LOL TomPreston did it again!

We won't win until he becomes a good artist, writer, and person.

While we're at it, I also wish for a unicorn that shits gold bricks.

I still think he could turn around, if somehow he had an epiphany...

He's had plenty of 'epiphanies' and if there's one thing I've learned it's that people don't ever really change. I mean they can improve to some extent, they can mute their flaws and they can better themselves, but the core parts of their personality will never fully go away. At best they'll be managed better IF they have the capacity to manage themselves already. If not, they're pretty much doomed to douchebaggery for eternity.

So Dobson is in Hell on Earth?

I decided to take a stab at improving Dobson's pirate characters, because it's fun.

It's just a rough paint over because I'm lazy, but it also shows how he could improve their designs without much goddamn effort.



Underped all the faces. Gave Atea actual black people hair while keeping the "rat tail", Alex's red lipstick always looked so out of place on her to me, gave Gourry punching bag cabin boy some much needed contrast, also got rid of his jeans. It's so fucking anachronistic, Dobson, unless he's from the future and fell down a hole in the ground into the past he shouldn't have jeans on. I can forgive stuff like Alex's skull motif though, but the clothing has to at least be consistent with the world and between characters. Then again Dobson is the guy who gives the characters a Roman bath on their wooden ship...

Anyway, just a few tweaks to Uncle Happosai and he becomes a grumpy drunken sailor past his prime. I can imagine this guy getting smashed, telling stories of past glories, giving bad advise and half-heartedly trying to pass on his business to the only less than competent family member willing to take it on. You know, rather than being a one-note out-dated 80's Japanese gag archetype.

And then there's the thing that will make Dobson ignore this picture and these words: Talus is basically unfixable. He is a completely pointless character. He contributes nothing that one of the other characters couldn't be doing. He's just there because Dobson desperately wants a "zany" character.

Original for reference:

We all are, Cesty.

Dobson's flaws are that he's obstinate and narcissistic and lazy, he doesn't want to admit when he's wrong and he doesn't want to grow from a place that is already comfortable. He has no ambition. He's also severely lacking in creativity which means he can only regurgitate the same ideas he's already seen--both in his art and in his actual arguments. You'll notice that he doesn't form logical positions so much as just copy ones that already exist, and when those are argued against he copies arguments he's heard elsewhere, and if those don't work (because he's attempting to plug in an out-of-context rationale into a position that has already been debunked but which he's too stubborn to back down from), he gets frustrated and blocks them so he can still have an illusion of power.

Every one of these flaws would need to magically vanish for him to ever truly not be Dobson anymore, and at this stage in his life he really doesn't have many more paradigm shifts left before he just gets old and dies. Even if he admitted he was wrong about everything and started being courteous and went back to drawing comics, he'd still have an empty creativity capacity and he'd still be lazy, so he'd still be swiping ideas and making generic cardboard comics left and right. A person can't just BE more creative, they either are or they're not. And he's just not. I tried to tell him once that he might just really be in the wrong field, but he was adamant he wanted to be a comic book artist, which is sad in a way.

But there was a time when he seemed to be going somewhere(the Samus drawing). Then he just spiraled off into nothing...

Dobson's of the mindset that thinks that it's everyone else's fault that he's so miserable. He never truly blames himself for his problems, because he doesn't see the connection between his actions and the way people act towards him. He simply has no self-awareness, as underlined by his tweets:



The only win condition for me is that I honestly hope he gets that sense of self-awareness. I think everything else will fall into place once he acquires it.

The only other real win condition is that he reveals himself to be the most master troll and has been spending the last 5-10 years in deep undercover getting us mad. That's fucking dedication there. But even then:



Too bad he can't be dedicated to being a better artist.

I think if Dobson wants to become creative, this is what he should do.
#1. Turn off the TV.
#2. Turn off Twitter.
#3. Study lineart
#4. Study color palettes.
#5. Study anatomy
#6. Return to completely hand-drawn art.
#7. Study effective characters(Not from cartoons or movies)
#8. Study what makes captivating writing.
#9. Make animations and advertise them.
#10. Decide whether to draw in anime or Western style(not his own mish-mash)

So we're coming up on a year since Brentalfloss fired him and he's basically done jack squat to further his art career and has settled down bitching about shit on his Journal/Twitter when he isn't working in a soulless warehouse/fast food/retail job he picked up. And so his tenth year since he graduated from MCAD has his atrophied art career finally crawling under the porch to die.

Christ, Dobson take a look at yourself. Look at what you've done to yourself. Where do you see yourself a year from now? Five years? Ten years? Did you think as a little kid your life would result in your being so washed up? Being such a failure in art that a decade after college you have to do some grunt job, not for extra money but because your art brings in zero notable income? Maybe four commissions a year, whoop-de-doo? You're so far behind, kids two-thirds of your age are more successful artists than you. You've what, 32, 33 years old and what do you have to show for it?

If Dobson was happy it would be one thing, but it's clear he's nothing but an angry, rambling mess. He just spews stupidity and impotent frustration and he's the biggest goddamn loser short of being incarcerated I've ever seen. And I can't feel sorry for him because he did it all to himself, every step of the way. Spat in the faces of people trying to help him. What a trainwreck.

I also just realized what else he needs;
The late, great, Internet Lumberjack.

In one sense I'll give Dobson the benefit of the doubt and pray that he does at least somehow manage to pull a "Grandma Moses" late in his life. Her art wasn't "good" (completely lacked perspective for starters), but it still had a charm that helped elevate her to relative stardom at the ripe old age of 78, and going on for some twenty years after.

That is to say, what little faith I have in him is at least padded up by my general optimism of people: it looks like it's gonna take him 40 years before he gets his shit together.

I still don't understand one thing.
What or who was the catalyst that started Dobson's downfall?
Was it that he was always bad and just seemed to rise up? Was it the inflation comic deletion? Was it his college graduation? Was it his DeviantArt account?

Maybe his fans inflated his fat ego? That's all I can guess. My honest hope is that if Dobson should ever learn from his mistakes his dumbass fans will follow suit and take a hard long look at themselves as well, but knowing the sheer levels of stupidity his fans are capable of I doubt they or Dobo will ever change.

I honestly get tired of explaining this so much, but here we go.

Dobson's "downfall" (did he ever have an uprising?) was almost immediately after college not counting the fact that he was CattyN the whole time he was IN college (the signs were all there) he might have posted one or two things on his DA that are arguably "good," but he was always shit. He always had a shitty attitude (see his opinion on his room mate's success) he's always preferred to draw lazy art (and I don't mean simplicity, there's a difference between simple art and lazy) and he's admitted several times that he didn't (and still doesn't) listen to what anyone taught him SO HOW THE FUCK ANYONE CAN THINK HE'S A FUCKING AUTHORITY ON ANYTHING IS BEYOND ME HOLY SHIT.

I see what you did there

A dude working in the design industry just recently told me that they say "success makes stupid"

I think the problem is mostly when people become popular when they are still mediocre and/or still rather young. If you are already a good artist having stupid fans won't do you much harm but if you're an immature brat and/or mediocre you'll end up sitting in your comfort zone.

I've rejoined community I used to be years ago and seeing people from 10 years ago and how their art has evolved. Those who were mediocre and already popular are still shitty, those who were popular but were objectively good are now much better(f.ex. algenpfleger, kleinnagini) and those who had potential but were not very popular/well known have improved a lot.

Back then one person bluntly told me that the anatomy in my work is terrible, and while most ppl would whine how you should always be encouraging ppl because being mean might completely drive them away I'm forever grateful to that person.
I already did get nice constructive critique telling me what I did well and what I cold improve etc blablabla but it didn't make me improve much. Overall I still had that feeling that my work was okay and improvement was an optional goal for maybe one day. Getting these critique sandwiches also prevents you from objectively seeing how bad you are.
You may see much better work and know it's much better, but you still lack to see what makes the difference thinking you are closer to it since you don't understand how it works.

I think Dobson needs a good long hard look at his life and get off the computer. The reason why he isn't creative is because he has literally no well of life experience to draw upon. He needs friends that aren't afraid to smack him upside the head when he's being obstinate. He needs friends in general. I can't see him having too many considering the time he spends talking to his 'fans' online.

I think I've said it before plenty of times. He really needs to get out of his house.