jamescho84 wrote:I respect your integrity. I too, have spent countless hours trying to do something i'm proud of, rather than sitting there wondering why people aren't impressed, or why I can't get better.
You're absolutely right. Anything worth doing, always takes time and sacrifice. Sometimes that means working all throughout the night, every night, because it's simply what you love to do.
As i've said previously - in last week and this week, I am inspired by you. Enough to where I read through your site tutorials, looked at all of your works meticulously to find what it is that makes your work look so professional. My entries this week, are in part, dedication to what you've worked so hard to obtain.
I've thanked you before for being here, showing this derby that your eye for composition, balance, and concept is amazing and cannot be replicated. I only hope that others will try to look at what you've created and strive for the perfection that I know, you put into all your pieces.
(Please excuse the length of this post, it's pretty much just a train of thought...feel free to skip if you hate trains of thoughts...)
This is a good post, Cho. I've thought a lot this weekend about what kind of responsibility I have as far as effort goes with shirt designing on woot. All this talk has made me wonder if I put enough of time and self into these designs. Everytime I see one of your entries, I say to myself "Damn, I need to be doing that!" You have a passion for doing this and it shows through. Everyone has that "thing" that they live to do and they strive to do it better. I don't know you personally, but I can only assume from the quality and time you spend on your work that design is that thing for you (or at least one of those things).
For me that thing is creating characters. I've been doing it since I could lift a pencil, It's what I do professionally, and what I like to do in my spare time. I dedicate myself to improving on it like you do on your shirt designs. I like to think I've improved exponentially in the last two years since getting in the field. When I was in school I'd stay up literally all night for many nights in a row drawing and modeling characters and I loved every minute of it. I can't stay up all night for anything anymore, regardless of how much I love doing it. Whether I go to bed at 9 PM or 3AM, my son gets up at 7AM every morning. 
If I spend my entire free time on my personal work, my wife would have a thing or two to say about it. I'm just speaking for myself here, but things can get in the way of your personal passions, and you have to fit them in where you can. Staying up all night may work for some people, but not for others. In truth, I could probably devote more time to this and at least try to reach that some level of perfection, but other aspects of my life would suffer. Since I do this for strictly for fun, taking away time from my family and interests simply for the sake of fun is not something I'd be willing to do. Would I fault anyone that does put in that kind of time to these designs? He!! no, I respect the heck out of them! They could be playing video games all day or watching television. Instead they're pursuing their passion and doing it well.
I think the great thing about contests like this is the fact that we have such a spectrum of people coming here for all sorts of reasons. You do it because you have a passion for it and are very good at it. Some people may be here because they desperately want that $500 check for whatever reason. I like to come here just because it's a fun diversion. I like the challenge of trying to come up with an interesting take on a theme. If it wasn't fun I wouldn't be here. I have spent upwards of 6 or 7 hours on an entry just to watch it flop. Then I spend an hour on Watch it Grow and it ends up being a big seller. It's such a random thing it's hard to wrap your head around. I've pretty much stopped trying. I'll throw an idea out, if it works great, if it doesn't, hey there's always next week. I don't really feel bad if one design is a quickie and another is one I put a ton of time into. They're all fun to do and that's the point for me.
Anyways, sorry for the long riff and congrats again on the well done designs this week. Also sorry to the thread owner for taking up so much space.
