Wanting to be an artist or creative is step one. Following through means investing in learning your craft, but we’ve heard from so many aspiring artists and creatives who feel unsure about where to start and so we’re incredibly grateful to the artists and creatives who’ve agreed to share their stories of how they learned their craft.

Heather Fox

I began my journey as a self-taught makeup artist, honing my skills and showcasing my work on Instagram. It was during this time that I caught the attention of a professional makeup artist, @Novamakeupandhair, who extended an invitation for me to work alongside her. Initially, I hesitated to accept this opportunity, plagued by self-doubt regarding my artistry. Read more>>

Alfred Gabidullin

Filmmaking and acting was always my passion. I graduated from New Your Film Academy (NYFA) as an actor. Being an actor in Los Angeles isn’t as easy as it may seem. Hollywood is a strictly look-based business, no matter what people tell you, it is as simple as that. Therefore, having an ordinary look, I quickly realized that I can’t just rely on the acting skills that I’d acquired during college. I needed to create my own projects and possibly act in them. The only problem that rose up was my lack of technical knowledge. Read more>>

Xinola

I regret not seizing control of the creative process sooner in my career. Back then, it was rare to see women in anything other than singing roles within the music industry. As a result, I struggled to connect with the idea of being a producer or an instrumentalist. However, today, the landscape has changed significantly, Read more>>

Katie Blondin

I began my journey in photography by learning the basics through a high school film photography class, which laid the foundation for my skills. However, my education didn’t stop there. To further enhance my abilities, I turned to various online resources, particularly YouTube videos, to self-teach posing techniques and how to capture the essence of a wedding day. Through countless hours of practice with friends and family, I refined my craft and gained invaluable hands-on experience. Read more>>

Anna DeChellis

Jewelry making began for me in 2020. The coronavirus shutdowns had me out of a job and I had a significant amount of free time that I was never used to. I took advantage of the free time that I had, and set out on a two month road trip across the US. The main goal of that trip was to explore as many national parks as possible and separate from all the craziness that was going on in the world at that time. Read more>>

Karen Shook

I grew up as the second eldest in a family of 11 kids. My dad was a church pastor who played guitar and sang, and my mom sang, near constantly…she had a song to wake us up in the morning, songs for cleaning…lots of songs. I was often depressed and had a lot of displaced energy growing up and my mom encouraged me to choose an instrument to focus on…my dad gave me my first guitar when I was 16. I took lessons very briefly, but I didn’t enjoy the method or process of learning guitar that way-I really just longed to sing and accompany myself with the guitar. Read more>>

Jeanne Hardt

A dream inspired me to write my first novel. A friend of our family, who is a successful, published author, encouraged me to join a local writers group. That was the best advice I could have ever been given. I attended every monthly meeting, went to writers conferences, gobbled up information from every seminar offered, and picked the brains of the published authors in the group. I learned that I had a lot to learn! Read more>>

Gabrielle Dobrzelewski

Since childhood I was interested in creative pursuits such as writing, music, and visual art. However, as I got older I realized visual art was the path that was calling me – everything always seemed to lead back to it at the end of the day. Read more>>

 Murphy Smith

I’ve played music since I was 10, and I was a full time jazz bassist in New Orleans from college until 2020; but to me something was always missing. Even though I loved what I did, jazz wasn’t the music I would listen to in my free time. When Covid hit and brought with it an abundance of free time, I learned what I really wanted to do. Read more>>

Karen Payton

My artwork is not a painting, it’s not a quilt, it’s not watercolor…so I get asked all the time, how did you come about doing this style? It was a long and winding path. I studied textiles in college and fell in love with embroidery. After many years of making small, stitched pieces I started to research ways to make my work larger. Read more>>

Abbey Fitzgerald

I work as a product designer (digital products) in the Fintech space and as a fine artist. How did I learn about design and fine art? In the beginning, I learned by exploring many avenues: – College – Post-college continuing education courses – On-the-job learning – Local meetups – Online learning – Freelance projects – Conferences – A whole lot of trial and error Read more>>

Keno

Honestly, I am still learning. Just like life, everyday is an opportunity to learn something new. I took a photography course taught by Photographer Chris Parker and learn so much that it definitely boosted my confidence. Speeding up my learning process was not something I wanted to do. I want to learn to retain and there is so much to learn that you can not learn it quickly. My background in photo editing has definitely been essential. Read more>>

Young Vo

How did you learn to do what you do? I always drew as a kid. I wanted to be an artist, but my parents didn’t. I was pulled in different directions so far awhile. I didn’t do much, but eventually, I made my way to CalArts (California Institute of the Arts). There, I learned how to be an animator. I was able to draw and tell stories for other people. Read more>>

Noel Austin

I always had an interest in photography the medium since I was in high school. I would look through old fashion magazines my mom had lying around the house and also just compose mental images while I was outside because I didn’t have a camera at the time. In college, I took an Intro to Photography class. While in the class we were given our own camera and everything I was learning I just did in my free time and then some. Read more>>

Lativia Pringle

Besides creating content of course I am also a fan of the niche. I prefer to watch YouTube videos over shows on Netflix or Hulu. I pay attentions to the different styles of editing by my favorite content creators, and gain inspiration from them all. I like to play around with the editing apps I use and I just try to create work that is pleasing to the eye, entertaining, and authentically represents myself. Read more>>

Alex Smith

For the most part, I learned by doing. I grew up in a musical family. Even though my parents didn’t force me or my brothers to take piano or music lessons, we still learned a lot just by being surrounded by music. I was a bit unprepared when got to college, the biggest obstacle being my inability to read music. Read more>>

Jazlyn Miller

I always say that anyone can dance. Dance is fun, and honestly natural. I liked to dance/cheer since I was really little. I had parents who fostered the whole thing, and I love that for me😂. Anyway, I was cheering in high school , I was all American 3 years in a row, and then as a junior I started going to this singing, dancing and acting conservatory called AGC (Amazing Grace Conservatory), lead by THE Wendy Raquel Robinson. Read more>>

Ashley Ludwig

Photography, for me, started with film and it has affected pretty much everything I do and see. Going into digital work, I watched my gear go from an OG 5D with the low light capabilities of the orange LG ENV phone I had in high school to the 50-100 mp medium format digitals I’ve been researching and dabbling in and R5 / R6 I use daily and edit giant files seamlessly on my iPad. Read more>>

Breyonna Bryant

When I think about learning my craft, I think of what makes me feel like I’m keeping everything about myself authentic. I found my love for the media and entertainment industry at a very young age, but I just didn’t know what I, myself, could do with my likeness to it in my own way. Believe it or not, I’m still learning my craft. Read more>>

Priscila Holtz

What interests me most about prinkmaking is the variety of skills needed to make the final product. I’ve been drawing and painting since I was a teenager, but it wasn’t until I taught myself how to carve and print that I decided on this medium as a way to express myself and hopefully make a living of eventually. Read more>>

LETTRISH BETRISH

Becoming a artist was random for me. Seeing the ones close to me work on their projects and learning from their challenges of becoming who they are today made me create my brand of who I am as a artist today. I choose to understand what it means to become a artist. It didn’t matter if it came from the internet, seeing other artist perform. Any information that I deemed as influential and important to me I took notes and ran with it. Read more>>

James Combs

Some of us are born obsessed with music and I am one. I am all about songs – writing them, recording and arranging them, performing them, putting them into films I music supervise, pitching them to other music supervisors. Read more>>

Parker Milgram

When I switched majors to interactive media and game development in college, I really threw myself into learning how to draw. I would take my sketchbook everywhere and draw everything I saw, the people, the buildings, the trees. In class, I would sketch teachers posing and classroom ceilings to study gesture and perspective. Read more>>

Karina (a.k.a. Kay Vixn)

Ever since I can remember I’ve loved to sing and dance. Music has always been an important part of my Colombian culture and it developed as a passion for me at an early age. After taking a few piano classes I learned to compose very instinctively, writing down my feelings and coming up with melodies to play along. I remember writing my 1st song when I was 8. Read more>>

Kaylee Ruiz

Patience and practice is obviously important, but it’s easy to be discouraged in the beginning. I think using good references will make good art. If you surround yourself with quality influences and artists you admire, then you’ll subconsciously have a better eye for design and style. I wish I would have spent more time studying good design and practicing basic skills like proportion, perspective, typography, etc. I think you have to like the less-glamorous parts of the creative process if you want to improve. Read more>>

Geissa Peralta Reyes

Thanks for the opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Geissa Peralta Reyes, and I am an elite pole dance athlete. My skills are solid, my heart is in my sport, and my dedication is to train hard to become an even better athlete. I have a passion for teaching and sharing my love, experience, and knowledge related to pole dancing. Read more>>

Allison Hatfield

As a kid, our home was constantly surrounded by music. It was the one thing I could always count on to help me express all of the emotions I wanted to keep pent up inside. I grew up in Nashville, TN so finding access to good, quality music/musicians was not difficult. Between my dad being a utility player, having incredible choir teachers, and having a wonderful piano teacher, I was able to grow and develop as a musician at a very young age. My biggest obstacle was myself. Read more>>

Julie Sola

I learned printmaking on the job at Hatch Show Print in Nashville, TN. Hatch is a 143 year old letterpress printshop where I designed and printed posters one color at a time on old printing presses. There is no fast way in letterpress, all the type is handset, the images are carved, I learned a trade. I wish I had discovered it sooner! Read more>>

Jacelyn Sellers

Here’s the thing, I don’t do photography full time. I didn’t get a degree in business or photography. I have learned most things the hard way. But I LOVE what I do and I have learned a lot about my craft. I have always had a love for taking photos. I was the kid doing “photoshoots” on ipod touches with my friends and always taking photos of SOMETHING. I quickly understood what I liked to take photos of and how I wanted the photos to look, but I didn’t start really investing in education or learning my craft until a few years ago. Read more>>

Nightmanyagami

I’ve watched a ton of YouTube videos, read a lot of books, and magazines on how to become a great photographer but the best way I’ve learned was to just go out and shoot. Just by going out and taking pictures of the city, friends, and even food improves your experience. The skills I think that are most essential is to be aware of your surroundings, even when I don’t have my camera on me I like to just look around and say “that would be a nice spot for a picture” or “the lighting looks cool in that spot”. Read more>>

 Justin Gamble

I began my journey in photography during high school. I was terrible at other art forms, so I thought I’d give photography a shot for my art credit and ended up finding my passion. From there, I went to Ohio University to study commercial photography and graduated with my bachelors in 2017. During college I worked a summer internship where I learned arguably more than I did in a year of photography classes and I began to realize that real world experience was going to take me a lot farther in photography. Read more>>

Inioluwa Alabi

I learned by watching videos on YouTube and observing the work of artists I admire. I paid attention to their techniques and thought process and practiced a lot.. and did my best to refine what I learned into what I loved. Read more>>

Isa Ottoni

I don´t have any formal training in writing apart from devouring fantasy books since I could read. My academic and career paths were not focused on creative writing, so everything I know about the craft today came from studying any materials I could put my hands on, and learning them by myself. As a teacher, I know a thing or two about learning, so I applied that knowledge, that mindset, to my own learning path. Read more>>

 Tanya Shaffer

I believe writing, or for that matter any other type of creative endeavor, is a job for which you can never be overqualified. That’s because to some extent you have to start fresh with every project. Every time I start an essay, a play, or a poem, I’m making something I’ve never made before. Read more>>

Moon Iciana

I began really learning my craft when I started interning with a fashion stylist. Which consisted of studying different materials of clothing, designers, picking up and dropping off clothes. Researching online resourcing items for photoshoots. To speed up my learning process as an intern, I believe researching what the job actually consist of to better understand what is expected. The one obstacle that stood in the way of me of learning more was wanting to learn everything at once time in regards to being a stylist. I grew to understand, Im constantly going to be learning about how to perfect my craft. Read more>>