Art and Design History
Jessi has been drawing all of her life and web designing for four years. Here I will explain the history and improvement of my art and web design.
Art History
I have been drawing my whole life. It is the one thing that has gotten me through the tough times I have had in my life. Art never left me. However, the first time I became serious about being a good artist, a real artist was when I was 12 years old. I had joined an online drawing board (an oekaki, for those who know the term) where other people would draw things. Beautiful things! They were all so passionate! The worked for hours on their pictures and they were (most of them anyway) friendly and unafraid of receiving criticism, which was something that I had never received before. The first time I drew on the board I got a ton of it. It really shrunk my ego, but it was for the best. It gave me a challenge and a purpose; to get better and to become an artist. And when I say artist I don't just mean someone who draws, writes or plays music. I mean someone who draws, writes or plays music exceptionally well. That is why I do not call my drawings art. They are drawings. I get better-closer- with each and everyone. But I am still not up to the level of ingenious creativity, handwork, and patience needed for that title. I am working harder and harder and getting better with each drawing in hopes of someday reaching that goal.
Some may be surprised to hear that I have never had any formal training. Everything I know, everything I do I all learned through books, criticism, practice and the iron will. I have studied many artist works, from video game artist to the great masters. I enjoy many different styles and I am currently seeking one that fits my hand and my head. I would love to have formal training, and probably will once I go to college/junior college; however, for now I am homeschooled and study the arts independently and on my own accord.
When I go to college I plan to study the digital arts. My ultimate goal is to become a video game character designer, though I have not ruled out other possibilities. I also take much interest in fashion design, though I do not know whether that crowd suits my "nerdy tendencies". I'm also considering the comic and graphic novel industry. I would love to publish my stories/drawings in a graphic novel. So I am still considering many different climbs of the long later of the art industry in a whole.
Web Design History
I began web designing at the age of 10. My first site was a freewebs page builder. The content was pokemon based and horribly written. So after I realized my site was a terror, I shut it down, only to, a few months later, open a new, horribly written page builder pokemon site. This time a friend helped. The site was open for a few months, and still is to this day but has not been updated in almost five years. After another break, I tried once again to build a pokemon site. Though the content was still horribly written, this time it was not a page builder. I did use a premade template I downloaded from a website for the first version. The second and third versions were layouts that another friend made. By this time I had maintained the site for a year on and off. It was hardly updated, and I didn't code much.
A little while later I clicked around around and found the anime graphics scene and a host at kylosa.com. This was when I was getting serious. My pokemon fandom had died down as well. So I opened a new site and hosted it at kylosa. I called this site Petal Dance Candy . This was about the same time my dads friend installed Paint Shop Pro on our computer. So the site was about me trying my hand at graphics. It had avatars, signs and badly coded layouts. But something was different than my past sites. Though badly coded, I did indeed code them myself. I had made everything this time. However, only a few weeks later Kylosa shut down. They're still dead to this day and no one knows what happened to them. So I switched host and re-opened Petal Dance Candy. I was 13 by this time. The site was a little better but I still didn't put much effort into my coding.
This went on for a year, until I moved to a new site under a new host and name. The new site was Illusive Wish Designs and it was hosted at freehostia.com. I finished the move in February of 2007. It had a Kingdom Hearts layout that was black and blue (and featured the character Riku, if you care). The new site was named Illusive Wish Designs. I named it this, because sometimes our wishes seem so illusive, that they may never be achieved, but somehow humanity can find the will to achieve them. The name sounds a little negative but I still use it on my graphics site which is where I do most of my coding and design. You should really go there if you like anime and video games, but don't bother if you dislike those things. Anyway back to the subject. I was freehostia-hosted for about 8 months until the lovely Melisa offered to host my graphics site there in September. And I love her for it!
This site is new and is an attempt to create a portfolio of my drawings and designs. (see above for drawing history.) I try to code this site in the cleanest XHTML and CSS possible. And I would really enjoy it if you linked me and helped to get my name out to the masses!
Music Time!
