My 2.5 year Blender sculpting progress
Just sharing my progress from December 2023 (left) to my latest character (right).
When I made that first sculpt, I was completely stuck. Like a lot of beginners, I thought the secret was to watch more tutorials, buy more courses, and memorize complex anatomy and medical names. I was basically prepping for a medical exam just to make a character in Blender.
It was slow, boring, and incredibly overwhelming. It led to so much frustration and delayed my progress because I kept overcomplicating things.
I was stuck in tutorial hell.
I got good results while following along with tutorials/courses, but when I tried things on my own, it sucked.
The breakthrough happened when I changed my mindset: I am an artist, not a doctor.
Instead of trying to learn every hidden bone and fiber, I shifted my focus entirely to primary shapes and forms. I only learned the few muscle groups that we can actually see on the surface. And instead of burning out with massive tutorial marathons, I committed to just 1 hour a day of deliberate practice.
I found focus in my practice. Instead of randomly sculpting references from Pinterest, I deliberately worked on areas I knew I sucked at. I stopped lighting, rendering, and posting my work, as I realized it didn't make me a better sculptor. All my focus was on what I could see in the viewport, and how to make that better.
Learning this way made my progress 10x faster. It brought back the clarity, consistency, and progress that made learning and growing fun.
If anyone here is currently stuck trying to memorize 600 muscle names and feeling demotivated, I highly recommend stepping back and focusing purely on your base shapes first.
Best skin detail on a shitty base = a shitty sculpt.
If you suck at sculpting right now, you're not a bad artist. You're just early in the process. It will suck, so get used to the suck !
Focus on little improvements every day.
If you didn't know anything, but now can block out a face, THAT IS PROGRESS.
The next day if you only learn where to place the eyes, THAT IT PROGRESS !
Don't try to learn everything in the same day, but breakdown every day into little doable steps that move your further.
(P.S. I actually put together a FREE step-by-step course on this exact shape-first approach to help artists skip the medical overwhelm. If anyone is stuck in tutorial hell and wants the link, let me know. Otherwise, happy to answer any workflow questions below!)
Course link :
https://www.skool.com/davinci-gang-1976/