Somewhere along the way I picked up this idea that you're only talented if you're self taught. I know exactly where this came from, whenever somebody would look at something I drew they always asked "Do you take art classes?" and once I sad "no" then they were impressed. If John Doe admitted to having art lessons then there was this knowing murmur that went thru the group "he takes art classes" and of course that explained it. John wasn't talented, he just had had lessons.

Then when I was in high school, I actually did take an art class. Now I had to admit that yes, I had taken an art class but hurriedly explained that it was only one, and "oh they didn't teach us this kinda stuff..." So I managed to still qualify as "talented" rather than "taught".

But there was a sudden "unexplained" improvement. My art teacher was evil and after the 100th time of making us draw ugly tables and chairs in one point perspective I wanted to scream. And she really didn't "teach us this kind of stuff". But there were a couple of useful bits of information I picked up inbetween drawing tables and chairs and cones and cylinders. Like to draw what you see, where to draw a shadow, proportions, perspective....all kinds of things that I probably could have figured out on my own eventually thru trial and error. But it was so much easier to just be taught them!

And now as I'm getting more frustrated trying to work on realistic skin tones and shading I've come to an important conclusion: I don't care if I'm not "self taught". Somebody, somewhere has already figured out how to do these things and could teach me.

And if anybody asks me whether I"ve had art lessons I'll just give them my best "Yeah, ya wanna make something of it?"