Decided to be decisive

I'm sure some of you may be as indecisive as me.  It does not matter what I'm deciding on, I seem to have the natural ability to make the process more difficult than it really is.  I've literally spent an hour on many occasions just deciding on what to eat when I would have enjoyed any of the choices I had.  If I'm this bad with decision making can you imagine what it was like deciding what language to learn first?  Not a pretty sight :)

I initially was leaning towards Java due to having an Android phone and I knew Android would only get bigger so I bought a book on Java.  I read maybe 50 pages before my mind started to wonder about other languages.  After a week of thinking and constant mind changing, I decided to learn c# instead.  My reasoning at the time was that the Xbox Live Market Place was bigger and had a bigger customer base.  These were assumptions which I've not really researched to prove these points but this is what I thought at the time.  I also liked the thought of having the power of the Xbox 360 to work with so I could make some really fancy graphics and animation.  Of course at this point I did not realise the extra amount of work and studying I would need to do in order to create higher quality material.

I found a really good site which taught me enough to create a really simple rock, paper scissors game in dos and I felt really proud of my accomplishment as I did it within 3 days. The feeling of accomplishment soon faded though as I started to think again about the amount of time it would take me to develop an Indie game.

I've scrapped the idea of learning C# and have settled on learning C++.  I decided on C++ as the general feeling I get from research is that it's widely used, especially in the games industry.  It's not the be all end all programming language but there is a ton of tutorials and books on the subject.  I've also read it's quite a difficult language to learn so I would like to challenge myself by starting from scratch.

My next task is to decide how I'm going to approach improving my art skills.  This is quite a tough one to decide as I believe there is a certain amount of natural ability when it comes to art.  I don't believe it's not possible to get to a high standard but in my opinion, some people have more ability than others regardless of how long they've been honing their skills.

I was watching a few video's on Youtube from a designer called Feng Zhu who is simply amazing at his craft and one tip he gave stuck in my mind.  He advised the fundamentals are the most important to learn as, once you learn them, you can draw anything. He goes on to advise most professionals can draw anything as they understand everything in the world is made up of 4 shapes, a box/square, cone, triangle and cylinder.  It was a sort of revelation to me to hear this as I used to concentrate on drawing human figures only.  I could draw humans okay but if I wanted to draw anything else like a car or plane, it felt impossible and the result reinforced that feeling.  Another point he made is, when you're in the industry and you draw something for a client and they ask for something to be added which you can't draw, you will not be in demand for long.  This is not to say there aren't people who specialise in certain area's it just makes sense to me to know the fundamentals which will give you the ability to draw what you see/imagine rather than be restricted to what you simply draw over and over again.  If you want to feel inspired to draw I would highly recommend you visit Feng Zhu's site http://www.artbyfeng.com/

I think my initial approach should be to start with 2D and progress to 3D.  I invested in a Wacom Tablet but I'm going to start by going back to basics with pen/pencil on paper.  After I feel comfortable with my drawing skill, I'll start scanning my drawing and colour them in through software.  After that I think it would be best to move to digital completely.  I may try some 3D whilst doing 2D work but this is a decision I'll make later on when I've gauged how well I'm progressing with 2D.

The most difficult skill I'm going to learn is probably sound effects and music.  other than having a laugh with some voice changing software and the odd mess around with DJ software (this was a long timer ago) I've had no prior experience with creating sound.  Although it's most likely going to be the most difficult to learn I somehow see it as being the most fun.  This we'll have to see.