundamental idea and one I revisit often. Because if we wish to continue moving forward, this notion lies at the base of that adventure, doesn't it? I want to seed this little idea: Excelling in realistic equine sculpture isn't so much about learning the ropes—the ropes will always be there, dangling for anyone to grasp—but instead it has more to do with learning about ourselves since we're the only ones who perceive that particular reality that gets infused into our clay or pigment. This makes realistic equine sculpture not only a creative journey, but a personal one as well. Every challenge or barrier we'll ever encounter is just an expression of something inside us that holds us back, and so it's within our power—and only our power—to tackle it. We created it and so we can conquer it. It’s really just that awesome.

Because in my wanderings through the equine art and horse industry, I've discovered this unexpected truism: The more we come to truly understand ourselves, the better our work becomes. And this is the great final gift the noble equine offers us on this path: We’re transformed into souls able to meet him and our fellows on that special plane found only through Awareness — we can look and finally See each other.

Skill is less important than awareness. 

— Graham Collier

STEM

But to wrap it up in a nice package, we can think of the fruits of artistic awareness as STEM: Seeing more effectively, Translating with greater accuracy, Evaluating with more acuity, and drawing from a Memory with more scope. And the more we develop our awareness, the greater the benefits of STEM. This is because Seeing, Translating, Evaluating, and Memory are four different components that all go into a realistic sculpture or paintjob. We have to better perceive what’s actually there to then interpret that in our clay to then step back and take stock, all the while drawing from a mental library supplemented by field study and reference photos. How well developed these four components are and how well they harmonize together will determine not only the quality of our work but how much we advance with each effort. 

And blindspots hide in each one and so understanding the nature of each component can really help us target their particular soft spots. For instance, if we’re consistently making our front hooves asymmetrical with each other but we can see that they’re annoyingly asymmetrical, we have a Translation blindspot problem. Something about our tools or technique is going haywire and so we need a new method to sculpt hooves. Or on the other hand, if we’re habitually sculpting faces in the same way, we might have a blindspot in our Memory. Here then we need to expand our knowledge base to include more manifestations of cranial shape, facial musculature, and textural details through more varied field study and analysis of reference photos. Now if we suspect there is a problem in, say, that appy pattern, but we can’t put our finger on it, chances are we have a blindspot in our Evaluation process — we need better troubleshooting techniques. But perhaps the trickiest of all blindspots to ferret out are those that lie within our Sight because they entail our perception filter of reality. It’s hard to see how we’re going wrong when we live inside the proverbial fishbowl. In this then we need to employ more artistic exercises, study, comparisons, and research — and more practice — to hone our Sight into something less burdened by habitual crutches. 

Learning to tease out our blindpots into these four components can really help us bust them apart easier and faster because we now have a kind of system, don’t we? We have a plan, a method, not just a shot in the dark. Actively develop your STEM and you’re well on your way to independent, autonomous progress at a pace you might not have thought possible of yourself! How cool is that?

Summing Up

Learning to develop our artistic awareness isn’t just a basic step forwards, it’s the foundation for all our steps forwards, one that will always sustain our growth and support every direction we choose. And through a more developed STEM, we can then better identify the quirks in our efforts that give rise to our blindspots and plateaus to become more fearless in rethinking what we believe to be self–evident in our work. We won’t ever root out all our blindspots or avoid all plateaus, we’re human after all. And would we really want to? Maybe not. But we can certainly continually deepen our awareness and intensity our STEM whenever we feel we need a bump forwards. And this is the quality of an artist who excels — they play the long game, using each piece as a kind of stepping stone towards their artistic goals. That’s to say they don’t become complacent and comfortable, but instead stay hungry for evolution and discovery. They stay learners. Their perception thus remains plastic and adaptable and so their Sight ever-evolves forwards, with each piece being a bigger discovery than the previous. And it’s through artistic awareness that we first open the door to all these gifts. Discover it, develop it, and employ it and you’ll find that Third Eye that guides you more effectively through any piece you undertake. Even more though, you’ll find that you’re capable of far more than you ever dreamed possible and what better view of your inner self is that?

"The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend." 

— Henri Bergson

Artistic Awareness: The Third Eye Of Creativity

Back To Reality: Camera Distortion and Other Conundrums

Some years ago, I wrote Mapping Out Success: Equine Topography that detailed a basic proportional method I use for my work. And for the most part, I still use it. Everything is based off the head measurement, making this method fast, easy, and adaptable. Even so, I’ve made some revisions over the years that are worth noting which I've since detailed in Measuring Proportion: Ahead Of The Game. But now let’s talk about something we all do…let’s talk about working from reference photos.

Photos are often our primary means to glean the information we need for our sculptures and our paint jobs, especially if we don’t have access to real horses. But here’s the thing, if we don’t have real horse experience or information based on real field study, we may miss an important point: Photos present their own issues and we need to compensate for them. Such things as lens distortion, perspective, lighting, and lack of diversity all introduce distortion of some kind and unless we’re aware of it, we may inadvertently infuse those distortions into our work.

Lens Distortion

All cameras, to some degree, introduce lens distortion into the image. Also known as optical distortion, it essentially causes straight lines to become curved in the image. There are three basic types of lens distortion: barrel distortion, pincushion distortion, and fisheye distortion. Barrel distortion is most common in phone cameras and with wide angle lenses. Pincushion distortion tends to happen with telephoto lenses. Zoom lenses can exhibit both barrel (at the shortest focal length) to pincushion (at the longest focal length). On the other hand, super wide-angle lenses tend to have fisheye distortion. The better the lens though, the less distortion which is all the more reason to buy the best lenses you can afford. That said, those lenses that more fully compensate for distortion are expensive, so just keep that in mind. For instance, take a look at these images…

The longer shadow line is the adjusted correction.

Click for a hi-res version

The longer shadow line is the adjusted correction.

Click for a hi-res version

The wider shadow line is the adjusted correction.

Click for a hi-res version

Images courtesy Maria Hjerppe

Note: Maria used a Canon L lens which is their (very) high end range lens. Yet notice how even with such a spendy lens we still have distortion? A lower range lens will have even more distortion.

Those are the same images overlaid onto each other, one unadjusted and the overlaid one adjusted and made more transparent so you can see the difference. It's subtle, but there. The discrepancy would actually make more of a difference for more precise things like the placement of facial features on the head or the length of the cannons, for example, where just that little bit can really mean a lot.

(It should be noted here that if you're taking your own photos, you can apply lens correction in many photo editing programs and apps. Look for it in the program you use. However, it's important not to apply this to photos you haven't taken as you don't know what sort of correction has already been applied and you risk over-correcting.)

So the trick here is being able to recognize these distortions and to also fully understand the technical nature of the lenses you use when taking your photos. It’s also important to stay within the frame center, the center of the focusing field, when taking any shot not only to minimize distortion but to set up a standard protocol for consistent images. Here’s the thing, the smaller the focal length (the wider the angle), the more distortion will happen at the edge of the frame, generally speaking. This is called volumetric anamorphosis and it essentially means that the further away from the frame center we are, the more stretched in perspective and the more bent in lens distortion the subject will become. 

To dampen all this, know the capabilities of your lens, take the photo well back from the subject, and keep the subject perfectly centered in the frame, vertically and horizontally. (This also happens to be good advice when taking shots of sculptures for your portfolio.)

Perspective

There are four primary ways perspective distortion happens. First is the distance between the subject and the camera. Cameras don’t have doubled-up vision or, in other words, they don't have depth perception so they see the world in a very flat way. They don’t compensate for perspective like our brains do. When it comes to angle shots then, the fore parts will be enlarged as compared to the rear parts, often markedly so. Indeed, the closer the camera is to the subject at an angle, the more pronounced this effect. We’ve all seen the typical nose shot that makes the schnoz appear extra large, for instance. And phone cameras are especially prone to this effect so be careful using their images for references. Second is the angle between the subject and the camera, or the horizontal or vertical rotation of the lens around the subject. Here again we see enlargement or distortion of those parts closest to the lens and when we involve an angle, this can create an elongation effect and even alter the angulation of things, something serious to consider when designing conformation or the orientation of patterns. Third is the distance between the lens and the ground which has that same effect. This can make body parts appear longer or shorter than they really are, another important consideration when constructing conformation and patterns. And fourth, the camera’s focal length plays a big part in perspective distortion so know exactly what your lens is capable of capturing at what distances. 

But all this is why having field study measurements and real horse experience can be so important to guide our adjustments back to reality. All in all, ideal perspective shots have been taken at a distance to help mediate that magnifying effect and knowing how to compensate back down to normal proportions through experience is a plus, too.

Lighting

The quality, intensity, and angle of the incoming light is a powerful effect in our photos. It can skew colors well away from their actual tone or it can obscure anatomical features outright, for example. Being able to adjust lighting in a photo editing program then becomes especially important if we want to reveal as much detail, surface features, and true-to-life qualities we need. In fact, we can use the Levels or Exposure adjustments in Photoshop, for instance, to lighten a dark photo to expose more detail or anatomical contours. Likewise, the Color Balance toggle will become critical to use for color compensation for paintwork. One thing to keep in mind though, a dark photo can be more saturated in color even when we lighten it which can skew color away from reality. To mediate this, de-saturating the lightened photo a wee bit can often better reveal its truer intensity. On that note, some promotional photos have jacked up the saturation levels to intensify the color of their horse for more eye appeal, so keep that in mind as well. 

Now when it comes to reference photos, finding images that have directional lighting is ideal because that angle helps anatomical features pop out. (White grey or double-dilute colors are particularly ideal here, too.) It can also reveal surface textures much better, a great boon for sculpture. Not ideal is a photo taken with strong shadows or even an overcast day because the former can obscure features while the latter flattens the lighting and so doesn’t reveal as much information as we’d might need. Even so, overcast days can be really useful for pattern translation as it avoids the harsh shadows that can obscure or confuse the track of a pattern. Worst though is a “blown out” photo in which the lighting is too bright because the exposure setting wasn't correct. This situation destroys a “blown out” area’s information completely since there’s just no way to adjust lost information back into a blown out photo, unfortunately.

Diversity

It’s smart to have multiple images of the same body part at the same angle in the same motion between many different individuals and moments in order to pick out what’s consistent and what’s different. Or with horse color, amassing multiple images of the same color, pattern, or effect. Indeed, it’s in comparing the differences and similarities that we start to pick out those things that are nonnegotiable and which things are options, even curious oddities. This helps our portfolio stay fresh and innovative rather than falling into habit and formula, two things which can be handy at times, but which tend to more often get us plateaued in our development. But if we strive to make each of our paint jobs or sculptures a bit different with all those options, we not only learn a lot of cool stuff along the way, but our process becomes a lot more fun and interesting to boot. Just as much, though, doing all this comparing also trains us to develop a deeper mental library which helps when compensating for lens and perspective distortions. Simply put, having more data in our heads just gives us more to play with and that spells more accurate work, more detailed work, more interesting work, and work that’s a lot more fun to paint or sculpt.

There’s this, too: Not everything we see in a photo or in a moment or an individual would actually translate attractively into a paintjob or sculpture. Sometimes we have to edit our work for the sake of the final impression. Like some areas may have so little detail they’d be boring and so we need to inject some to liven up the clay or pigment. Or perhaps a color patch on a sculpture does nothing to flatter it so we have to tweak it to marry better. We may also be familiar with the weird distorted limbs on race horses during photo finishes. The limbs aren’t actually distorting like that, it’s the limitations of the camera’s mechanics that are causing those goofy contortions. Add it all up then, it’s having a deep mental library born of comparisons from a diverse collection of reference photos that helps us in this department.

The Takeaway

So what’s the big takeaway from all this? Well, that photos aren’t gospel, they’re guides. Even the very best ones are suspect to some degree, and be particularly careful when using close up images. What's more, some professional photographers actually stage their subject and use a lens that accentuates certain desirable features to help along the final result. Hey, when you have to cater to the expectations of the owners, things get murky. Also actively try to compare different images taken at different distances if only to program your brain for identifying distortion better. We also need to supplement our references with a developed mental library born of practical experience. It’s not enough to simply copy something from a reference photo as close as we can. Instead, we need some interpretive powers to translate what a fallible camera with technical quirks is interpreting into a flat format. Maybe in the future, cameras will have AI to make those compensations our brains do so well, but until then, we have to mediate these factors with our knowledge base and awareness. Meanwhile, we don’t have to be duped by our photos into inadvertent misinterpretations. We can steer our proportional measurements back to reality with a bit of know-how and resourcefulness! 

Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.

— John Lennon

Back To Reality: Camera Distortion and Other Conundrums

Measuring Proportion: Ahead Of The Game

Introduction

Back in 2015, I wrote Mapping Out Success: Equine Topography detailing my proportional measurement system I used for sculpture. No small matter either. Having a solid proportional system is really important for realistic sculpture, in fact, it's the very basis of realism itself. Indeed, everything we sculpt can literally be described as a function of proportional relationships. Get the proportional relationships right then and we create a solid sculpture almost by default, but get them wrong and there's no saving that sinking ship. So the more reliable the system, the better, but it should also be quick, easy, and highly adaptable to accommodate all our varied needs and subjects. Honestly, having an arduous or clumsy system won't compel us to apply it as often as we should when we work.

That being the case, over the years I've since refined that 2015 system by adding in some new measurements and altering how I relate them to each other, all of which works a lot better for me now. I don't use this just for sculpture though, but also for studying references with a lot of compare and contrast analysis. By doing this, you can develop a more robust mental library able to draw from more possibilities as you design your composition and make artistic choices as you work.

Landmarks

Knowing the body's bony landmarks can be really helpful for determining our proportional measurements because they entail fixed lengths of bone rather than variable lengths of muscle and tissue. As such, our reference points should really be based on the bony skeleton as much as possible for this reason. So knowing where those bones and the joints are located in the living animal can really make or break any proportional system. And, of course, the more precision we can apply, the better. So familiarizing ourselves with the palpation points and bony anatomy through field study, photo analysis, and diagram investigations can really help our process. (Incidentally, knowing the bony skeleton and the joints also helps us build our armatures with greater ease and accuracy.)

The Body

Using those palpation landmarks then, here's my updated proportional method:

Notice that everything is still based off the head measurement, as measured from the back of the ears at the poll to the tip of the upper lip. It’s from this measurement that all the others derive, which can be broken down into three-quarters, one–half, one–third, and one–fourth increments. From those then we can finagle our way to greater precision because they give us a place to start. I just find this tactic makes things far quicker, easier, and much more adaptable, things that are most welcome in the immediacy of actual arting. So, practically speaking, what I'll do is delineate my head measurement on my reference photo and then pre-measure and indicate the respective three-quarters, one-half, one-third, and one-fourth measurements so I can quickly refer to them with my calipers and the sculpture. 

As for calipers, I like to use my Prospek proportional calipers for on the fly measurements. It's cheap and easy to use, making it a steady partner in the studio. Then I may use a pair of locking calipers, fixed with the head length, for quick reference of the back and larger sections. (The key here is "quickly" because I often work in epoxy clays that have a cure time unlike oil clays or Sculpey which have open work times.) By doing this preliminary work, I now have all my measurements at the ready for quick reference.

Now let's talk about body width, or more specifically, chest width, a common question that comes up when it comes to proportional measurements. This is probably the most tricky measurement to gauge only because it's so variable and situational. That's to say, there's really no fixed standard measurement for the chest largely due to its anatomy. See, there's no bony connection between the torso and the scapulae. It's just muscle, fascia, ligaments, and tendons that lash the scapulae onto the body which means that chest width fluctuates with movement and conditioning. For instance, it can squish together with foreleg adduction or expand with foreleg abduction. Likewise, an overweight or heavily muscled animal will often have a wider chest than a svelte one and especially an emaciated one. Horses that wear weighted hoof stacks or "packages" on their fore hooves also tend to have wider chests simply due to the muscle conditioning from lifting that weight repeatedly. So here field study and lots of good references are going to be crucial to make our situational determinations for our sculpture because for the most part, we're just going to have to eyeball it best we can. But when we do measure, think about using the points of shoulder as the measuring points as their knobby bumps make for useful landmarks (the black dot in the diagram).

This now brings us to shoulder length, another tricky measurement also due to shoulder anatomy. Because there's no fixed, bony connection between the scapulae and the torso, this means the scapulae can slide fore and aft and up and down a bit, too, and everything in between. In practice then, this has the effect of "lengthening" the look of the shoulder as it slides forwards or downwards, or "shortening" the look of the shoulder as it slides backwards or upwards in relation to the fixed point of the top of the withers. And the more athletic, agile, and supple the horse, the more pronounced this movement. Again, lots of field study and analysis of good reference photos is going to be important here so pay attention to what the scapulae are doing in relation to the torso when you gather your measurements.

All in all though, it should be mentioned that these aren't idealized measurements, they're simply the measurements I take to start my process. In fact, this is a tracing of a typical Thoroughbred stallion so, absolutely, these proportions will change according to individual variation, breed, gender, and age. Always remember that proportional measurements aren't gospel but simply guides we tweak as needed to faithfully portray our specific subject. They're starting points only. Now yes, there are certain lengths that are preferred when it comes to conformation. For instance, having a long shoulder and hip, long forearms and gaskins with short cannons and what not, but that's beyond the scope of this article. Just keep in mind that when it comes to proportional measuring, you'll have to factor in conformation at some point, too.

The Head

As for the head, it's probably one of the most difficult things to sculpt when it comes to horses. You gotta admit, its many planes, angles, symmetries, and skeletal and fleshy structures offer a continual challenge to even the most seasoned sculptor. That being so, we can get confused and go off track even with the most painstaking diligence or even worse, become quickly overwhelmed and frustrated. And as humans who are visually oriented and sensitive to facial cues, we naturally zero in on the head immediately. If something is off then, that error can become rather distracting and compromise everything else we’ve gotten right. Luckily though there are some basic associations we can use as guides, as baselines that can guide our sculpting of any equine head with relative ease. And by providing a straightforwards architecture, a framework of sorts that helps to direct our sculpting, we gain more clarity and direction in what we’re doing. Even better, these baselines are universal regardless of the breed, species, gender, age, expression, or individual, and so we can apply them across the board to express any characteristic or eccentricity.

Just remember this: These guidelines should be used as a starting point from which to build those unique features your piece needs. In other words, think of these measurements as guides that you’ll need to tweak as needed. We need a place to start, right?  

This is the Ears–Eye–Nostril Alignment (EENA), a pretty simple alignment easily gauged with a straight edge like a pencil, ruler, or the long side of Prospek calipers. Going from the bottom of the ear bulb, past the bottom of the eye and to the bottom of the nostril, this is the alignment that not only helps us place the ears, eyes, and nostrils but also helps to determine a straight head, convex head, or concave head. For instance, many Thoroughbreds, Warmbloods, Saddlebreds, Mustangs…most horses…have a more or less straight alignment, or a straight head. There’s a bit of variation, of course, but for the most part, many types line up to a straight EENA pretty well. In contrast, sometimes this axis can be bent upwards, or convex, with the nostril dipping below the line as can may see with breeds with a convex profile such as many Iberians, Campolinas, Kladrubers, some drafters and such. In contrast, sometimes this axis can be bent downward, or concave, with the eye encroaching on this line. This kind of head can sometimes be seen with some Arabians, in particular, or other “dishy” heads. But this is why carving in a dish or simply adding a roman nose often doesn’t create such a convincing head type because we aren’t addressing the actual axis of the head. What’s more, notice that the teardrop bone somewhat parallels the EENA in part, too, a handy observation for refining its orientation on our sculpture. Regardless, use the EENA to study lots of different heads to get an idea of all the variety and options involved — there’s a lot!

Generally speaking, the horse’s head can be broken into thirds, from the ear “V” to the front canthi of the eye from that point to mid-cheek and from that point to the end of the upper lip, the Eye-Ear Length (EEL). This measurement tends to be more or less consistent among heads though deviations between individuals, breeds, and species can occur. When they do, however, it tends to be in the length of the face rather than the distance from the eye from the ear, but not all the time so pay attention to this.

As for the depth of jowl, a good baseline start is this: It’s often one–half the length of the head from the forehead to the bottom of the jowl (when the mouth is closed).

Similarly, the depth of the muzzle varies quite a bit between breeds, individuals, and species, but a general baseline to start from is that it’s about one–fourth the length of the head. From that we can decrease or increase its depth as needed. The width of the muzzle can vary a lot as well, being quite broad or quite narrow, and everything in between. This is also where references photos of a straight on front view are so useful. Nonetheless, we can think of muzzle width as almost one–fourth the length of the head, adding or subtracting width as needed for our sculpture.

Ears vary tremendously between individuals, breeds, and species, even genders as mares tend to have longer, even larger ears. Foals also have relatively larger ears since they haven’t quite “grown into” them yet. Similarly, hemonids, asses, and equine hybrids tend to have larger ears while zebras do as well, who may also have ears of a modified shape. In contrast, some stallions have really small ears on occasion. On that note, some breed standards require a certain size of ear such as Shetlands, Hackney Ponies, and Dartmoors who are supposed to have tiny ears. But a general place to start these explorations is this—many ears tend to be about one–fourth the length of the head from the bottom "V" to the tip. From that, we can lengthen or shorten, or even enlarge them as needed.

Now determining the width of the head, the distance between the brows, can be quite tricky as it varies a lot between individuals, breeds, and species. For example, some Iberians, drafters, and Saddlebreds can be rather narrow whereas others like the Arabian, Morgan, and some ponies can be quite wide. Study lots of reference photos from different angles when determining what you need, ideally with a front on shot of the head to really get a more accurate reading. But if we've done a lot of study, we'll probably have a mental library to make our own judgment to compensate. Even so, a good start is a measurement about one–third the length of the head, between the front of the brows, then we can make it more narrow or wider as the sculpture warrants.

As for the width of the jowls, that varies a lot, too, especially between breeds. For example, Quarter Horses can have very wide, hefty jowls, even extending beyond the width of the teardrop bones. Nevertheless, we can start here: The width of the jowl is almost one–half of the head length then make adjustments as you need to.

The width of the cheeks, the area of the head between the jowls and muzzle, is often comparatively narrow, sometimes markedly so. So to get us started, think of this area as being about one–third the length of the head, adding or subtracting width as needed for our sculpture.

Nostrils can be a tricky thing to sculpt owning to their fleshiness and pliability. They can certainly squinch to become narrow and pinched one moment to then become wide and cavernous the next. So here’s where study and reference photos are particularly helpful, especially since all this needs to be synched to the level of exertion or the mood depicted by our sculpture (since horses also communicate through their breathing such as snorting or nickering). But we can think of a resting nostril as a baseline and even though that varies a lot, we can make a general starter observation: The length of a typical nostril, from the upper “V” to the bottom of the posterior rim (at rest), is about half the depth of the muzzle.

For a baseline, the angle of the mouth can run more or less parallel to the EENA. There’s going to be variations, of course, but this gives us a good place to start our investigations. As a general tendency, too, the corners of the mouth protrude out a bit while the front “corners” of the lower lips tend to protrude a bit past the upper lip but tend to be more depressed inwards at the corner of the mouth. This isn’t always the case, but we can use this tendency to identify variations.

The length of jaw bars from the intersection with the jowls to the start of the chin varies a lot, but a starter baseline is this length can sometimes be close to the EEL. Study this a lot between individuals, breeds, and species to find all the fun options for your sculpture.

The width between the ears, or the crown, also varies a lot between individuals, breeds, and species so study this, too. For instance, generally speaking, Arabians and Morgans can be quite wide in the crown whereas Iberians and some drafters can be relatively narrower. As a basic measurement though from which to make your necessary adjustments is that the crown can be roughly one-third the head measurement from the “V” fold of ear to ear.

One feature of the head that’s wildly variable is the size of the eye — not the orb itself, but the eye as seen with the surrounding fleshy features. So do a lot of study here to find your options. For instance, Arabians and many ponies appear to have bigger eyes than say drafters or Warmbloods due in part to the structure of the surrounding fleshy features and the relative size of the heads. A common mistake when sculpting the eye though, as a function of artistic stylization, is to make the eyes way too big, so knowing the bubble of possibility here can be really helpful to avoid this hiccup.

The Method

So in practice, what I'll do is begin with the shoulder length and build the entire sculpture out from that as a starting point. In this, I'll work on the torso first then the legs, then the neck, and ironically the last part is the head. As for the head, I'll start with the profile, length of the head, and jowls first so I can establish the teardrop bone from which I can build out to the EEL and the EENA in order to place by eyes, ears, nostrils, and mouth. But establishing this sort of sequence helps me stay on track in terms of marrying the whole thing together properly as the piece develops and evolves. Like if I run into proportional trouble, I just go back to the beginning, the shoulder, and remeasure everything out from there in sequence. If I'm doing it right, I can find the systemic error pretty quickly while also formulating a ready strategy for fixing it at the same time.

I do have to admit though that I have one quirk that I have to actively compensate for: I tend to make the back way too short in the armature stage and I've had to always lengthen it by cutting the sculpture in half and resetting the halves further apart. Very annoying! So now I just make the back "extra long" in armature stage and that usually solves the problem from the get go.

And absolutely, I check and recheck my measurements as I work to stay on track because it's so easy to skew things out of proportion as we smoosh around clay or change our minds. The more careful we are as we work though, the less errors we'll have to fix later. Absolutely, regularly check your proportions and reference points.

Just always remember that all proportional and alignment systems are merely guides, not gospel. They're starting points by which to build individual, breed, gender, age, or species-specific variations so keep that in mind as you measure. But we all have to start somewhere, right? So why not have a set system to serve as a baseline by which we can better determine all the variations we'll encounter?

Ending Thoughts

See, once you have a base measurement such as the head length, putting together the rest of the sculpture isn’t so hard! The real trick is just doing your homework ahead of time so you know how to tweak these measurements when it comes time to sculpt. Preparation is key! It’s also important to use these guidelines to study lots of individuals, breeds, ages, species, and the genders so you can develop a hefty mental library of the possible options. Honing your Eye will always serve you well. And just as much, regularly checking your work against these measurements as you sculpt will keep your work from going sideways right under your nose. And above all, practice practice practice! Learn to apply these guidelines as standard operating procedure and pretty soon they’ll become second nature and you’ll find yourself not only having an easier time sculpting proportion, but becoming better able to pinpoint what’s so wonderfully different with all the possibilities! What a great way to get ahead, right?!

Proportion is the heart of beauty.

— Ken Follett

Measuring Proportion: Ahead Of The Game